Author Archives: Mohammed Amin

Mohammed Amin

Britain can never rejoin the EU, it might join it.

By Mohammed Amin | Sun 22nd January 2023 - 2:30 pm

I have passionately supported European integration since I first became aware of the European Economic Community around 1962. I am as die-hard a Remainer as you can find. Despite that, I consider calls within our Party asking our leaders to campaign for re-join to be naïve.

To re-join something means basically to restore what existed before. If I fail to pay my subscription to the Chartered Institute of Taxation, I will be expelled. If I pay the missing subscription in a reasonable timescale, I can re-join and do not need to take any membership examinations; examinations that must be taken by new members seeking to join.

To put it very simply, the UK has left the EU. If it wishes to become a member, it needs to apply for membership. The EU has a detailed process for dealing with membership applications, and of course every single EU member state has a veto.

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Posted in Europe / International and Op-eds | Tagged , and | 68 Comments
Mohammed Amin

How we name our enemy’s ideology really matters

By Mohammed Amin | Tue 24th August 2021 - 12:03 pm

All complex thinking requires language; either words and sentences or symbols and equations. In conflicts we particularly need to think clearly. Our chosen words must pass two critical tests:

A. Have we defined the enemy accurately?
B. Will our words unite “our side” or divide it?

In state warfare, the enemy’s name is normally obvious. On 3 September 1939 Britain’s Prime Minister accurately declared that “this country is at war with Germany.”

We called Germany’s ideology Nazism; Nazi being an abbreviation for National Socialist German Workers Party.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged , and | 5 Comments
Mohammed Amin

Discussing inequality requires precise language

By Mohammed Amin | Mon 23rd December 2019 - 12:30 pm

When mathematicians discuss categories such as groups, rings and fields, they are all agreed about exactly what they discussing. Unfortunately, much political debate today degenerates into a dialogue of the deaf, because we fail to define our terms precisely enough.

This is particularly true with the subject of inequality in society. Let me illustrate.

Country A – an unequal dystopia

In country A, the top 1% own over 6% of total wealth, and the top 10% own almost 49% of total wealth.

This contrasts dramatically with the bottom 50% of the population. They own only 1.5% of total wealth.

Indeed, the bottom 30% of the population own absolutely nothing, while the 1.5% of wealth mentioned in the previous sentence is owned by those in the population range 31% – 50%.

Who could possibly justify such an unequal society? Isn’t Country A is rigged against the poor?

Country B – an egalitarian utopia

In country B, there is no inheritance. Everyone has the same life expectancy.

Everyone attends university until the age of 21, without incurring a penny of debt, and then starts work.

Country B is so equal that every person starting work at age 22 earns exactly the same salary. Each year they get an identical pay rise.

Everyone saves exactly the same proportion of their income. They also achieve exactly the same return on their investments.

Everyone works until the age of 70 when, they die, and the state takes 100% of their assets because no inheritance is allowed.

This society is so equal that only the most extreme socialists would envisage creating imposing such equality by government edict.

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Posted in Op-eds | Tagged | 20 Comments
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