Immigration rules and skills shortages hold back UK tech potential April 21, 2014 THE FIRST few months of 2014 have been a whirlwind for London’s tech sector. Just-East burst onto the stock market with a £1.5bn valuation, DeepMind and Natural Motion were acquired for a combined £720m within three days of each other, Circassia completed a £200m public offering, and we witnessed a resurgent IPO market. Yet while [...]
Letters to the Editor – 22/04 – Bank productivity, Self-employment, Best of Twitter April 21, 2014 Bank productivity [Re: The British productivity disease: How to cure it, Thursday] Dominic Raab is right that falling productivity can be blamed, particularly, on sectors like finance. But can he really claim that this is due to poor competition? Has he missed the new regulations that have pushed up the cost of doing business? Perhaps [...]
City & Gild: How Tesco can make us fall back in love with its brand April 17, 2014 Tesco’s current strategy worries me enormously, especially off the back of a six per cent fall in profits. Chief executive Philip Clarke has confidently explained, “Tesco will be firmly established as a middle-market retailer, which offers low prices and good quality – all under one roof”. My translation of this is essentially, “we’re going to [...]
Letters to the Editor – 17/04 – Pensions tax, Inflation, Best of Twitter April 16, 2014 Pensions tax [Re: How Britain can rebuild welfare with the power of individual contributions, yesterday] Here we go again. Bash higher rate tax relief for private pensions. What are we going to do about public sector pensions? Of course, it’s easier to have a go at the private sector, which is already subject to all kinds [...]
ACCA Comment: Why big data matters for accountants April 16, 2014 New technologies are carving out novel career opportunities THE BIG data revolution is fast becoming the gold rush of the twenty-first century, and everyone is eager to harness the opportunities it has brought with it. Reams of data are being produced every second from phones, credit cards, online interactions, infrastructure and tablets. The data produced [...]
The British productivity disease: How to cure it April 16, 2014 THIS week has brought more bright economic news – with falling inflation and unemployment paving the way for rising real wages. Yet while the UK is now the fastest growing developed economy, the productivity of its workforce languishes a fifth below the G7 average. What can be done to cure this British disease? US economist [...]
We’re resetting the energy market to make it simpler and smarter April 16, 2014 WHEN energy consumers open the next bill, letter or email from their supplier, they should notice some major changes. On every energy bill, they will now receive personalised information about the cheapest tariff their supplier can offer. They will also receive an accurate projection of how much they will pay if they stay on their [...]
Putin doesn’t need to invade Ukraine to get what he wants April 16, 2014 THE SIMMERING crisis in Ukraine has just been brought to a boil again. Pushed to the point of no return, the fledgling government in Kiev has at last responded to Russian provocations, for the first time deploying troops, aircraft, and armoured carriers in the east of the country. Kiev has explicitly labelled this an “anti-terrorist [...]
Letters to the Editor – 16/04 – Mansion tax-lite, Housing crisis, Best of Twitter April 15, 2014 Mansion tax-lite [Re: Why the Lib Dems’ new mansion tax-lite is just as ugly, yesterday] Alex Wild makes some excellent points on the unfair mansion tax. It would be nice to hear some intellectual justification from the likes of Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband. We won’t, of course, because there isn’t one. The politics of [...]
How Britain can rebuild welfare with the power of individual contributions April 15, 2014 THE TWO great legacies of post-war socialism were the NHS and the Beveridge system of welfare. Designed for a different world, with a younger population and lower life expectancies, both are seen as politically untouchable, impossible or at least very difficult to reform. Periodic attempts to introduce internal market mechanisms to drive efficiency in the [...]