The always interesting Chris Dillow castigates Sam Bowman for his glib ‘econ 101’ answer to youth unemployment: abolish the minimum wage and allow youths to offer their labour for any price to employers. Chris has a point. The minimum wage, especially as it is currently constituted and enforced, probably has little impact on employment levels.… [Read More]
Last Thursday Alan Johnson quit front-line politics, and with it his position as shadow chancellor of the exchequer. His replacement by Ed Balls was coupled with a major shadow cabinet reshuffle which saw Douglas Alexander becoming shadow foreign secretary, Liam Byrne becoming shadow work and pensions secretary, Tessa Jowell becoming the shadow Cabinet Office minister… [Read More]
The unglamorous subject of fisheries policy has been given a publicity makeover thanks to TV Chef Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall’s ‘Fish Fight’ campaign. Championing reform in the fishing industry and specifically the waste caused by the EU’s Common Fisheries Policy (CFP) quotas, the family-friendly face of Hugh brings the necessity of CFP reform to a new audience.
The European carbon market has been temporarily closed after fears that it has been the victim of fraud. Having lost £7 million’s worth of carbon credits, there could be a polluter somewhere in Europe happily belching out their fumes knowing that they won’t be paying for it. This isn’t the first crisis to hit the… [Read More]
Over the past few weeks Civitas staff have written many articles questioning the Government’s plans for the NHS, not on invigorating competition – which is needed, particularly with the productivity challenges the NHS faces – but on commissioning: on abolishing all PCTs, the current commissioning bodies in the NHS, by 2013, replacing them with ‘consortia’… [Read More]
After a year of industrial unrest, damning assessments, and accusation of falsifying records, the country’s largest further education college has once again come under fire. The Manchester College (TMC) now faces an investigation by the Skills Funding Agency over its offender learning at HMP&YOI Reading, after a whistleblower alleged that the education provider regularly receives… [Read More]
George Santayana wrote ‘those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it’; Ed Miliband would be wise to heed Santayana’s warning in formulating his administration’s economic policies, however evidence so far is that he hasn’t.
Fat days, unrequited love, stomach-churning credit card statements, hangovers and hang-ups, tumultuous friendships and obsessive-compulsive-early-morning-snooze-function-disorder. Diagnosis: just the start of another day?
On Tuesday, a group of Danish citizens were given the go-ahead to challenge the legality of Denmark’s ratification of the Lisbon Treaty. The UK government would be well advised to pay close attention to the proceedings as it finalises its European Union Bill.
Yesterday, two surveys, one by the British Chambers of Commerce and one by the British Retail Consortium, indicated that 2011 could be a difficult year for some areas of the British economy, due to a decrease in consumer spending. Highlighting this decrease in domestic consumption British retail sales fell in December for the first time… [Read More]