"...corporate economic power is increasingly translating into political power. This is what I worry about. Large corporations maintain very significant lobbying operations with substantial resources. They employ lobbyists, lawyers, consultants, and, of course, former political advisers and even cabinet ministers. They secure access to ministers and officials that ordinary people rarely enjoy. Their influence can shape legislation, regulation and government contracts. The resulting political system is anything but the level playing field that the proponents of market economies suggest should exist if they are to operate efficiently."
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/10/18/who-really-runs-britain/#gsc.tab=0
#monopolies #UKpolitics #inequality

TIL about the Olivia Hill rule.

rpgmuseum.fandom.com/wiki/No_f…

It starts "If you're a fascist, you're not welcome to play this game. It's against the rules."

As you can imagine, it causes fascists and adjacents to out themselves.

"Why should the cost of government financing be dictated by secondary-market transactions when the government is the issuer of the currency in which those bonds are denominated?

That is exactly the question I think we should be asking. The government is not bound by the bond market. Since 1981, when Sir Geoffrey Howe, Thatcher's then Chancellor, introduced the so-called full funding rule, it has chosen to be so, but that decision could be revoked. The question is: why isn't that being done now?"
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/10/09/why-does-the-government-feel-bound-to-serve-the-bond-market/#gsc.tab=0
#UKpolitics #economics #Macroeconomics

"Higher bond rates are being presented as evidence that the government's debt is unaffordable. Old age pensions are under threat in the UK. So is social care, and support for children with autism and ADHD is being rationed. Economic support for everyone in need is being withdrawn when it is needed most, and the AI boom is creating this outcome. It's imposing costs on everyone except the tech bros and Trump, of course."
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/10/01/ai-could-cost-you-a-fortune/#gsc.tab=0
#BondMarkets #inflation #UKpolitics #inequality #economics #macroeconomics

"many of those now turning to the far right are seeking exactly what social democracy once offered them: security, belonging, decent public services, economic stability, good healthcare, affordable housing and confidence in the future. They are not rejecting those values. They are expressing their frustration at having lost them."
there's much to agree with in this and the wider article.
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/06/14/why-do-older-people-support-the-far-right/
#FarRight #austerity #UKpolitics

Right now, someone could read your messages, watch through your camera or track you. All without you knowing.

This isn't science fiction. Across Europe, powerful spyware has been used against journalists, activists and people who dared to challenge those in power.

Israeli corporations behind this technology are making billions selling tools that can secretly take control of your phone.

It gets worse: a new scandal just revealed that the EU is funding this tech to monitor people like you and me. And they refuse to stop.

Momentum is building to challenge them. Journalists are exposing the spyware industry. Individual politicians are demanding answers.

But unless citizens speak up, decision-makers will keep treating this as a problem for a few journalists rather than a threat to everyone’s rights.

Every signature added pushes these hackers away from our private lives:
https://action.wemove.eu/sign/2026-06-phone-hacking-petition-EN/

''If you have two economies of equal size and productivity, one has a massive financial sector and billionaires while the other does not, the financialised economy will have less left over to invest in research, education, infrastructure, and healthcare. Over time, it will inevitably fall behind the country with a smaller financial sector because it’s the other things that drive the economy and productivity"
www.baldurbjarnason.com/2026/the-old-world-of-tech-is-dying/
#billionaires #economics

@pluralistic reminds us:
"Now Australia has so much solar that they're giving away electricity, with three free hours of unlimited energy every day. Stick your dishwasher, clothes-dryer and EV charger on a timer, invest in a battery or two, and fill your boots:
https://billmckibben.substack.com/p/free-electricity-like-at-no-cost "

That put me in mind that when I was a kid they used to tell us that nuclear powerhouse be too cheap to meter.
Looks like they made the wrong bet ...

https://pluralistic.net/2026/04/20/praxis/#acceleration
#NuclearPower #SolarPanelGeneration

"...who was so desperate to have Mandelson in Washington that they were willing to take risks on this scale,...? Why, in other words, was Mandelson, with his known links to Epstein ...so important that it was necessary for a string of people to prejudice their political careers to secure his appointment ...? Who was it ... appeasing ...? ...assuming ... the Foreign Office has persistently misled Downing Street, why d...and in whose interests?
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/04/17/is-there-a-government-within-a-government-in-westminster-which-is-beyond-ministerial-reach/
#EpsteinClass #UKpolitics

RE: https://mastodon.social/@DrALJONES/116345076836213186

Tl:dr ''...reports indicate that Trump’s frustration stemmed not from Bondi’s failure to uphold the law, but from his belief that she didn’t weaponise the Justice Department aggressively enough against his political enemies,”

We are looking into putting some sort of secure bike shed in our garden for our bikes, in the UK. We're thinking metal but we are also wondering about securing to soft ground and whether a slight slope poses issues we need to consider. Advice? Recommendations?
#bikes #cycling

''... The war made the sanctions too effective, so the sanctions had to be lifted to fund the war effort against the country that no longer needs sanctions because the oil revenues that sanctions were preventing are now required to prevent the economic damage caused by preventing those revenues, which is itself a consequence of the military campaign designed to make the sanctions unnecessary ... "
https://no01.substack.com/p/march-19-21-god-is-a-comedian
#irony #geopolitics #USA #Iran

Trump is strangling Cuba – and as governments let its citizens suffer, ordinary people are stepping up to send urgent humanitarian aid. Add your name to rally behind the people's convoy for Cuba leaving in four days – and urge governments to defy Trump and speak out against this illegal blockade.
https://secure.avaaz.org/campaign/en/solidaritycuba2_2/
#Cuba #solidarity

''What about including [in GDP] the value of unpaid childcare, the value of charity and voluntary work, the value of looking after elderly relatives at home, or even the value of doing your own housework instead of paying someone to do it? All of these clearly create real value in the economy, but they're not included in GDP.''
And indeed why aren't we factoring out the false economies related to pollution etc?
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/03/17/10-of-gdp-is-fiction/
#WagesForHousework #GDP #UKpolitics #economics

Big companies, if they can make big political donations, they can pay more taxes.

#Billionaires #EpsteinClass

RE: https://mstdn.chrisalemany.ca/@chris/116175085401061524

"To the extent that a popular opposition was building against this government in the streets in January, by bombarding the country, that movement has had the steam taken out of it. You can’t go into the streets if you’re afraid of being bombed, and moreover you look like a traitor if you’re demonstrating against the government when it’s under bombardment. So the idea of regime change in this way was always foolish, and it hasn’t happened. It’s not likely to happen. "

''Medicine... the perfect market. Patients cannot judge treatment quality... qualified to do so. Decisions are made urgently... often emotional. Illness cannot be delayed... it's there right in front of us, affecting us, or our loved ones. And doctors hold trusted authority, but they and the services that they can deliver are in restricted supply. That combination creates enormous pricing power for Big Pharma, even within the NHS"
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/02/22/is-big-pharma-capturing-the-nhs/
#NHS #BigPharma #inequality #UKpolitics

"The question... It's "How do we make our leaders follow us?" Today's Democrats are unserious quislings who keep bringing a squirt-gun to a mass-casualty assault-rifle spree-shooting. How do we terrorize these cowards into rising to the moment? If we want Congressional Democrats to form a Nuremburg Caucus and start holding hearings on who they're going to put in the dock when the Trump regime collapses, we're going to have to drive them to it"
https://pluralistic.net/2026/02/05/contingency/
#resistance #USpolitics

Watching daytime TV with an elder the other day. Struck by how many ads for charities (intereting reflection on demography) . Matters arising ...
why is RLNI a charity rather than something like fire and rescue?
Why is the state that sends people to harms way in war zones, not taking responsibility for their aftercare?

#charity #neoliberalism #CollectiveResponsibility #Welfare

"the right-wing's moment is over. I know that it won't be dying as yet, but the point is, the current political conversation was set by the right. They promised growth, strength, and national renewal. What we have got instead is  institutional breakdown, policy incoherence, economic nationalism without an economic plan, and personalised power replacing competence"
https://www.taxresearch.org.uk/Blog/2026/02/01/politics-has-run-out-of-road/
#neoliberalism #UKpolitics #politics #economics