An incredible 155m children around the world are chronically undernourished, despite dramatic improvements in recent decades. In view of this, the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals include Zero Hunger. But what do we understand by the word hunger? It may refer to lack of food or widespread food shortages caused by war, drought, crop failure or […]
The weather outside is frightful. The so called Big Freeze now grips the United States for the second week, and the United Kingdom too is experiencing its own blast of Arctic weather. All this chilly weather reminded me of an article written in The Telegraph last month about ice-houses, which were the go-to method of refrigeration just a couple of […]
Carrie Gracie’s resignation from her position as China editor at the BBC because male international editors earn more than her £135,000-a-year salary, again highlights the gender pay gap in the UK, and at the BBC in particular. It is an important debate, and one which must be resolved. But her resignation also raises serious questions […]
The end of 2017 is barely a week away. So now is the perfect time to reflect upon the positive difference humanity has made to the world over the past 12 months. How have we advanced as a species? We often underestimate the progress we make because it is incremental: an algorithm here, a genetic […]
Monopolies are a very real economic and political problem. That much is uncontroversial. The difficult question is what to do about them. And the answer varies depending on whether we are dealing with fast-moving new technology, or a more established industry. Unfortunately, that distinction is lost on most people at the moment. Consider Google, which […]
Normally, the concept of wealth redistribution involves government using force to take from some people and give to others. But the bitcoin revolution is redistributing wealth differently. For the sake of simplicity, and to avoid confusion, we will talk about only the original bitcoin in this article and avoid the likes of cryptocurrency products such […]
There may be people who still haven’t heard of Bitcoin, but there can’t be many and they must live a long way back from the road. From its beginnings as a niche of niches somewhere on the outer belt of the internet, this strange and next-to-impossible-to-understand mathematical construct has turned into a phenomenon that has […]
The publication of the Government’s Strategic Vision for Rail yesterday will prove to be a landmark moment in the often troubled history of Britain’s railways. The restoration of the lines cut by the now infamous Beeching cuts naturally made the headlines, but the real story is the drift back to the future and the dramatic […]
Nine months since Article 50 was triggered the future of Britain’s economic model post-Brexit is still something of a conundrum. One vision popular with the Government is that of the UK as a global trading hub freed from ties with Brussels and EU red tape, with a highly productive and innovative service and manufacturing sectors […]
If this week’s Budget proved anything, it was that Budgets don’t actually matter that much. As Robert Colvile pointed out for CapX, the most important part of Hammond’s speech wasn’t a pledge to cut a tax here or raise spending there. It was the section on productivity, in which he reported that “our productivity performance […]
“Brexit means Brexit” the Prime Minister has said again and again. And this week, if you are one of the 900 employees of the European Medicines Agency in Canary Wharf, which is now confirmed as moving to Amsterdam, Brexit feels very real indeed. No matter how you spin it, the departure of the EMA from […]
Whisper it quietly, but our Prime Minister may, finally, be waking up to the biggest issue in contemporary politics. Whether it is her bleak warnings of Russian cyber-espionage or new support for driverless cars, Theresa May has barely said anything in the last week not somehow connected to the awesome, disruptive power of technology. There is more […]
The joint BEIS and Work and Pensions Committees’ report into the Taylor Review of the gig economy, which is published today, is undoubtedly a step in the right direction. Too often the gig economy is associated in the public’s mind with the idea of low-paid, insecure work that exploits the vulnerable. This is certainly the caricature that […]
China currently sits at the top of Africa’s FDI league. Once a story of state-bartered trades of oil for infrastructure, China’s investment is now driving a campaign of urbanisation that is widely expected to deliver another economic miracle in “China’s Second Continent”. The world has counted the billions being invested in Africa, watched the trades, […]
We all know that alongside the divorce bill and citizens rights, the Irish border completes the unholy Trinity of Brexit negotiation blockers. A minority Government, in hock to its absolutist faction and reliant on DUP support to survive, can never really have much room for manoeuvre. Hence the opportunistic swirl of ludicrous hyperbole ranging from […]
The case for research and development can be overstated. Take the fashionable claim that Government-funded research is the primary cause of all leading innovations – from the iPhone to the internet. In reality, the process is far more complex – and organic. Today’s cutting edge technology, in machine learning, was as much a side result […]
Watch or listen to CapX’s weekly podcast ‘The Capitalist’ wherever you get your podcasts.
