employment

Labour will regret its war with P and O

12 October 2024 6:34 pm

Labour’s Employment Rights Bill promises workers flexible working, is supposed to protect them from unfair dismissal from day one of…

Will AI make bricklayers better-paid than barristers?

28 September 2024 9:00 am

Old tortoise that I am, my head usually yanks back into my shell when people start talking about artificial intelligence.…

In defence of McJobs

21 September 2024 9:00 am

The burden of higher taxation must fall on those with ‘the broadest shoulders’, says the Prime Minister, and City folks…

Labour vs labour: how can the government claim to be promoting growth?

21 September 2024 9:00 am

Growth, growth, growth: that was what Keir Starmer told us would be his government’s priority in his first press conference…

How hot is too hot to work?

31 August 2024 9:00 am

Gold standard The Paralympics were instigated in 1948 and first held alongside the Olympics in Rome in 1960. But disabled…

How to quit like the Japanese

25 May 2024 9:00 am

Tokyo For many, the idea of quitting a job they hate, of walking into their boss’s office and telling him…

Barometer

30 September 2023 9:00 am

Degrees of failure: the great university rip-off

19 August 2023 9:00 am

Is university still worth it?

Jonathan Ashworth: ‘We are at risk of a lost generation’

8 July 2023 9:00 am

Jonathan Ashworth on Labour’s plans to cut unemployment

The civil service’s exercise in navel-gazing

3 June 2023 9:00 am

Navel-gazing in the civil service

Portrait of the week

20 May 2023 9:00 am

Britain needs more honesty about unemployment

18 October 2022 4:30 pm

Is low unemployment causing us more problems than we realise? The suggestion might seem absurd, offensive even. It’s reminiscent of…

In Japan, being a token westerner is big business

5 March 2022 9:00 am

How to make money as a token westerner in Japan

Work is no place for your ‘whole self’

19 February 2022 9:00 am

One of the few things I have learned in this life is that Dante Alighieri was wrong. In the Inferno…

Bad news, Governor: the wage-rise spiral is already raging

19 February 2022 9:00 am

I’ve had the opportunity recently to take part in wage-rise discussions for several small entities in which I’m involved. The…

What’s to become of Africa’s teeming youth?

19 February 2022 9:00 am

Demographers are attached to their theories. The field’s most enduring is the ‘demographic transition’, whereby modernisation inexorably lowers a society’s…

Who survived the sinking of the Titanic?

29 January 2022 9:00 am

Prime numbers As of 29 January Boris Johnson will have been Prime Minister for two years and 190 days. Currently…

Boris’s hostage to fortune

9 October 2021 9:00 am

Most prime ministers would be worried about supply chain shortages. But as became increasingly clear at the Tory party conference…

Was furlough the worst £70 billion ever spent?

30 September 2021 8:00 pm

Concorde obviously. The Iraq War perhaps? Or Scottish devolution? It is not hard to come up with a list of…

How to solve the looming pigs-in-blankets crisis

4 September 2021 9:00 am

This is getting serious. Never mind global shortages of microchips, plastics, copper and container ships; now we’re running out of…

Letters: Why aren’t Italians fighting for their liberty?

14 August 2021 9:00 am

Wage concern Sir: Martin Vander Weyer’s call for higher wages to end the shortage of British HGV drivers (‘Your country…

Is it time for a Dad’s Army of lorry drivers?

7 August 2021 9:00 am

Here’s a patriotic proposal: let’s form a Dad’s Army of lorry drivers, of which the Road Haulage Association reckons there’s…

The ‘alpha migrants’ are here – why don’t we let them work?

31 July 2021 9:00 am

They’re bright, brave – and could help solve our labour crisis

Vaccine passports could threaten the employment recovery

29 July 2021 9:45 pm

Alongside the UK’s latest step in reopening, optimistic forecasts have been rolling in concerning the economy’s timeline for returning to…

In the post-pandemic economy, the workers are the boss

17 July 2021 9:00 am

In the post-pandemic economy, workers have the upper hand