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Comment by inasio | Hacker News Reader

The quote by one of the German residents that got the letter is pretty great:

One 41-year-old German man, who received two copies of the letter at his London home on Friday morning, one addressed to him and another for his wife, told The Independent.

“We were quite surprised,” he said. “I’m sure pay and conditions for HGV drivers have improved, but ultimately I have decided to carry on in my role at an investment bank. My wife has never driven anything larger than a Volvo, so she is also intending to decline the exciting opportunity.

“It is nice to know there are specialist jobs available here for us though after Brexit. We would never have been headhunted to drive a lorry if we’d gone back to Germany.”

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I'm so glad he declined. What would we do without those investment bankers?

And isn't it so good that he can be an investment banker by his choice and not be forceful reallocated by the state.

And yet he is staying in UK as he can't make such money back in Germany and complaints about UK and Brexit. Some people are just insufferable.

How do you know that?

Is it possible he just likes living in the UK?

lol no

You're complaining about someone making a mild Brexit joke to a reporter. Some people really are insufferable.

> and complaints about UK and Brexit.

I don't see a 'complaint about Brexit' in his response.

In fact, being a German citizen I'm sure he didn't even get a vote on the subject.

Finance people are so insufferable. Yeah mate we’re all glad you’re an investment banker so you don’t need to occupy yourself with such plebeian jobs. Great for you mate! I will make sure to vote for anyone who promise to tax the rich next election

If these jobs are sooo important, the market should pay for them. Or is Britain going to be a centrally-planned economy, that dictates people which jobs to have?

I mean if we're now going to have shortages of fuel because we're not living in a centrally planned economy that certainly be a funny twist on history

sort of like a inverse soviet union. "If filled supermarkets were so important, the committee would have made it happen".

Texans freezing to death, German's can't make any cars because there's no chips, Brits have no fuel, but we have a gazillion consultants and bankers. The market has spoken

But this was a central planned choice. Brexit pulled the rug out from under the market and was a centralised choice not a market reaction.

Also I'm unaware of whether or not the UK government, one of largest and oldest bureaucracies in the world actually anticipate this and provided the advice necessary.

The Brexit referendum was 5 years ago. The market has had plenty of time to react. If some companies now have skilled labor shortages then that's entirely due to management incompetence. They could have hired more employees years ago and trained them to be lorry drivers.

This is way off the mark.

It was never obvious what sort of deal would be done between Europe & the UK govt. from the point of the referendum until quite on late on there was discussion of varying degrees of access to the common market and freedom of movement.

Everything was up in the air politically and diplomatically until the last minute for 4 years and then there was a pandemic (no lorry driver training or testing for over a year)

It’s not contentious that the problem is largely of the UKs own making but management incompetence at a company level is probably not to blame in most cases.

The referendum was in 2016 but the thing that happened in 2020 was not the culmination of 4 years of sound planning and forewarning. It was Leeroy Jenkins applied to geopolitics.

That is to say, the market is reacting now.

To the market's credit, it hedged a few years hoping the UK wouldn't shit the bed, giving us some relative stability post-referendum. Until the UK started filling its pants and blaming everyone else for the stink.

Brexit was 'happening' for 5 years, I don't feel we need to make up excuses to maintain the slogan 'market can do no wrong'

Especially since creation EU is a 'centralised choice' to begin with

Compensation has almost nothing to do with how critical or important (lorry driver) your job is to the functioning of society, or how noble it is, or even how skilled you are.

All that matters is the balance between supply and demand.

Lorry drivers are paid shit because, despite the pressure and bad conditions, they're relatively easy to train up (sure it takes time, so this isn't helping right now), there are plenty of people willing to put up with shit conditions for a few years at a time (always fresh supply), and most of them are hauling shit around for retail consumption which has low profit argins.

Software developers at investment banks (for example) are paid well because there's huge demand, supply of good developers with the right domain knowledge is short, and they work in a lucrative industry.

So you would graciously quit your own job to drive an HGV for queen and country?

You're on HN so I imagine you're earning as much as, if not more than, this investment banker.

Even if the pay is better, it's brutally reckless to give people 7.5 ton machinery to control without prior training. But hey I guess Brexit means "Who cares about needing several months of truck driving lessons?".

When they mow down a pedestrian crossing full of school children, the government can just say "Those dastardly Germans of the past!" except this time it'll be continued with "Why did they give unqualified people truck driving licenses?".

In the UK, which is where this is happening, this is just about class. An investment banker who won't quit their job and become an HGV driver is construed as a statement on class. Middle/upper class turning their nose on working class.

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