It's natural. It's very important to have a well paid job, a nice house, good medical coverage. This is all very important.

Sure there are other things and I'm not completely sure what Brexit was all about. Control of immigration (whatever control means, probably less), control of the borders (it's an island there are natural controls of the borders), rejection of the EU court of justice (never knew this was a sensitive topic anyway), fishing rights (clearly the economy) or more money like 350m pounds a week (economy again). Economy probably has been a big part of it.

What was your previous name in here?

Can't remember at the moment.

The negotiations about Brexit haven't really started yet, and results are even less available, but the British government has initiated a snap General Election in the coming month. It looks good for the Tories. UKIP and Labour are no serious opponents currently. The majority election system will most probably give them a majority again (without a majority of the popular vote) and then five years time to do what they want. Included in the Brexit bill was the right to modify laws and that means that the future course of the country can be influenced tremendously. I'm very curious how that all will play out additionally to Brexit.

Brexit also will create some tensions and it's currently unclear what the final result will be. It's a classic power play but usually you have to make compromises in the end and work together. In my eyes the question is still how hard or soft the Brexit will be? What exactly does it mean to control borders with respect to Ireland? What exactly does control of immigration mean? .. Some debates are still needed about these points. With a referendum ending as narrow 52:48 one would expect some kind of compromise but currently voices sound rather harsh. This could be negotiation tactics but still in the end tactics has to stop at some point.

What I don't understand is why people are okay with voting now when (nearly) nothing about the final Brexit deal is known. This doesn't sound like the prudent option. The mandate is clearly there. There was a General Election only two years ago, a referendum only last year, and the Brexit law this year was agreed in Parliament with like 80% approval. What else do you want? The planned General Election in 2020 would have been a nice moment to judge the deal that will have been achieved until then, now this judgement will be delayed until at least 2022. And Labour actually agreed to that snap election. It seems the oppositions is very weak if it agrees with the government all the time.

well, as always, politics is the plaster of the common people. This is also now compounded by the fact that any decision made by government is question, dragged through legal courts, uhmed and ahed over on social media and in media in general.
Personally I could care less wether bunch of knobheads A or bunch of knobheads B are in power, they will effectively do exactly the same thing. Be it the wicked witch of the blue, jeremy to weak to raise a aspargus shoot, uki-haven't got a clue where to go next, or as I recently amusingly found some people advertising, the libdems.

What will happen however is that business behind the scenes will work out what it wants to do, where the money will go, what trading deals and such like. Then, after letting the politicians gass around for months on end electioneering, business will tell government what has been decided and G will then spin that either way suits them.

The way of the world is money.

What makes you think people are okay with it? This election came out of the blue. If anything, right now there is a high voter apathy.

Maybe you know the answer to this, so I'll ask.

Reading today's Brexit news, it was mentioned that EU commission demands UK to pay up something like 100 billion euros for Brexit. It was just briefly mentioned in the news that the estimate is based on e.g. EU agriculture support money.

1. So what exactly is this 100 billion euros? Some money EU has given UK in the past years or decades, or something that was given to UK in advance recently (and it was meant to be used in the coming years or so)?

I'm just trying to understand what exactly EU wants UK to pay up. What does UK owe to the EU? If it is some EU support money given years ago, I have no idea why EU thinks they should get it back (UK received the money, used it, and that's it. I don't think there was any clause it should be paid back at some point?). Or is it just some estimate what EU will lose for UK not being part of EU in future years (like how UK is not paying EU fee anymore after Brexit)?

Either of those don't make any sense to me, so hopefully it is something else, something that UK owes to EU in reality. Some EU loans given to UK?

2. To whom exactly does EU want UK to pay up 100 billion euros? EU commission? All remaining EU countries? How much is e.g. Finland supposed to directly get from those 100 billion euros?

I don't know. And there is a big chance this number is completely made up. It's used to heat up the public opinion (one way or the other). My advice: ignore it completely until there is a number agreed upon officially, then carefully read the explanation.

What Britain probably owes is the budget contribution (which ultimately will benefit the other countries and Britain and Brussels) for the remaining time of membership in the EU. Also there might be long term commitments like projects which are not yet fully financed. One could have the opinion that if they were agreed upon, then payment should also follow. It's something to do with legal obligations which is always tricky. To be fair, Britain would probably also benefit partly from these projects. Don't ask me which projects that are. Finally, there might be obligations to pay pensions (or other long term obligations) which should be meet to get a clean divorce.

A critical point is here how to treat disputes during the divorce. Tricky.

As a comparison, the whole EU budget is something like a 100 billion per year (around only 1% of the GDP). Most of it flows from the member states to Brussels and then back to the member states, so apart from some redistribution not much effect. See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budget_of_the_European_Union

Also see: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/may/03/what-do-we-know-about-britains-brexit-divorce-bill

So whatever the real number is, in the long run it's pretty much peanuts compared to the ongoing effects of less movement of labour and less economic and political collaboration which might mount up to several hundreds of billions easily (just my opinion).

In a divorce you always haggle about the money most fiercely and every side feels overreached and feels bad about it in the end. In order to avoid that both sides have to be generous. That's the only way. Pay what is generally agreed upon that you owe and a bit more, then walk away with a clean consciencous. Of course this won't happen.

Just remember the 300 million pounds per week for the NHS which was a completely made up number only losely related to anything in reality. Very likely the 100 billion in total has been invented by the same method (just think about a very large number).

I guess, waiting is the best to do here. That's why a General Election now is maybe not the best idea because there are no finalized deals (or even something remotely close to that) which would be worth to vote on.

The coming months will be full of speculations, intentions, leaks, plans, opinions, accusations, soap bubbles,... but nothing of substance. I don't expect this to change until the middle/end of 2018.
Sorry, I meant why the Labour party is okay with it. It could have blocked it in Parliament where you need a two-third majority for it.

That helped somewhat. From the "How is this calculated?" section I got the impression that the figure comes from the idea that Britain has agreed to participate in many EU programs and spendings for even many decades (like pensions for EU civil servants, handouts to weaker Eastern EU economies etc.) and they should still be honored by UK, even if they are no more part of EU.

To me that doesn't sound logical though, such commitments become null and void if the country is no more part of EU. They are commitments for existing EU countries, and that's that.

But yeah, I guess EU commission (and certain EU countries) want to coerce as much money from UK, by not agreeing with any kind of separate trade union with UK etc unless they pay up. So unlike it was suggested somewhere, the demands for UK paying up do sound like some kind of revenge for them leaving the EU.

Sorry, but to me this sounds a bit like weird logic. With the same approach any government could stop paying the debt that its past governments gave out. After all they are not the same anymore. Kind of: Yeah, I agreed to pay X dollars to someone in the future, but now I'm a completely different person and not member of that particular club anymore, so I don't care about my past obligations. That would of course result in disaster, if we all would act in the same way.

The crucial point is probably how you arrive at the estimation that commitments become null and void if one is no more part? Why should that be? Where does it say so? That seems completely arbitrary. What value have contracts, if you just can say goodbye and all commitments magically vanish?

Pacta sunt servanda - agreements must be kept - is one of the fundamental principles of law. So it all comes down to how binding these agreements were? Opinions will probably differ on that. If Britain is obliged to pay something then they must pay it whether or not they are part of the EU unless the obligation or something else explicitely stated otherwise.

What Britain may follow is not acknowledging any claim and refusing to pay anything. After all, nobody can force them, even if the claim would be rightful. But this would also destroy relations for years to come. So this is probably the nuclear option which usually ends bad for everyone.

Just my opinion of course. One should ask a lawyer.
And UK probably wants to minimize (pay zero) of what they owe too. It's natural that everyone always acts in self-interest. What did you expect? The crucial question is, who decides if two parties do not agree? There should be something like a court to decide in case of disputes.

Currently the dispute is who decides in case of disputes. Catch 22? Well probably.

each EU civil servant earns the right to a pension while working for the EU. Each member state (including the UK) guarantees to pay these benefits once that person retires.
The UK benefited from the work of these people during its membership and I think it is fair to expect that the UK will own up to the given promise and pay its share, even if the person retires after the Brexit.
Not sure it is fair though to consolidate all these payments into one big, one-time bill instead of paying the costs when they occur.

similar I think it makes sense that the UK pays all planned contributions until early 2019 (or whenever the negotiations end) since formally they are still a member until then. And these contributions make up a big part of the 60/100bn number that you see floating around, as far as I understand.

Whether they actually should pay all planned contributions in the 2014-2020 budget, i'm not sure. I certainly can understand some resistance against that idea.

It's worth noting that the 100bn number is like the highest possible bill that the UK could face, based on the speculation of some think tank/journalists.
The EU itself hasn't stated any specific numbers yet afaik.
So reporting that "the EU is demanding 100bn from the UK" is just plain wrong.

That is not the good comparison at all. It is not really the government who owes something. It is the nation in itself who democratically elected and elects governments, who overspent (to use it on the nation). It is the nation's duty to control what decisions their democratically chosen government does. The nation does not get rid of its debts by just electing a new government.

Single individuals may be able to escape it by emigrating, so in that sense it could be theoretically possible there is no one left to pay up, if, say, all the Greeks suddenly decided to move out of their country. Maybe the debtors would then seize the area formerly known as Greece, as a payment for the debts...

No, it would be more like that ex-club member was obliged to pay up of the future spending of the club, even though he is no more part of it, and is not enjoying the club benefits either anymore.

Obligations end where the received benefits end too. If UK is not part of EU anymore, then I don't see why they should receive all the same benefits(?) as other EU countries (like compensations to its agriculture etc.), nor why they should be paying up anymore so that the remaining EU countries can get those benefits.

If I revoke my membership in the local gym so that I can't visit there anymore lifting weights, then I sure as heck don't expect to have to pay them for the months I can't use their facilities and services. I don't receive their services anymore, and they don't receive more money from me anymore.
To keep it simple, the payers are those who are still member states when that person retires. Otherwise, where do you draw the line? If some junior becomes an EU civil servant today, is UK still obliged to pay for their pension 40-50 years from now when they retire? Why?

If that is really the case, then that is a completely different thing then. Of course UK's obligations (what they pay annually to EU etc.) stays as long as UK is part of EU. As I said before, as long as UK is receiving benefits that being part of EU grants them, then they should be paying.

My understanding was that this 100 billion figure was meant to be what UK has to pay extra on top of these annual fees, kind of an extra severence pay towards EU.

This is not a general rule. It may be true in some cases and wrong in other cases, where obligations outlast received benefits. I could give millions of examples for this. It all only depends on the legal construction, time or syncronicity itself doesn't play any role. Sometimes you pay first and eat later and sometimes the other way around.

I don't draw any lines. I would strictly act accordingly to the law. If there is a commitment to pay then it must be fullfilled. If not then not. So we "only" have to find out if there was a legal binding commitment. That probably opens up room for negotiation (additional to the question of enforceability).

Wouldn't it be easier if article 50 would have been 100 pages long with detailed explanations of what you have to do and what you have to pay and what not?

It is more like if you agreed to pay for a portion of the cost of building a new wing to the gym, then cancelled your membership long before the construction was finished. Would you really expect that the other members will just happily split your share of the bill among themselves when the whole project might not have been started had you not agreed to be part of it in the first place?

no, the payers are those who are member at the time the person is working.

Since the UK is still part of the EU as of today, it still benefits from the work the EU staff is doing today. In compensation for that work the EU members pay a salary and a pension. That the pensions are coming as a delayed payment once the person retires doesn't change the fact that it is a compensation for the work done now and it should be paid by the members making use of that work now.

as you said as long as the UK is receiving benefits, it should pay. That the payment is delayed by 30-40 years until the person retires doesn't change the equation.

check the diagram in the guardian link that Trilarion posted.
The blue parts of the graph are the "end 2018 commitments", ie the part of the agreed budget spending until 2018.
Since the negotiations won't end until at least March 2019, I don't see a problem with these parts of the bill.
Even the UK government has said that they'll have to pay "something".

The big question mark will be the other parts of the bill, like the 2019-2020 commitments, i think.

You can make the argument "agreements must be kept", as Trilarion put it.
And fact is the EU operates on a 7-year budget plan. And in 2013 the UK agreed to the 2014-2020 budget spending plan ...
Not sure though how sound that is from a legal perspective.