Tim Worstall

Few vegetables are more British than swede and parsnip, says Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall That’s why it’s full name is “Swedish turnip” then, eh?

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Caption to Torygraph picture: Teenagers will lose up to fiver percent of their marks for failing to maintain high standards of written english Perhaps the Australian schools should do the same? Shows how out of touch I am though: I hadn’t realised that the examination system was so dumbed down that proficiency in language wasn’t [...]

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Gender Part 10 – where are the lesbians in public life asks Hannah Blythen Rather a lot of them appear to be acting in films on this ‘ere internet thing. The fact that only 0.3 per cent of MPs are out lesbians is a breathtakingly low statistic, That women make up around 50% of the [...]

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because society no longer locates the value of women and girls in their looks Oh, right, we’ve to go out and find ourselves a new species then, eh? Look, no society, ever, has located all of the value of women and girls in their looks: just as no society made up of human beings will, [...]

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Women as a group already own less than men and earn less than men; Umm, no, actually, they don’t “own” less than men. Longer female lifespans, inheritance between married couples, means that actually ownership, wealth, is slightly skewed towards women rather than men.

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Vaccine manufacturers big winners in fight for government cash Given that vaccines are a real public health issue, a straight up and right proper public good, I would damn well hope that the major recipients of public health spending were those who manufacture vaccines. Wouldn’t you?

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Britain is the only country in the industrialised world where wealth does not determine access to healthcare, study finds. The study is here. There’s nothing wrong with the study as is: it’s a telephone survey of individuals. And there’s nothing very surprising about such a survey showing that one of the very few health care [...]

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As a result the UK’s total tax rate has risen from 35.8pc of commercial profits in 2006 to 37.3pc today. Among the lowest in Europe were Ireland, calculated at 26.5pc, and Denmark at 29.2pc. As we should all remember: tax rates are not the sole determinant of the tax burden. We need to include tax [...]

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The comedian, who replaced Adrian Chiles on the programme six months ago, walked out last night amid allegations that he shared sexual internet messages with female fans. The latest reports come weeks after Manford was forced to apologise for sending explicit Twitter messages to a female fan and asking her to send him topless pictures [...]

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A report commissioned by the Department of Health says GPs’ administrative support teams should be radically altered to cut costs. However, doctors and surgery staff say the proposal is “flawed”. The plan would involve centralising appointment bookings through a national call centre, clearing surgeries of thousands of staff. Flawed? It’s insane. The NHS already suffers [...]

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No, really, quite, quite, gorgeous. He’s written a paper (another!) for the TUC. About how we should have a General Anti-Avoidance Principle written into English Law. As he says, the sort of thing this GAntiP would crack down upon is the following: The idea behind a General Anti-Avoidance Principle is simple: it would say that [...]

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What a damn good idea. Hmm, well, there goes the MVO for services to blogging then, eh?

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A MUSLIM fanatic who torched a wreath of poppies on Armistice Day was given a police guard to protect his home, The Sun can reveal. Taxpayers paid to cover the cost of placing two officers and a patrol car outside the house of Abu Rahin Aziz. The zealot was part of a 40-strong mob who [...]

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When Muhammed Yunus first got going with Grameen Bank there was all sorts of misunderstanding about what he’s actually done. Stripped down to its essence what he had really done was to replace the traditional measures of collateral with social pressure to repay a loan. Borrowers are organised into groups, only one of the group [...]

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Here’s a question: love to know the answer. OK, so, the euro, it can only really continue with full and proper economic and fiscal union. The necessarily leads to fiscal transfers: just as within the UK or within the US. The rich regions (London, SE) have to cough up to pay for the poor (Wales, [...]

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Rents are typically 10 per cent more expensive – although in some towns, they exceed mortgage payments by almost 40 per cent, according to the research by property website Zoopla. Err, no. For with a mortgage comes the maintenance bill, something that renters do not have to pay.

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Way back in 2006 the then government decided it was going to introduce something called the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Act. This was all about giving Ministers more Henry VIII powers. In effect, a Minister could amend, reform, abolish, any Act they so desired without the consent or leave of Parliament. I dubbed it the [...]

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D’ye think you could change the URL of your place? bris.co.uk rather causes an unfortunate wince in anyone who has ever told the joke about the Jewish circumcisionist.

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With the demarcation of ‘separate spheres’ for women and men during the Industrial Revolution, the selection of household goods and management became overwhelmingly the responsibility of women. Eh? Is this some sort of special history where we get to make up whatever we like? That, for example, gender differences in occupation or the division of [...]

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Tax is gendered since men pay more tax than women because they earn more and since women receive more public services and benefits from the state because they contribute more unpaid care-work than men. Public services, such as health, are disproportionately used by women, employ women, and are politically supported by women. OK, agreed on [...]

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