Two-thirds of the electorate voted in the referendum, and half of those chose Leave. The Leave campaign was clear that leaving the EU would be expensive - saying the price was worth paying in order to reduce immigration and regain sovereignty. The campaign was deliberately vague about the cost, instead making claims about savings on membership dues (which the leaders then denied making).
So how much would the British people be willing to pay?
One recent survey shows unsurprisingly that Remainers don't want to pay anything, preferring the economic boost of managed immigration. Interestingly though Leavers are evenly split between those who won't pay and those who will pay a sizeable chunk of their income to have closed borders. There are even a fair number who would accept family members losing their jobs.
So are the won't-pay Leavers pro-immigration and pro-free trade, wanting us to become a Singapore-on-Thames? Or are they anti-immigration but were bamboozled by the Leave rhetoric and didn't really understand that control of immigration is expensive, whether we are in or out of the EU. EU countries do have control of their borders, our previous governments simply didn't want to pay the cost.
It isn't simply that borders costs money to control, but the effect of reduced immigration on our wider economy will be worse. Who is going to pick our crops? Who is going to nurse our sick and elderly? If you voted Leave then I hope you are ready to help out - half the jobs created in the last ten years are currently filled by EU workers. We have near full employment. When they leave who is going to do those jobs?
29% of households still think Brexit will be good economically (down from 39% last year). Presumably those households voted Leave. When will all Leave voters face up to the real financial cost of getting what they asked for?
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