Predictions Thread

[Montmorency]

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@Beskar
@Hooahguy

We make all sorts of predictions about world affairs and other things in our discussions here, but I have a hard time keeping track of them for future reflection.

The most recent significant prediction in the Backroom was Pannonian's alarum on UK border control and industrial logistics following Brexit March 2019. I won't remember this in a year! So, for all of us who want a simple way to manage these reexaminations...

Rules

1. Must be a concrete prediction about an event or state of affairs, to be realized at a certain date or within a bounded period
2. If prompted from discussion within a thread, include a link to that thread or relevant post
3. If listing a prediction made by someone other than yourself, provide quotes and proper attribution.
4. Ought to follow a concise and informative format

For example:

Origin: Pannonian
Time Scale: After March 2019; acute
Prediction: Border control and customs infrastructure at UK ports of entry, especially Dover, is inadequate to process supply and logistics chains at current levels under a stricter regime, leading to trade and economic disruptions regardless of Brexit negotiation outcomes

The supply chain and the dictum of time equals money is the killer. KFC had supply chain problems (they had products and demand, but they couldn't get their products to the relevant outlets to meet demand) for 2-3 weeks, and shed a large chunk of their value as a result. Now that's one company in a functioning economy, with other businesses able to take up the slack. Post-Brexit, the supply chain bottleneck does not affect just one company, but all companies that work with multiple components some of which originate from outside the UK. The estimate, given similar experiences elsewhere and the volume of traffic Dover processes, is 30+ mile queues, where Dover is currently equipped for frictionless trade. Consultations are due to start next year, when we're due to formally leave the EU. Consultations for that scale of project normally last years before they settle on what to build. Then there's the small matter of building; the rebuilding of Tottenham Court Road, a single tube station, took the best part of a decade to complete. And remember that this isn't a single business being affected by the bottleneck which can be re-routed, but businesses across the board and their subsidiaries. And this isn't just a possible disaster scenario; the organisation of freight transporters, the people who work the supply chain, have said that we've already passed the point where we can prepare for it. Complete chaos and zero preparedness isn't a possibility, it's an inevitability come March next year.

GB says that things would be better if we had a PM who was prepared to properly Leave, rather than May who was supposedly a Remainer. No we wouldn't. The chaos doesn't come from not being willing to Leave. The chaos comes from cutting ties. We still wouldn't have the infrastructure to cope with cutting ties, no matter how willing the government may be. And we still won't have the economy to cope with this lack of infrastructure post-Brexit. All of this was concrete, or perhaps ironically, non-existent in concrete, before the vote, except that Leave labelled it as Project Fear. Project Fear that even Leave's leaders now accept is Actual Reality. Putting an X on a ballot doesn't change this reality.

Furunculus has mentioned an acceptable economy before. At what point does it become unacceptable?

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

Origin: ACIN
Time Scale: 2020 Democratic primaries; acute
Prediction: Sanders and Harris will be the top two candidates for Democratic nominee

No one would have voted for Elizabeth Warren in the primaries anyway. Predictit has Bernie and Kamala as the front runners.