Hardly an hour passes without talk of some new reform in the public sector. For at least thirty years change has been a constant in public services. Indeed the job of a public sector leader – perm sec, chief executive or whatever – seems to… Read More
‘You can’t always get what you want,’ sang Mick Jagger in 1969. ‘But if you try sometimes, well you might just find, you get what you need.’ The Rolling Stones frontman isn’t mentioned in How Much is Enough, which is a shame since his lyrics… Read More
‘The shape of a city changes too fast, alas!, for the heart of mortal man,’ wrote Charles Baudelaire in one of his most famous poems, The Swan. Baudelaire wrote it around 1859, when many of the narrow old streets of Paris were being bulldozed by… Read More
LIRE CE BILLET EN FRANçais Battered by the economic crises of the 1920s and and 30s, European politicians clung to the gold standard because it was the only thing they knew. The gold standard dictated permanent austerity and relentless downward pressure on wages. The result… Read More
The last year has seen a glut of books on economics for general readers, feeding off the fears most people have about their future in the global economy. In fact, the dismal science has never been so popular – or indeed so dismal. Catastrophe sells,… Read More
What actually happened yesterday was a single credit ratings agency, an agency with a lamentable record, especially in respect of the banking crisis, downgraded the France’s debt by one notch from AAA to AA+. That this should lead a plunge in the euro, panic buying… Read More
