Business and Economics

Chancellor Philip Hammond’s Budget Statement failed to relieve the strain on workers from a further squeeze on living standards as wage growth is on course fall, GMB trade union warned today. Responding to the Chancellor’s Budget statement, the union said he neglected to support workers facing a decade of pay and had failed to provide proper funding for public services or social care. Hammond also raised National Insurance for the self-employed, turning his back on a manifesto pledge to not...

Public sector workers have been slapped with a decade long “pay pinch” and now inflation caused by Brexit has worsened the pay problems for midwives, teaching assistants and refuse collectors amongst others. The GMB union claims the public sector is now suffering from the worst salary squeeze since the Thatcher government The government cap on wages means that full-time workers, in the public sector, now actually face a real terms reduction in income. On average this will be a huge...

Over the last month supermarket inflation has doubled, meaning customers are having to fork out more cash to buy staples such are butter and milk. This news means that pressure on household’s spare income will be reduced even more and Brexit is partly to blame. Some will see this has another indication that the economy is starting to struggle since the decision to leave the EU, and possibly some Leave voters might be feeling Bregret. The inflation growth indicates that...

AN AWARD-WINNING entrepreneur is looking to help others ‘Be Bold For Change’ this International Women’s Day (8 March 2017) by offering free mentoring to women wanting to start a new businesses. Julie Chen, the Director of The Cheeky Panda explains. International Women's Day (March 8) is a global day celebrating the social, economic, cultural and political achievements of women. The day also marks a call to action for accelerating gender equality and the theme this year is ‘Be Bold For...

Last week, the inevitable happened. The latest figures released by the Office of National Statistics showed that net migration to the UK now stands at 273,000 for the year to September, a massive drop of almost 50,000 from the previous year. In truth, these results should surprise no one. Given the result of the Brexit vote, the endless negative migration headlines in the press and the increasing levels of xenophobia, it’s fair to say that the UK isn’t exactly rolling...

A record number of people in the UK are on zero hours contracts, which are very controversial as they offer no guarantee of work, leading to income instability. These contracts are widely used by retailers, restaurants, leisure companies and hotels. These worrying figures follow on form a report we covered yesterday that over 5 million children will suffer child poverty by 2022 as households face a squeeze on wages. Now the number of workers who are on zero hours contracts...

More worrying economic news has emerged, this time from The Institute for Fiscal Studies. They believe that child poverty will reach 5.1 million by 2022 as households face a squeeze on wages. The think-tank believes that average pay rate won’t grow over the next two years. The analysis says households are suffering the worst slowdown in incomes for 60 years and if planned benefit cuts go ahead, and earnings growth slow, inequality will start to rise over the next five...

German tabloid BILD’s Leipzig sent its thanks to Britain after news broke that BMW may move production of a new electric Mini to Germany. The paper ran with the headline "thank you Brexit" on Tuesday as BMW refused to deny claims it was considering a move as uncertainty mounts for British manufacturers who export to Europe. A so-called ‘hard Brexit’ could see additional tariffs levied on goods made in the UK but sold in the EU. Last year, 38 percent of the...

British Airways has held off Apple, Microsoft and PayPal to be crowned the top business superbrand of 2017. Despite successive strikes making the headlines and unpredictable poll results disrupting the economy BA was ranked top in a survey of marketing experts and thousands of British business professionals. The airline outperformed nearly 1,500 others in the sixteenth annual poll, with Apple retaining second spot and, in its strongest performance since 2011, US tech giant Microsoft moving up to third. Fellow US tech giants, PayPal...