Don't read "Gazeta Wyborcza" Polish newspaper -- wPolityce.pl

A million Poles must love it.

But the remaining 37 million do not!

How many of them read papers?

I am not a prophet or clairvoyant. But people who favour wholesome conservative values and national sovereignty rather than fly-by-night utopias like today's passing PC dictatorship and neo-colonial globaliom

look forward to Poland as an unquestioned regional power wielding considerable influence in a reformed EU. Reformed away from today's bloated and all-interfering Brussels bureaucracy into a democratic confederation of sovereign national states.

Since the refugee crisis will probably deal a crippling and destabilising long-term blow to Germany, Poland will all the more stand out as a bastion of stability in the region. Poland will move away from its neo-colonial status as a cheap-manpower source controlled by foreign corporations which have reduced Poles to the level of hired help (mercenaries) in their own country, and begin developing an indigenous enterpreneurioal class.

Unlike the Polish vusiness community of the first post-communist quarter-century, who mainly built their fortunes within or in close, subservient cooperation with foreign corporations and sold off nearly all of Poland's recognisable brands (Wedel, Wyborowa, Żywiec, Okocim, etc.), the new generation of entrepreneurs will begin designing, manufacturing and exporting

original and recognisably Polish products world-wide. The "Made in Poland" label will be seen as a guarantee of high qualtiy and good value.

Putin will not last another 25 years and it is not inconceivable that he will be assassinated and/or trigger a violent backlash leading to the break-up of the Russian Federation into its component parts (all republics lacking an overwhelming Russian majority will become independent).

But anything may happen over the next 25 years, not excluding an ISIS takeover, a world-wide recession greater than anything seen before or even a giant meteor, so all predictions involve a huge potential margin of error. We shall simply have to wait and see.

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Do you have any idea how the rest of the world perceives Poland as a brand?
Even Ursus tractor was more well known globally in 1989 than ANY of the brands you listed (and continues to be).

That has got to change. President Duda's Developent Council should include a brand and PR subcommittee devoted to promoting the notion world-wide that "Made in Poland" means high quality but not overpriced, hence the best value available anywhere. The Platformers certainly didn't do anything to promote that. They were too busy milking the system for their private advantage.

You mean such as flying to Poznan from Warsaw on private business and then defrauding the Polish taxpayer by claiming the cost of the flights as expenses? Who was it who did that and is now hiding behind immunity instead of facing the charges? I'm sure I read something about that case in Gazeta Wyborcza; could the fact that they reported it be one of the reasons you tell us that we shouldn't read that paper?

I think it is a hole in taxpayers' pockets meant to benefit some people with a government salary and pension, with no other purpose and no vision. Till date we've seen nothing from this council except their hefty salaries weighing down on taxpayers. When they do or say ONE useful thing then you can talk about them. Until that happens you need to learn to actually answer what people tell you instead of trying to squiggle your way around with irrelevant stories as usual. FYI, from 2010-2015, the "value" of the Poland brand went up 300%. During the last 10 days it went down ~7%. Not a good start. Also, S&P is about to downgrade Poland's credit rating, due to the imbalanced and illogical fiscal vision of your friends.

Lobbyists for foreign banks and big chain retailers like yourself will naturally shoot holes in any attempt to have them pay their fair share of taxes. As it is, small Polish retailers pay much more and cannot compete with the biggies. It turns out that those taxes will provide billions of złotys to help bankroll the govt's social projects such as 500 zł per child. The president's council is only just emerging, so its laughable to expect it to already be operating in top gear and proudcing results.

You are the only lobbyist here, and you are lobbying on behalf of something called bankruptcy.

In turn, the retailers will raise prices, meaning that it's essentially just a tax on consumers. Think about it Polonius - the government taxes you an extra 2%, so you in turn charge your clients more to cover the tax that you now have to pay. You don't really lose out, because all the big supermarkets will raise prices more or less equally. But the end consumer loses dramatically, as he now has to pay extra for his shopping just to pay for some welfare measures.

End result is that the poorest people in society end up paying much more. I'm not going to be bothered by a 2% increase in my shopping bill, and neither will most people on here. But the childless couple surviving on minimum wage will be hurt by this.


You do realise that a huge amount of the banking market is in Polish hands? Again, a tax on transactions won't hurt me significantly - but it will hurt Babcia who has to pay extra just to service her already-expensive PKO account.


Indeed, it's PiSonomics - get as many friends as possible into non-jobs with healthy salaries and expense accounts.

Are you getting a kickback for your lobbying or are you just anotehr "useful idiot" for the capitalist bloodsuckers? They use the same argument that consuemrs will suffer. But no, the tax will be spread. An economist explained on TVP evening news that it will be spread among retailers, suppliers nad consumers. As a result, the consumer will be roughly pay 1 grosz more on 100 złotys worth of goods so it will hardly be felt by thd average shopper. Natrually, if the greedy capitalists try to circumvent it, pass the tax entirely onto consumers or try some other funny business (and we can't put it past those greedy bastards!), they will be dealt with severely.

And who are the suppliers, pray tell me, Polonius? Are they some faceless organisms, or are they Polish people, who are struggling to make profit from their products?

He used the term "dostawcy", so I presume he meant "wholesalerrs btu maybe also manufacturers. You'd have to ask him to know for sure. BTW, since you seem so knowledgeable, what kind of profit margin prevails in Poland amongst manufacturers, wholeslaers and retailers? Is it comparable to what you have in other countries?

Interesting to see you advocating price controls, isn't that how prices in Poland were decided back in what were for some here the good old days?

The simple fact is that supermarkets will just pass any new tax onto customers, their shareholders won't accept anything else.

Indeed. I would love to know how PiS plan to prevent them from raising prices to compensate for their losses.

More to the point, why is it only the big supermarkets? What about companies like Małpka Express and Żabka that make fantastic profits for the owners of the brand? What about my local pizza restaurant that also charges ridiculously high prices compared to the cost of a pizza in Centrum?

We all know the reality here - prices will go up to cover the tax, the retailers will make the same profits and the poorest in society will be hit hardest. What else can you expect from a party of lawyers and other middle class professions?

I'm not sure whether that's very stupid or very clever. On the one hand, they are the natural supporters of PIS and it isn't a good idea to drive away your natural supporters; on the other hand, who else are they going to vote for?

Exactly, PiS are playing it fantastically here. They know that the poorest in society have no choice - they can't afford to shop at more expensive local shops (and a 2% tax is not going to level the playing field), so they're going to have to pay this tax regardless. But if they don't vote PiS, then they're in danger of a very economically conservative government coming in and getting rid of what little safety net exists, especially if KRUS is reformed.

In short, they've just screwed over their electorate.

Then again, given that their pre-election candidate for Prime Minister has gone missing...

I think they're counting on their electorate not being able to associate increased benefits = higher taxes (or think they won't be affected by the taxes, somehow......)

Yes, their core electorate has always been characterised by being financially illiterate.

Let's say 200zl for the TV bill and around 2zl extra a week for shopping. That means PiS plan to increase taxes for the poorest in society by over 300zł a year already - and we haven't even got a Prime Minister yet!

So many options are available. Foreign chain stores that won't cooperate are free to leave and fleece people elsewhere. And good riddance! Over the past 26 years enough Poels have learnt the ropes amd have accunualted adequate captial so the departure of foreign bloodsuckers could actually faciliate and catalyse the rise of indigenous Polish chain retailers.

A law can be enacted obliging whoesalers to sell at the same price to corner shops as to big chains, and that WOULD level the playing field.

The possibilities are endless despite all the ranting and whinging by the poor, frustrated losers. That's all they can do fortunately is sob, badmouth, take the p*ss, nitpick and whine. And the Brit Bullies and their brown-nosers are now free to extol and defend the big losers! LOL!

I'm not a Brit but I'm curious how catholic fundamentalism is going to create this Utopian society. Moral solution to an economic problem? Sounds like regressive jargon from post-soviet thinking. I think a lot of people here have just lost the plot and are blinded my hatred and xenophobia.

It's a nice dream Polonius, but it's just that - a dream. The large chains have European-wide supply chains, which gives them a huge competitive advantage. The name of the game in Europe is consolidation - not just in retail, but in all areas. More to the point - foreign companies aren't going to leave because of a small tax applied. If anything, it might actually result in wage deflation as they cut wages and squeeze suppliers further.

Populist taxes never work.


It could be, which would then result in wholesalers simply moving their distribution centres to Nachod, Cesky Tesin, Marijampole, Cadca and other border towns. More to the point - you would essentially ensure that many companies go out of business as the supermarkets will simply source from abroad.

For what it's worth, this level of manipulation has been gone for 26 years and counting...

The big boys would just get all their stock from outside Poland. Got any other brilliant ideas?

You can call it manipulation or whatever you like. The fact remains that every decent government's prime duty is to protect its own country's interests not those of foreign interlopers and bloodsuckers, Unfortunately too many govrnments (first and foremost the PO clique) were on the leash (and take) and let alien marketing forces get away with murder. That has to be stopped. Only the government of the United Right is in a positon to do so. You haven't answered whether the Brit Bullies are getting a kickback for their lobbying or just being "useful idiots" in the service of big foreign capital.

You do realise that if it wasn't for foreign capital, Poland would still be in a horrific state financially?


I don't recall PiS ever doing anything about it, and they don't seem to be doing anything about it now. All they've done is slapped a tax on the supermarkets that will be automatically passed to the consumers/suppliers to fund socialist welfare promises.


They might be in a position to do so, but they're not in a position to negotiate. The foreign supermarkets can easily pull out of Poland. Poland can't easily replace them, not least because no Polish supermarket has the logistics and supply chain to provide products of a comparable quality at a comparable price. The end result is that the Polish consumer loses (again).


Not only the big boys. Zabka and the others would do the same, meaning that Paweł in the local shop would end up paying even more for his supplies because the wholesalers would need to raise prices dramatically to compensate for the loss of income from the supermarkets. Paweł probably would have a terrible Christmas, but hey, PiS gave him 500zł for his kid because his income is now less than 800zł/per person!

You mean like the Americans who bought Polish state-owned property at knock-down prices?


I'd say Zabka are amongst the big boys, especially given that all the Zabka shops can only buy from approved sources. In the unlikely event of unfavourable taxes here, guess which EU member state those suppliers will not be located in.


Name three.


Are you trying to tell us that when you're faced with facts which expose your stance as being as delusional as the pre-election promises of PIS that all you can respond with is off-topic ad hom trolling?

It never ceases to amaze me how much of the standard PiS party line (supposedly rabidly anti-communist) could be lifted straight from 1954 or 1978 or 1982 with just a change of word or two here and there.

I keep having the feeling that Kaczyński liked the People's Republic style just fine, he was just teed that he wasn't one of the party bigshots saying comforting things to the proletariat.....


I actually agree with this, I just don't think that that's PiS's primary concern (or alternately and more kindly) their ideas mostly won't accomplish that worthy goal.

And do you agree that huge foreign corporations are not basically benefactors of Poland and remaining mankind but insatiably greedy exploiters sucking the life blood out of every nation they get hold of. They do provide a few peripheral benefits (underpaid jobs, tecnological expertise often already outdated in their home countries), but the price paid for these is extremely high indeed. Creating and promoting resilient, dynamic, indigenously Polish entrepreneurship should be a government priority although it hasn't been in previous governments so far. But that task will be all the more daunting since the all-interfering Brussels bureacracy (on the leash of the big multinationals) will impose all their restrictive rules, regulations and procedures to stop that happening and uphold foreign corporative hegemony.

I've posted it before, but there was some research on this...

thenews.pl/1/9/Artykul/84214,Communistera-newspeak-most-appealing-to-conservative-party-supporters

And yes, all the language about "evil foreigners" and so on could easily be straight out of the PZPR handbook on "how to control the masses".


Well, we all know where he learnt it.


Indeed. Those huge distribution centres in Cesky Tesin, Ostrava and so on would be welcomed by the Czech Republic. I imagine the Czechs would even provide favourable tax concessions to ensure that they get all the business.