Letters to the Editor – 10/03 – Political failures, Best of Twitter March 10, 2014 Political failures [Re: Cameron is alienating his core voters without attracting new ones, Friday] The day David Cameron ceases to be leader of the Conservatives, many lifelong Tories and ex-Tories will cheer. That day cannot come soon enough. At least all the other parties get to have a leader who actually believes in their own [...]
The limits of celebrity power and the rise of selfie-nomics in one tweet March 7, 2014 IT WAS the tweet heard round the web. The selfie Ellen DeGeneres took during the Oscars became an internet sensation. First, it garnered the most retweets ever: as I write, Twitter reports 3.3m users have recommended it in this way. The previous record holder, President Barack Obama, had managed only 780,000 retweets, for a photograph [...]
City & Gild: How Russia presented my consultancy with a brand dilemma March 7, 2014 Talk about timing: a couple of months ago our brand consultancy was approached to work with Moscow on rebranding Russia to make it more attractive to business. It’s been done before. In the late 1980s, Mikhail Gorbachev dramatically rebranded the Soviet Union, and Russia as its core member, from closed to open, building a nation [...]
Letters to the Editor – 07/03 – Punishing savers, Fractional reserves, Best of Twitter March 6, 2014 Punishing savers [Re: People too scared to save because they don’t trust politicians, yesterday] The older generation, who scrimped and saved in order to buy their homes, have now been punished by having to sell them to pay for their old age care, wiping out any useful inheritance that may have helped their children to [...]
Stop acquisitive politicians forever with a max tax guarantee March 6, 2014 HOW MANY times have we heard a politician say that “those with the broadest shoulders should bear the greatest burden”? Indeed, given the frequency with which this mantra is repeated, you could be forgiven for thinking that the rich are only taxed lightly. The reality is somewhat different. If anything, the UK is dangerously dependent [...]
Scottish nationalist failures have spooked business. EU outers beware March 6, 2014 SHELL, Lloyds and Barclays have joined Standard Life and Sainsbury’s in warning about the consequences for their businesses of Scottish independence. Uncertainty for business about the implications of a vote to leave the UK appears to be harming Scottish prospects already, even though opinion polls suggest the risk that Scotland votes to leave the UK [...]
Letters to the Editor – 06/03 – Investment risks, Russia’s takeover, Best of Twitter March 5, 2014 Investment risks [Re: Memo to the City and UK industry: 2014 is the year for business investment, yesterday] Danny Alexander’s challenge to businesses for a pick-up in investment misses the fact that political factors are behind part of the recent lull. As the CBI recently pointed out, the uncertain political environment is currently one of the [...]
Why the justice system is failing bankers March 5, 2014 YESTERDAY saw the latest example of how alleged misconduct in finance is being rigorously pursued. The Bank of England suspended a staff member and launched a formal investigation into allegations that officials condoned or were aware of forex market manipulation. A few weeks ago, three Barclays bankers were charged in relation to Libor. The FCA [...]
How to boost GDP and demolish debt with one radical policy March 5, 2014 HOW DO you discombobulate a banker? Ask them whether a fully reserved banking system – in other words, ending high street banking as we know it, by forcing banks to back their liabilities 100 per cent with reserves – could significantly improve our long-term prosperity. After the financial crisis, prominent economists like Laurence Kotlikoff argued [...]
Resist temptation: A sugar tax won’t make us healthy March 5, 2014 THE RECENT suggestion by the chief medical officer Sally Davies that “we may need to introduce a sugar tax” is a tribute to the extraordinary media profile of Action on Sugar, the latest pressure group to blame a single ingredient for people being overweight. Previous targets include saturated fat and salt, but it is now [...]