The Productive Pessimist

  Over the next couple of weeks, we'll be introducing the individual elements of full-spectrum inclusion, which are all considered equally and combined in our inclusive design and practice consultancy  services. We're starting with Financial Inclusion , because we're approaching that time of the year when, in the UK, prices skyrocket a full four weeks before most peoples' "inflation-related-pay-increase" kicks in. (Make it make sense, UK...it's a fiscal version of kids gathering their stuff & getting to their feet the minute the bell rings, with teachers screaming "the bell is my signal, not yours!!!", completely pointlessly.) (To American "wealth influencers" - your  education in financial inclusion starts with this fact: In the UK, "presenting a record of all your achievements, and all the additional work you've undertaken, and then requesting a raise" will not work.  99% of companies here tell you at your initial in...

                                            On Friday 20th September 2024, it was revealed that the UK’s national debt was equal to the income the UK was able to generate; in short, debt was at 100% of GDP. This last occurred in the 1960s - and resulted in the following decade, the 1970s, being extremely difficult for ordinary people, with standards of living declining sharply across all demographics, something which, inevitably, hit those who were already experiencing poverty the hardest. The 1970s saw a massive loss of manufacturing in Britain - historically, the one sector that had been able to pull Britain through the downturns of economic cycles, because the UK used to be known, and respected for, exceptional quality of its manufactured goods, and many countries around t...