Child poverty is thankfully not rising – but the archaic definition needs to go June 30, 2015 David Cameron is feeling the heat. This is not just a consequence of the sudden dramatic rise in London temperatures. The need to extract something meaningful from our EU partners and the increased threat of terrorist attacks are sleep-depriving problems. But the Prime Minister did have one good result during the past week. Despite widespread [...]
No Waitrose, no cry: Why the music you listen to defines your social class – and Bob Marley fans are decidedly middle class June 4, 2015 The music you most enjoy listening to is a strong indicator of your social class, according to new research from the University of British Columbia – and it turns out those who like reggae are surprisingly middle class. By asking 1,600 adults from varying backgrounds about their feelings towards 21 different genres of music, [...]
Christmas charity: Empowering people in poverty thanks to Opportunity UK November 30, 2014 This Christmas Morning Wire is presenting five of our favourite charities to provide our readers with some inspiration for festive charitable giving 2014. We're starting off our Christmas charity drive this year with an old friend. Morning Wire has worked with Opportunity International UK for a number of years, with our readers helping over 635,000 [...]
Private schools have become “finishing schools for the children of oligarchs”, as fees rise at twice the speed of inflation November 23, 2014 The cost of private education has become so high that it is no longer an option for the majority of people in the UK, with teachers, doctors and lawyers among those no longer able to afford the fees, according to the headmaster at a top London school. Andrew Halls of King's College School, Wimbledon, [...]
Joseph Rowntree Foundation predicts lack of housing will leave more renters in poverty November 16, 2014 Soaring rent rises will leave nearly 6m private renters in poverty by 2040, according to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF). The independent charity predicts that, without intervention, rents will rise twice as fast as incomes, increasing from an average private rent of £132 a week now to £250 a week in 2040 in real terms. [...]
Brits told: Save six times more for your pension or face poverty January 21, 2014 BRITISH workers must be forced by government to save six times more of their salary or face dying in poverty, a damning new report warns today. Average savers have just £36,800 to pay for old age – well below the £240,000 barrier required to get a decent pension in retirement, the study by Policy Exchange [...]
We must help poor kids – not subsidise middle class parents September 17, 2013 Sometimes I despair at this government’s inconsistencies, internal contradictions and intellectual incoherence. It keeps telling us that it wants to save money to reduce the deficit, and then splashes out £600m on a new entitlement in the form of free school meals for all under-8s. Poor children are already eligible for free school meals, which [...]
Anti-globalisation campaigners got it wrong: Trade is defeating poverty September 17, 2013 GLOBALISATION is likely to have cut the number of people in the world in poverty by three quarters by 2015. This remarkable trend was the reason I first became interested in economics. I was brought up in Malaysia, and could see that economic development was gradually wiping out poverty. It seemed almost miraculous, and I [...]
Tories can match Clegg’s income tax coup without punishing middle classes September 17, 2013 FORGET business secretary Vince Cable’s guttersnipe speech at this week’s Liberal Democrat conference – throwing childish insults at his coalition partners, to look clever in front of party activists. They may get written up by the media, but Cable’s political stock has plunged. Under fire from his own side for disloyalty – and the lousy [...]
Deloitte helps pants to poverty pop-up shop December 18, 2012 One of Deloitte’s self-styled Social Innovation Pioneers, the ethical retailer Pants to Poverty, has opened a pop-up shop in Sloane Square for the Christmas period. It promises organically farmed stocking fillers, all the way from “cotton to bottom” by buying directly from 12,000 farmers in Southern India, who are provided with funding and education.