Well put as always Rods 
What do you do for a living mate ?
You have a better grasp on this then most on here 
Does anybody know if Nigel Farage drives a Omega

Entrepreneur / Computer Programmer and before concentrating on programming I used to design digital hardware and computers.
I've always had an interest in politics, but apart from reading a couple of economic books, I didn't know much about economics.
I realised in the 1980's when the EEC changed to the EU where is was going, basically it would be moulded on the French social model and French law everything is illegal unless made legal, where Anglo Saxon law is based on everything is legal unless made illegal! I've always been instinctively anti-EU since then as the French model will fail, making it European wide would extend its life by making the EU a much bigger inefficient bureaucratic trading block. The only chance of such a model working and being economically competitive was by it being the biggest trading block in the world and getting away with imposing import tariffs to keep out priced EU industries competitive, but with the rise of Asia with a much more competitive social economic model this was / is never going to happen. So Europe and the UK now have to compete or die. 13 years of Labour Government have put the UK in a particularly bad position and this is being perpetuated by the most left-wing and inept Conservative Government since Ted Heath.
I have since 2008 concentrated on understanding what is happening for two reasons: My business interests have been very badly hit by the recession and business mistakes, so I want to understand enough not to repeat them. The current economic crisis maybe the most significant event to affect us in our lifetimes, much like WWII was for our parents and WWI for our Grand parents and the 1930's depression was for both. So it makes sense to understand it to make good decisions. One of my hobbies is 20th century military history, where I have learnt much about human nature, intellect, personalities and strategies which you can apply effectively in other areas. That is why good army officers are normally good in business.
For example compare Churchill and Hitler, UK v German political and military systems (The Germans had by far the best army in terms of equipment and tactics which is why they held out for so long), Montgomery v Rommel. The turning point and outcome of WWII was settled in the second half of 1941. Two massive mistakes, German invasion of Russia, so they had war on two fronts, and Pearl Harbour with the US entry into the war.
Since 2008 I've learnt much about economics. The interesting thing is that the information is ALL on the Internet, like most things these days, The key is deciding what is important and what isn't to form a learning strategy as there is so much information and then using Google effectively to sort the wheat from the chaff efficiently. There are still areas where I want to learn more when I have time where I'm very busy on a new business opportunity.
The most important thing we learn from higher education is not knowledge as over the years you don't use 95% of it and so forget it, but learning how to go about solving problems.