Whether it’s a knee on a football field or a dress with a slogan, symbols are like fertiliser: pointless in untilled groundThe first anniversary of the global Black Lives Matter (BLM) protests was widely noted a few months ago, with acres of coverage a…
It measures everything in short, except that which makes life worthwhile
Enough with the GDP — it’s time to measure genuine progress – “Unlike GDP, the Genuine Progress Indicator is designed to measure economic performance from the perspective of ordinary American households, not corporations or Wall Street investors.”[1,2]…
Constructed Worlds, Group Beliefs and Narrative Consciousness
Three Simple Policy Heuristics – “The most important thing to understand is this: Harm ripples, kindness ripples. People you hurt go on to hurt other people. People who are treated with kindness become better people, or more prosperous people, and go o…
A tale of two towns: Rochdale and Braintree expose UK’s uneven asylum system
Relatively wealthy Braintree has supported just one asylum seeker in recent months while deprived Rochdale hosted 734Labour councils house eight times as many asylum seekers as Tory areas, analysis findsSituated in the heart of rural Essex, Braintree o…
The Guardian view on ‘levelling up’ schools: a slogan without substance | Editorial
Labour should have a policy to deal with rich people seceding from the rest of society by buying social privilegeGordon Brown gave substance to the slogan of “levelling up”. In 2006, he said that his “long-term aim” was to fund state school pupils at t…
Generation Covid has been hit hard. Thank goodness they’re not resentful – yet | Polly Toynbee
Jobs, wages, housing: young people are paying a price. We have to address this or risk their anger boiling overThe pandemic’s next effect might be a wave of political conflict. A rising tide of anger among young people at what they have willingly sacri…
Staggering US wealth inequality heaps long-term harm on to minority children
Black children have access to just 1 cent for every dollar enjoyed by their white counterparts, new research shows, and Hispanic kids fare little betterAfrican American children are suffering long-term disadvantages as a result of vast and growing disp…
Wishful thinking will not close Britain’s widening inequality gap
Covid has made us poorer and increased wealth and educational disparities. Optimism alone cannot fix thisCoronavirus – latest updatesSee all our coronavirus coverageOptimism helps get us through tough times, and the Covid pandemic has had plenty of tho…
The Guardian view on high pay: the fat cats are still there | Editorial
Vast disparities in income may have lost some of their power to shock. But they remain a gross injusticePublic anger about the vast salaries extracted from business by the highest-paid people surfaces less often than one might expect, given highly cons…
‘The hypocrisy is nauseating’: Wes Streeting on state school arts cuts
Shadow child poverty secretary wants all pupils to have access to arts education after decade of Tory cutsWes Streeting can’t claim to be his inner-city comp’s most famous alumni. That claim goes to the Hollywood actor John Boyega who, like the shadow …