I wonder if it is possible for those MP’s who consider many of their constituents to be lazy, scrounging, thieving, irresponsible and generally feckless, to be in a position to understand any of the consequences of their policies. To judge by a recent ‘Guardian’ report this is actually the only possibility that seems remotely comprehensible:… Read more
Category:
Politics
The Old for the Young – or Pensions for the Future?
There is much publicity about the University Pensions strikes. A solution has been suggested by Alexander Douglas Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of St. Andrews, who puts forward a government guarantee for the University Superannuation Service (USS). It sounds like self serving advocacy but he also suggests good reasons that this could be opposed including,… Read more
How are you going to pay for it? – a politician’s guide
I thought it worth flagging up these two, short well-written pieces from Australia on how politicians should be answering the question “how are we going to pay for it?” A Politician’s guide to the question, “How are you going to pay for it?” The only improvement I’d suggest is that ‘the politician’ fails to point… Read more
Diversity is Key
I’ve for some time been trying to advocate much greater diversity in the UK economy and I’ve often linked to this research, which suggests that economically diverse countries are more prosperous. To quote directly: inequality lives within a range of values that are determined by your underlying industrial structure. Which, being translated, means that if… Read more
Can you have too much education?
When Charles Adams posted “unless we stop thinking of education as a commodity, we will fall behind.” it set me thinking whether we should be offering a tertiary education as of right. Historically and indeed up until quite recently we have been gradually raising the school leaving age and now it is in effect 18… Read more
An education is not a commodity
These are dark days for the UK higher education sector. First the good news. The UK university sector is still world leading – 16 universities in the top 100, second only to the US with 25, third is Australia. Although speaking English seems to help, these league tables do seem to suggest that UK universities… Read more
Your part in £88 trillion and counting
I’ve come late to this but the ONS calculated in August last year that UK net worth was £88 trillion (if you’re wondering, as I was, £1 trillion is a one with 12 zeros after it). Now from a peremptory glance it seems they subtract the ‘National Debt’ from this figure so goodness knows where… Read more
The payments balance…
There has been much discussion both here on Progressive Pulse as well as at Tax Reseach UK on where money comes from and what has come to be known as Modern Monetary Theory – usually referred to as MMT. I am far from alone in thinking that this basic outlook is not a theory but… Read more
Meritocratic failure
There is an interesting review of Talent vs Luck: the role of randomness in success and failure from the University of Catania (the main University in Sicily). They start from the idea that there is a Gaussian distribution of talent (as I understand it, this Gaussian distribution is just a normal distribution, so if, say,… Read more
What is the problem to which Brexit is the solution?
I received this from the European Movement today and I confess that I’m impressed with its sentiments – even though it is from a former Tory politician! There is a gaping hole at the heart of the Prime Minister’s speech today. She was at pains to explain the “hard fact” that it is in Britain’s… Read more