Commodity prices falling, crude oil is tumbling, market confidence is crashing - the monetary policy committee's next move will probably be to cut interest rates The credibility of the monetary policy committee of the Bank of England in general, and that of its governor, Mark Carney, in particular, is now seriously in question. The concern is that they may have already missed a significant downt..
It's easy for progressives to be cynical in the face of global inequality. But cynicism won't protect the poor in the coming slump In a recent article, the novelist and academic China Mieville warns progressives against adopting the cynical savviness so characteristic of mainstream punditry. "Becoming a radical critic of capitalism," Mieville writes, "involves a process of disenchantment, the dy..
For many, a dry January is now an annual ritual, and new guidelines will soon be released on our intake. Here, six writers discuss their relationship with alcohol It's 34 years since I stopped using the stuff Among my favorite lines poetry are Christopher Logue's woeful, "Nevertheless, I shall forget her, and, alas, as if by accident, a day will pass in which I shall not think about her even mor..
A recent case that caught the public's attention shows how writers' choice of words can., however unintentionally, create a misleading impression. Coverage of a court case about a 50-year-old woman whose determination to refuse to treatment after a failed suicide attempt was dubbed by newspapers as an issue about "the right to die", angered some readers. The case of the woman, identified only as..
The parliamentary party now realizes any attempt to stop the leftward drift will require time and patience As I was saying before I was so rudely interrupted... "The opening line of Ken Livingstone's victory speech after the 2000 London mayoral election was equal parts humor and vanity. He was entitled to a moment of bombast, having out-manoeuvred the New Labor machine at the peak of its powers...
What better way to show you're too cool to be 'on' all the time; that you need space to think great thoughts? It was a death as intensely private as the mourning was public. David Boiwe was cremated this week in New York without fuss of fanfare, following an illness he managed to conceal from the world. Not for him the gawping circus, the paparazzi stalking famous mourners. He turned his back on..
Our national park authorities are vandals and fabulists, inflicting mass destruction on wildlife and habitats, then calling it conservation At one end of the country, conservation groups are doing all they can to stop the burning of moors. Challenging the grouse shooting estates, for example, the RSPB argues that "there is an urgent need to restore these landscapes by... bringing an end to burni..
Raising special taxes and taking desperate people's valuables are not the acts of a compassionate polity The Germans want to introduce a pan-European tax to pay for the refugee crisis. The Danish want to pass a law to seize any jewellery worth more than 1,000 pounds as refugees arrive - apart from wedding rings. That's what marks you out as a civilized people, apparently, that you can see the ro..
The twin issues of Trident and the EU will redefine the nation - yet they've been reduced to tribal tiffs In his memoirs, Tony Blair admits that he and Gordon Brown were less certain about the renewal of Trident than might be assumed. "Spend the money on more helicopters, airlift and anti-terror equipment?" he writes. "Not a daft notion." In the end, Blair recalls, he and his chancellor let the ..
Employers shouldn't ban staff from using social media during work hours. Quite the opposite, in fact... It's what any employer would want: flexibility. The flexibility to hire and fire fairly quickly, to use "contingent labor" ie zero-hours contracts, to make it possible for people to work and be on call anytime, anywhere. The flip-side of the remote, off-site workforce is that it aggravates ano..
This empty, violent movie will scoop up awards. What does that say about society and our attitude to violence? Ritualized brutality. Vengeful blood lust. Vicious savagery justified by medieval notions of retribution. We all know how dark the world can be these days. A world where men are garroted and impaled. Where they're speared and disemboweled and have their necks slashed and their genitals ..
The belief that anything can be flawless is a mirage. Embracing imperfection is the best way to truly improve our work and relationships. A little perfectionism can be a good thing. It generates an image of as future we care about and the energy to strive for it. But too much and we can quickly become overwhelmed, lose confidence, frustrate others and underperform. So it's crucial to be able to ..
The exodus from war-torn and poorer countries and pull of the EU have created a demand the world cannot meet How far we have come from the warm generosity of the German summer to the cold hard reality of a Nordic winter. Europe's internal borders have been closing; its external borders are being reinforced. And governments are looking for ways to foot the bill for receiving and integrating all t..
I used to think a rerun of 2008 would undoubtedly benefit the anti-capitalist left. Now I'm not so sure Five months ago this week, I invited some good-natured mockery by warning people that the only way to survive the looming economic crisis was to take a large notepad and go and watch The Revenant. We'd all be living in the wilderness soon enough, so it was time to learn how. Well I didn't go q..
With the end of nuclear sanctions, Iran's forces of repression can now get very rich. De-escalation of conflict is welcome, but it will count for little without American support for democracy and human rights "This is a good day," said Barack Obama, announcing the end of nuclear sanctions against Iran, "because, once again, we're seeing what's possible with strong American diplomacy." The deal, ..