It is believed to bring luck and good health, but prices that have soared by 1,000% in past five years could go into reverseForty million years ago a group of ants sat on a tree trunk watching another ant at work. A drop of sap welled over them; the rest is palaeontology. The ants’ story has come alive in Poland where a pendant featuring the Tertiary Period work scene is one of the main attractions of Amberif, the annual amber trade fair. In the past five years, amid soaring interest from China, the gram price of amber has overtaken that of gold. But now there are fears the Chinese economic downturn is about to impose an ice age chill on the sector.Related: Burritos, cheese and Bowie: curious bonds and unusual investments Continue reading...

Iain Duncan Smith, the work and pensions secretary has resigned from David Cameron’s cabinet. Duncan Smith submitted his resignation to Cameron on Friday night in a letter in which he cited the plans to cut disability benefits - the Personal Independence Payment (PIP) - as the main reason for his move . Duncan Smith says the cuts are for the benefit of higher earners. David Cameron has expressed surprise at the resignation

Another budget, another set of dodgy statistics. The chancellor’s rosy autumn statement seems a long time ago. Speaking of ‘a long time ago’...The Office for National Statistics has just released a revised list of items that determine the consumer price index. In come lemons, cream liqueurs, large bars of choccy and a restaurant main course and out go organic carrots, gloss paint, cooked sliced turkey and pub snacks. Such is life in 2016 Britain. Or maybe not, as the ONS doesn’t have the best of track records for getting things right. Continue reading...

The chancellor’s sums could only be made to add up by some rather blatant accounting tricks, disapprovingly debunked by thinktanks and observersGeorge Osborne had a plan when he arrived at the Treasury in May 2010. He would take on the task of repairing the hole in the UK’s public finances and complete the job within a single parliament. It was an ambitious plan: too ambitious, as it turns out.Austerity was extended into a second five-year parliament, and as a result of the chancellor’s eighth budget, now persists into a third, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. As things stand, the only way the government can meet its target of running a budget surplus in 2020-21 is if it cuts an additional £10bn in Whitehall spending.Related: Budget 2016: IFS savages tax claims as 'rhetorical nonsense'Related: Budget bashing gives George Osborne a shrinking feeling Continue reading...

Institute for Fiscal Studies calls Osborne’s points about lower income jobs disingenuous and slams fuel duty freezeThe Institute for Fiscal Studies has criticised George Osborne for a misleading budget pledge to help Britain’s lowest paid workers, and warned that the chancellor’s new soft drinks tax could backfire by raising sugar consumption.

Data shows one in six staff are overqualified for their role with a further one in six undereducatedAlmost one in three workers are either overqualified or underqualified for their jobs, according to new figures that deal a fresh blow to hopes that the UK can lift its productivity growth out of the doldrums.Data from the Office for National Statistics shows the proportion of workers “matched” to their job has dropped steadily in recent years. Continue reading...

MPC keeps interest rates at historic low of 0.5% despite steep fall in sterling linked to EU referendumThe Bank of England has kept the UK base interest rate at its historic low of 0.5% despite a steep fall in the value of sterling linked to the EU referendum, which policymakers said was likely to exert upward pressure on inflation.The BoE said disappointing business investment and the weaker outlook for global trade would offset the impact of a cheaper pound and keep inflation in check in the short term before a rise to its 2% target within the next two years.Related: QE, inflation and the BoE's unreliable boyfriend: seven years of record low rates Continue reading...

Civil society activists warn panel on economic empowerment not to ignore the unpaid work that women do, which blocks their path to better payBold promises to empower women economically will come to nothing if the structural barriers that prevent women from getting decent jobs are not removed, civil society groups have warned.A high-level panel backed by the World Bank, UN Women, the International Monetary Fund and the International Labour Organisation (ILO) is producing an action plan to improve women’s economic opportunities over the next 15 years.Related: Bertha Cáceres: 'My mother’s is not the first assassination. I don’t want another'Related: UN Women's head: 'Historic shift' needed to find concrete ways to end gender inequalityRelated: Tackling gender inequality could add $12tn to world economy, study finds Continue reading...

Republican frontrunner could damage trade and increase Middle East instability if he wins US presidency, say analysts

Many factors are conspiring to make the US public fearful despite the low oil price but investors should recall that markets tend to climb a ‘wall of worry’The latest season of House of Cards got a lot of things right except (small spoiler alert) the price of gas. Francis Underwood, our sociopathic slimeball in chief, is facing an economic crisis thanks to sky-high gas prices. In the real world gas prices haven’t been this low for close to a decade. In January there was a station in Ohio pumping gas at $1.20 a gallon. And yet, just as in Underwood’s world, fear spurred by economic uncertainty roils the land.Gasoline prices are now more than 20% below where they were a year ago, leaving a lot more cash in the pockets of most Americans. In times gone by, lower gas prices seemed all that was required for a mini-flurry of optimism to take hold, in both the economy and the stock market. But not this year – not by a long shot.Related: Fuel prices around the world - in pictures Continue reading...

Chancellor will have to raise taxes or make further cuts if OBR downgrades its forecasts again, IFS thinktank saysGeorge Osborne has only a 50% chance of fulfilling his plans to deliver a £10bn surplus on the public finances by 2020, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has said.On Wednesday, Osborne was forced to acknowledge in his budget statement that a sharp deterioration in the growth forecasts published by the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) meant the public finances were £56bn weaker than expected over the next five years, more than reversing the £27bn windfall the OBR predicted as recently as November.Related: Budget 2016: magical thinking from charmed world of the chancellor | Jonathan Freedland Continue reading...

Chancellor announces eye-catching measures including sugary drinks levy and tax cuts, but Office for Budget Responsibility warns of fiscal holeGeorge Osborne’s attempt to woo voters ahead of Britain’s EU referendum has come under immediate and intense scrutiny after he used a range of accounting devices to disguise a looming £56bn “black hole” in the government’s finances and deliver a promised surplus by the end of the decade.Despite being faced with a markedly weaker outlook for the economy, the chancellor announced a range of eye-catching measures on Wednesday including a levy on sugary drinks, lower income tax bills, a cut in corporation tax and help for small businesses, in a budget he said would “put the next generation first”.Related: What the 2016 budget means for youRelated: We won't cut spending, McDonnell promises as Labour derides budgetRelated: Budget 2016: magical thinking from charmed world of the chancellor | Jonathan Freedland Continue reading...

Huge cuts in payments to disabled people sit alongside a major tax giveaway to the super-rich. At the heart of this budget is unfairnessGeorge Osborne delivered a budget built on failure. He failed on closing the government deficit. He has failed on reducing the government debt. His politically precious but economically nonsensical target for a budget surplus at the end of this parliament is remaining intact only as a result of creative accounting, shuffling around billions in corporation tax revenues.Related: Budget 2016: magical thinking from charmed world of the chancellor | Jonathan FreedlandRelated: The Guardian view on the budget: a poorer country, a diminished chancellor | Editorial Continue reading...

Shadow chancellor sets out economic plans, while Jeremy Corbyn says George Osborne budget has ‘unfairness at its very core’Labour will fight the next general election campaign without any plans for spending cuts, the shadow chancellor John McDonnell has said.After the party’s leader, Jeremy Corbyn, said George Osborne’s budget was laced with “unfairness at its very core”, the shadow chancellor pledged to eliminate the current budget deficit by stimulating greater economic growth and leading a more effective crackdown on tax avoidance. Continue reading...

US central bank has said that rates will stay at 0.25% to 0.5% for at least another month as most economics predict a hike will be announced in JuneThe Federal Reserve (Fed) put any further increase in US interest rates on hold on Wednesday, announcing rates will remain unchanged for at least another month.The potential hike was postponed after fears of a slowdown in China and collapsing oil prices have rattled investors worldwide.Related: Fed: strong US job market may justify multiple interest rate increases this yearRelated: Janet Yellen hints further rate rises on hold amid plunging marketsRelated: Federal Reserve meeting minutes show uncertainty about global economy Continue reading...

Growth forecasts down and no coherent narrative – the chancellor delivered a difficult budget statement. Surely not even Jeremy Corbyn could make it worse?Sometimes a man’s gotta do what a man’s gotta do. Given the choice George Osborne would rather have stayed in bed watching Jeremy Kyle. Failing that he’d have settled for appearing on Jeremy Kyle. Anything but give a budget statement in which he would have to admit that almost everything he’d said on his previous three budgets had turned out to be either misleading or inaccurate.Related: George Osborne uses budget to convince Tories of his leadership qualities Continue reading...

Office for Budget Responsibility analysis indicates chancellor’s hopes of achieving surplus appear at odds with policy of reducing net migrationGeorge Osborne’s hopes of securing a budget surplus by the time of the next general election rest on continuing high levels of net migration to Britain, the Office for Budget Responsibility has made clear.

Chancellor gives go-ahead to Jamie Oliver initiative, while Office for Budget Responsibility says economy has been dealt permanent blow by 2008-09 crisisGeorge Osborne has placed a tax on sugary drinks at the centre of his budget, as he sought to mask a significant downgrade to Britain’s economic potential with a flurry of initiatives and giveaways to small businesses, motorists and savers.Delivering his final budget before voters decide whether Britain should remain a member of the European Union on 23 June, the chancellor said he would seek to “put the next generation first” and introduced a proposal for a sugar levy that was welcomed by TV chef and food campaigner Jamie Oliver.Related: Budget 2016 live: Treasury clarifies Osborne's maths teaching pledgeRelated: George Osborne's budget is for the very short term onlyRelated: Jeremy Corbyn says budget has 'unfairness at its very core' Continue reading...

George Osborne has unveiled the budget. Here are 26 key pointsThis aims to raise £520m in a two-part levy on companies – one for total sugar content above 5g per 100ml and one for drinks with more than 8g per 100ml – to be introduced in two years’ time. Pure fruit juice and milk are excluded. It will be used to fund sport and longer school days.Rowena Mason, political correspondent This is a big political story after pressure from the medical community to act on obesity. Cameron was said to be sympathetic, then backtracked, but has now taken the plunge. Some Conservatives may not be happy with the nanny statism but the government will be able to rely on opposition support to get it through.RM The increase in the 40p threshold is another tax cut for high earners to delight the Tory backbenches. The personal allowance changes will benefit middle and some lower earners too but not those at the very bottom of the income scale who are already taken out of tax altogether.RM This explains measures to boost saving in last year’s budget which have still not come into force, and introduces new incentives for saving. It is meant to ‘put the next generation first’ but Labour is likely to point out that many people can hardly afford day-to-day costs, let alone setting aside thousands of pounds in savings.RM Osborne has not dared to increase fuel duty for fear of a huge revolt among Tory backbenchers. The original campaigner for fuel duty freezes, Rob Halfon, ended up as the chancellor’s parliamentary private secretary and is now deputy chair of the Conservatives.RM This extra tax was a great cash cow for the Treasury when the oil price was high but has proved punishing for the industry now it has slumped.RM Osborne gives with one hand to business and takes away with the other. The climate change levy is a tax on non-domestic users to encourage them to reduce energy consumption. He is, however, abolishing the carbon reduction commitment - a complicated reporting regime that was only introduced in 2010.Related: Budget 2016 live: George Osborne claims Britain on course for budget surplusRM This is due to the ‘storms’ gathering in the economy that Osborne has been heavily emphasising recently. He is also trying to set the weaker figures in an international context, saying the UK is still growing faster than other countries. However, the negative economic news is being overshadowed by interest in the sugar levy.RM Osborne has risked infuriating pro-Brexit colleagues by using the platform of the budget and independent OBR advice to make the case for the UK staying in the EU. But he has obviously calculated that it is worth the row to hammer home the fact that the UK’s fragile growth figures are predicated on staying in the EU.RM Once again the chancellor is stressing the uncertain economic environment. It certainly helps the cause of the campaign to stay in the EU to keep repeating that the UK is in a risky economic position that should not be jeopardised by Brexit.RM Osborne is pressing ahead with austerity as usual, despite some financial voices saying there is no need to at this point and when the economy is still fragile. Some of this will come from cuts to benefits for the disabled. The chancellor tried to downplay it by saying the overall disability budget would rise by £1bn but this is less than it would have been without £1.2bn of savings due to reforms of the personal independence payment.RM Only last year the chancellor thought he would have a surplus of around £23bn to play with this year. However, this was later revised down to £10bn. He is sticking to this target now as a result of further spending cuts.RM Time and time again, Osborne unveils plans to find extra billions through crackdowns on tax avoidance that never seem to yield as much as predicted. He is now ending several loopholes, including stopping multinationals over-borrowing in the UK and then deducting interest bills from their British profits and restrictions on offsetting losses against tax from 2019.RM This is what the prime minister must have meant when he talked about a pro-business budget. Labour is likely to question whether companies should be getting even lower tax, when welfare is being slashed even further.RM This is likely to delight small businesses as rates are a deeply unpopular tax that disadvantage high street shops compared with online retailers. However, it will be councils that suffer as they are getting revenue from business rates devolved to them.Osborne is hailing the move for London as a triumph for devolution but it will be less lucrative than currently because he is slashing rates for small businesses at the same time.RM This is a handy cut for the Tory effort in Wales where there are assembly elections in May.RM This could be seen as a partial win for the Labour leader, Jeremy Corbyn, who has repeatedly raised the topic. However, there are not many details at present about how it will be used.RM Osborne is ploughing on with funding announcements for his “northern powerhouse”, although these will not be built for quite some time.RM The government came in for heavy criticism for under-funding flood defences during the last winter crisis. This looks like it could allow ministers to say they are increasing it more than in the last parliament.RM Osborne has been emphasising that this is a budget for the next generation. At the same time, ministers are opening themselves up to charges of being overly ideological with their determination to take schools out of council control for little gain.RM ‘Sin taxes’ are an easy way for the chancellor to raise a bit extra. Few can object to raising additional money from smoking.RM Osborne was mocked for being patronising to voters with his ‘beer and bingo’ budget of 2014, but freezing alcohol duty is a popular move that is simple to sell on the doorstep.RM He skated over this quite quickly but this is a massive change to benefit investors when they make money. Labour’s Chris Leslie said: ‘Lots of very wealthy people will be delighted with massive giveaway.’ Continue reading...

Has George Osborne’s sugary bunny sweetened the pill of further cuts, and is this his big pitch for the leadership? Continue reading...

• Proceeds of levy on soft drinks to fund school sports

Social injustice on an unprecedented scale, massive inequities and loss of trust in elites define our political moment – and rightly soSomething interesting has emerged in voting patterns on both sides of the Atlantic: young people are voting in ways that are markedly different from their elders. A great divide appears to have opened up, based not so much on income, education or gender, as on the voters’ generation.There are good reasons for this divide. The lives of both old and young, as they are now lived, are different. Their pasts are different, and so are their prospects. The cold war, for example, was over even before some were born and while others were still children. Words such as socialism do not convey the meaning they once did. If socialism means creating a society where shared concerns are not given short shrift – where people care about other people and the environment in which they live – so be it. Yes, there may have been failed experiments under that rubric a quarter- or half-century ago; but today’s experiments bear no resemblance to those of the past. So the failure of those past experiments says nothing about the new ones. Continue reading...

Unemployment rate has held at 5.1%, while average weekly earnings for employees has risen 2.1% in three months to JanuaryUK unemployment has held at a 10-year low and wage growth has edged up, according to official figures that provide a small, pre-budget boost for George Osborne.Average weekly earnings for employees rose 2.1% in the three months to January compared with a year earlier, the Office for National Statistics (ONS) said. That was faster than the 2% growth rate in the previous three months. It also beat economists’ forecasts for another 2% reading in a Reuters poll.Related: Budget 2016 live: George Osborne to announce fresh austerity and school shakeup Continue reading...

Growth, borrowing, spending cuts, the jobs market and Brexit – what to look out for in George Osborne’s eighth budgetGeorge Osborne’s eighth budget is unlikely to be a radical affair, as the state of the public finances and the upcoming EU referendum limit the chancellor’s room for manoeuvre. This all but rules out big or controversial policy announcements (he has already decided not to press ahead with pension tax relief reform). But with the economy growing more slowly than expected and borrowing remaining high, the chancellor has already signalled further spending cuts of £4bn.We expect the Office for Budget Responsibility to cut its forecasts for growth by one or two 10ths. This, along with a poorer outturn for the current fiscal year, would push the deficit higher in the absence of further tightening measures.Downward revisions to growth seem likely. Chancellor Osborne will blame financial market wobbles and China’s slowdown, but the main problems are closer to home.Earnings growth has never really taken off post-crisis - so the cost of recession on earnings remains over £100/week pic.twitter.com/AVyPjVEL72Borrowing looks set to overshoot this fiscal year as a whole, and future years’ borrowing forecasts will be hit by the recent bout of global uncertainty (count the number of times “cocktail of risks” is mentioned ...) and slowdown in the domestic economy. Offsetting this to some degree will be lower debt interest forecasts due to lower expectations for gilt yields and Bank Rate.”These cuts will be contentious as they will take more demand out of the economy at a time when the economic backdrop is already very challenging. Further cuts would also present logistical problems: November’s comprehensive spending review put in place departmental budgets for the next four fiscal years, so these would need to be reopened.”In many respects, we see this budget as similar to a pre-election budget. Against the backdrop of evenly divided public and Conservative opinion over the EU referendum in June, we think that the chancellor and prime minister would likely prefer a ‘feelgood’ budget, and would probably choose to avoid any controversial decisions.”Economically, the emergency budget of 2010 was the most important one for the Conservative government. Politically, budget 2016 could be the most important one. Few days on the political calendar get more coverage than budget day ...[Osborne] will argue that the UK has a choice between a ‘certain’ new deal that improves the UK’s lot with the worst of austerity over, or, a choice with an uncertain long-term outcome that almost certainly damages the economy near term and sends progress on the public debt into reverse. This is powerful rhetoric to deliver on a key day and it won’t be an opportunity he’ll miss.” Continue reading...

Our guide to what it all means in the chancellor’s budgetDo you know your debt from your deficit? Your benefit cap from your universal credit? And what has Mr Micawber got to do with it all?

George Osborne eyeing cuts of £4bn but will plough on with pet projects including the academisation of all schoolsGeorge Osborne will announce fresh austerity measures on Wednesday as he delivers his eighth budget against the backdrop of a darkening economic outlook.

The easiest route for the chancellor will be to ladle out a few modest tax cuts paid for by stealth taxesBudgets have their own rhythm. Chancellors like to marry economics and politics and that means getting all the bad news out of the way early in a parliament so that there are goodies to be handed out when an election is looming.

George Osborne expected to announce funding in Wednesday’s budget, aimed at targeting ‘unacceptable’ growth in homelessnessGeorge Osborne is preparing to announce extra cash in Wednesday’s budget to tackle what he has called the “unacceptable” growth in homelessness.

All the day’s economic and financial news, including rumours that Beijing is pondering tighter currency controls

Additions and removals to the consumer prices index, according to the ONSRelated: Nightclubs out and coffee pods in as inflation basket updated Continue reading...

Economic exclusion helped trigger the conflict in Syria. Rebuilding will mean integrating disparate groups and enabling them to find jobsEconomy and peace are intimately linked. But the economy can also play a role in conflict, and competition over resources is at the heart of most of the conflicts we see today.Syria is no exception. The erosion of livelihoods by prolonged drought, and a history of excluding certain groups, helped trigger the conflict, which enters its sixth year this week. Related: Voices from Syria: 'This camp is a paradise compared to life back home' Continue reading...

Sanders’ plan means higher taxes if you’re middle-aged – but it will make your children wealthier, more productive, and better able to look after youBernie Sanders, in his election manifesto, has argued for making tuition free at public colleges and universities. This is a proposal that has struck many, including prominent economists, as ludicrous. For sure, there are scant details about how all this would work in practice and I don’t mean to shove those under the rug. And yes, there are legitimate concerns from economists about making education too cheap, thereby promoting its overuse, as well as reducing the skin in the game for students.But I am here to argue that the plan makes economic sense, and the current generation of middle-aged workers, even if it means higher taxes on them, should consider rallying behind it. My argument is a variant of the old adage: “Be nice to your children. They’ll choose your nursing home.”Related: Bernie Sanders: free public college tuition is the 'right thing to do' Continue reading...

Additions to the basket also include computer software and cream liqueurThe decline of Britain’s nightclub scene has forced the government’s independent data gatherers to exclude admission prices to late night dance venues from the official inflation figures.The Office for National Statistics said the closure of scores of nightclubs in recent years and the shift to free or low cost entry for many of those that remain meant the prices were harder to gather and no longer a useful guide to inflation in the hospitality sector.Related: The 2016 inflation basket: what's in, what's out Continue reading...

Manchester to Leeds railway line, Peak District underground tunnel and Crossrail 2 to receive funding from chancellor in budgetGeorge Osborne will use Wednesday’s budget to set in motion plans for a high-speed railway line from Manchester to Leeds and an 18-mile underground road tunnel beneath the Peak District.The chancellor will also promise to “prioritise” a north-south link through central London as he accepts the final recommendations of the National Infrastructure Commission, led by former Labour peer Lord Adonis, which are being published on Tuesday.Related: Budget 2016: George Osborne fuels speculation of nasty shocks Continue reading...

The confederation may hold some of the UK’s biggest exporters, but does its opinion count in an era of corporate scandals and “fat cat pay” rows?There was never the slightest doubt that the CBI would back Britain remaining a part of the European Union. For all the talk while David Cameron was conducting his negotiations that the employers’ organisation was in favour of remaining in a reformed union, it would not really have mattered had the prime minister come back from Brussels with a blank sheet of paper: he was always going to have the CBI onside.Related: CBI member survey reveals huge support for remaining in EU Continue reading...

North-east England is still feeling the effects of the Redcar closure, but some businesses are confounding grim statisticsIt costs £1.35 for a Victoria sponge in Yasmin’s halal bakery on Middlesbrough’s Parliament Road. That’s for a whole cake, not just a slice. “We charge what we can,” said owner Shazad Ahmed, describing his shop as the “Asian Greggs” as he tried to tempt us with a jumbo samosa (58p). Business is not booming: “We’re just covering our costs at the minute.”When the SSI steel plant 10 miles up the road in Redcar shut in October with the direct loss of 2,200 jobs and the same again in the supply chain, the reverberations were felt across Teesside. “It has a knock-on effect for us. With the steel workers not having any jobs, they aren’t going to come and spend money in our businesses. They haven’t got no money no more,” said Ahmed. A customer, Tan Hanif, chipped in: “If that steel complex was in London, the government would have put money into it and kept it open.”Related: Budget 2016: George Osborne fuels speculation of nasty shocksRelated: Life after steel: can Redcar rise from the ashes? Continue reading...

A key component of every budget is the distributional analysis, which shows how the chancellor’s spending decisions will affect households across the income spectrum. However, despite its obvious importance, the government removed this analysis from last year’s emergency summer budget. We believe this is a serious mistake.It is a vital function of government to clearly detail the implications of its policies on the finances of different income groups. Moreover, in order to tackle poverty, inequality, and other social ills, it is important that government publishes its most robust data to provide an accurate account of the scale of these problems. This includes data on whether government policies effectively alleviate or exacerbate them. Continue reading...

All the day’s economic and financial news, as traders brace for news from the Fed, the Bank of England and the BoJ this week

The former Bank of England governor’s condemnation of the world economic and political order offers few solutions but deserves a wide audienceMervyn King looks like one of those old-fashioned bank managers who cast a paternalistic eye on the nervous customer. Or he could be a GP telling you that you really need to exercise more and go easy on the carbs. It is in this vein that he probes the state of the global economy; his diagnosis does not reassure.Not for him is the Piketty-esque grand sweep. He avoids the hubris of the “I told you so” school (virtually none of them actually did tell us so ahead of time). He says he is not interested in the blame game, which is probably just as well considering that he was governor of the Bank of England at the time of the great crash of 2007-08. He baldly states: “No doubt there were bankers who were indeed wicked and central bankers who were incompetent, though the vast majority of both whom I met during the crisis were neither.” Many (myself included) might beg to disagree, but this argument has exhausted itself.Most alarming is the inability of economists and politicians to think their way out of the mire Continue reading...

With such grave financial prospects, it’s no wonder today’s under-25s prefer jogging to drinking. To have a sense of freedom now seems illogicalIt’s bad news for the drinks industry, but it’s mainly bad news for people who think each generation is more feckless than the last: the number of drinkers among 16- to 24-year-olds has dropped sharply. All kinds of drinkers are dying out: the steady drinkers, the binge drinkers, the drinkers-in-training, the social drinkers the bus stop drinkers – the lot.In a study by the Office for National Statistics, less than half of young people reported drinking anything in the previous week, compared with two-thirds of 45- to 64-year-olds – many of whom are in all likelihood under medical advice to please cut it out, or at least do the nation the favour of lying about it in surveys.Today’s students must look at the lad and ladette culture of the 90s and wonder who we thought we were Continue reading...

Jeremy Corbyn has a tough job countering chancellor’s budget but openings do exist – on wages, investment and productivityJeremy Corbyn has one of the hardest gigs in politics coming up on Wednesday. By tradition the response to the budget comes not from the shadow chancellor but from the leader of the opposition, who has the unenviable task of responding to a package of measures he has not seen and which invariably contains one or two big surprises.The surprise this time could be some modest tax cuts. George Osborne likes nothing better than to set traps for his political opponents, so Corbyn should be alive to the possibility that the budget will not be nearly as grim an affair as its advance billing has indicated.Related: George Osborne's November pledges: how far has he got? Continue reading...

It’s 100 years on from the Easter Rising, but in the wake of economic crisis and deep uncertainty, Ireland faces huge challenges once more. Here, five young Irish novelists offer a personal view of their homeland todayKevin Curran’s first novel, Beatsploitation, tackled the subject of racism in Ireland. His follow-up, Citizens, takes the events of 1916 as its starting point. He works as a teacher and lives in Skerries, County DublinIn the winter of 2014 I attended my first anti-water charges protest. But the march had already started – its smooth flow of bodies drifting cheerfully down O’Connell Street in Dublin – by the time I joined it. My train had been delayed. Such was the feeling of distrust with the government, whispers from passengers with their “No way, we won’t pay” placards had spread giddy rumours through the carriage that it was a state-directed conspiracy to stop us getting there.Cities, to my mind, are for people who like to do things in close proximity to other peopleRelated: Spill Simmer Falter Wither by Sara Baume review – instils fear and wonderRelated: The Glorious Heresies by Lisa McInerney review – the Sweary Lady is on bellicose formRelated: This Is the Ritual by Rob Doyle review – sex, drugs and NietzscheRelated: Eggshells by Caitriona Lally review – a daring debutCoffee used to be a treat to meet a pal for; now it’s a polystyrene necessity to get through the day Continue reading...