Saturday 13 April 2019

"Who plays Diana in The Crown?" is not the interesting question

From The Radio Times:

Rising star Emma Corrin is set to play lady Diana Spencer – the future Princess of Wales – in Netflix’s The Crown.

The actor will not appear on screen until season four of the royal drama – season three is expected to be released later in 2019 – but her casting is a major step forward for the young British star.


The series has managed to cover Royal history from the 1950s to the 1990s in about four years, at this rate, they will be as far as Harry/Meghan in two or three years' time.

So the interesting question is, which actress will play Meghan Markle, who is herself an actress with a real life job of playing a Royal? If they manage to persuade Meghan to play herself, then the real and a parallel universe will overlap. If not, we'll have an actress playing an actress playing a Royal, which is also pretty self-referential.

Either way, I expect that Meghan will have strong opinions on who gets to play her part. This'll be fun.

7 comments:

Me said...

Hi Mark, how much are the revenues from a Land Value Tax? In the UK, could a 100% Land value tax (95% federal, 5% local) replace existing property taxes 20p rate to 0p, cut VAT to 5% and abolish corporation taxes, how much left for a basic income?

Mark Wadsworth said...

Unk, don't confuse tax side and spending side.

UK LVT could replace existing property taxes and nearly all payroll taxes (NIC) and sales tax (VAT). Leave income tax for now.

The UK welfare, pension and tax system already have a sort-of embedded UBI, do that's a tidying up exercise.

Mark Wadsworth said...

And leave corporation tax for now. It's no longer a major tax, raises one-third as much as NIC or VAT.

Me said...

What is your view on George Soros as USA Foreign Secretary supports ending war on terror and war on drugs anti-Saudi and anti-Isreali views.

We need George Soros in government.
Get George Soros as Secretary of State (USA Foreign Secretary) he supports ending war on terror and he has anti-Saudi and anti-Isreali views. He also supports ending the war on drugs. We must oppose the Russian government tirelessly. I propose the following (USA/EU) foreign policy:

* George Soros Secretary of State.

* Implementation of Job Guarantee - guarantee every American a Job with hours they want and near where they live to end all poverty in the USA. Examples of JG: open source programming, social care, environmental work e.g. stabilizing sand dunes, teacher assistants, tour guides, community handyman, mothering as a caring job and contracts on a shelf (e.g. side of a motorway, trim down a row of trees.) Implement in Europe via EU Common Treasury and EU Job Guarantee. Australian economist Bill Mitchell who supports JG contact: Bill.Mitchell@newcastle.edu.au JG: http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=23719

* Expand EU/Schengen Area to UK and Ireland, Moldova, Ukraine, possibly Belarus (after revolution see next point), Western Balkans (Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Albania, North Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina), Turkey, Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan.

* Oppose Russian government - Assassinate Assad, no-fly zones in Syria implemented, Double State Department funds and target Belarus for revolution. Encourage Belarus to join EU to end all poverty there.

* Drive a wedge between China and Russia - USA/China cut military spending and open up South China Sea in exchange for human rights improvements and Chinese sanctions on Russia.

* Soros 'Marshall Plan for Africa' rent out infrastructure in Africa EU/USA/China after US/China cut military spend.

* Better relations with Mexico - amnesty for illegal immigrants and Soros end war on drugs end gang problems.

Land value tax and bank regulation (domestic USA):

* Ban all bank lending except capital development, 0% overdrafts for capital development lending. USA Courts decide whether it is capital development lending with lending becoming gift of shareholder's funds otherwise. A small basic income will be paid after monetarise the entire national debt as a stimulus to counter recessionary effect of bank regulation.

* Land value tax on unimproved site value of land. 100% land value tax along with ban on property taxes at state and local level replace lower income taxes (24% tax bracket to 0%, same with 22%, 12%, 10%), replace payroll taxes and abolish corporation taxes with anything collected above that used to fund a basic income. 0% overdrafts for capital development lending agency business deliver state funds + abolish corporation taxes = 'pro-business' and would encourage business-people to vote Democrat instead of Republican. A land value tax is a progressive tax, in that the tax burden falls on titleholders in proportion to the value of locations, the ownership of which is highly correlated with overall wealth and income.

Mark Wadsworth said...

Unk, I'm in the UK and I don't do 'foreign policy'. Armed neutrality, like Switzerland is the best sort of thing for every country to be doing. End 'war on drugs', obviously. I explained why banking is fine except for bank lending on land, but LVT will sort that out. UBI and reducing taxes on payrolls is a much better way of giving people the opportunity to work than JG.

Me said...

I've changed my mind to right libertarian. Taxation is theft. I think I might support minarchist government and 100% land value tax, with police and courts, and none of this traffic analysis and war on drugs and abolish intelligence services, and none of this traffic analysis, with the remainder to fund a basic income.

Me said...

'I explained why banking is fine except for bank lending on land, but LVT will sort that out.'

The only problem is banks have special privileges. I would ban all bank lending except capital development, 0% overdrafts for capital development lending. Similar to restricting size of government, you could print money to cut taxes with no 'high powered money' agency businesses deliver state funds.