Why does the British tax year end on April 5th?
For Britons the end of the tax year looms on April 5th. Why such a seemingly random date? In the Middle Ages England’s tax y...
Britain’s wimpish effort to balance its books
Rachel Reeves may not have called her Spring Statement on March 26th a budget, but it certainly felt like one. Speculation gr...
Who will speak for Henry?
It is hard to feel sorry for someone who boasts about their £460 ($600) Sony headphones. It is difficult to worry about the f...
New data show that the class divide in Britain may not be so wide
“BUILDING SOCIAL capital will not be easy, but it is the key to making democracy work,” wrote Robert Putnam, an American poli...
A Northern Irish factory has a deal to make missiles for Ukraine
Belfast used to be known as a place where weapons were fired rather than made. But a nondescript factory in a suburb of North...
Comparing apples and oranges. And also small caged mammals
Cod-liver oil (1947-51), mercifully, passed away swiftly. Liver (1947-98) lasted a little longer. Avocados didn’t arrive unti...
The thinking behind Labour’s benefits cuts
One way to judge the viciousness of the backroom fights over a policy is by how much its announcement gets dragged out. On Ma...
Why apprenticeships are so rare in Britain
THOUGH IT SPENT a lot of time lambasting Britain’s universities, the Conservative government that left office last year did a...
ZOE, a British personal-nutrition app, is growing fast
MOST PEOPLE mention the poo hammock. At this stage you would have already eaten (and digested) your blue cookie. The paper cr...
The British state has a bad case of long covid
Coronavirus in Britain is a story of individual grief and collective amnesia. The fifth-anniversary commemorations on March 9...