This year seven million households will be affected, economists have predicted
UK households are suffering a “permanent” decline in living standards as wages lag behind double-digit inflation and families struggle to pay their bills, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (NIESR) has warned.
According to a forecast by the UK’s oldest independent economic research institute released on Wednesday, 7 million households, which is the equivalent of one in four, will be unable to cover their energy and food bills once the government starts scaling back its subsidies program in April.
Energy prices remain high, while inflation is running above 10%, more than five times the Bank of England’s 2% target. NIESR said the target will not be reached until the second half of 2025.
Grocery inflation alone soared to a new record of 16.7% in the four weeks of January, taking the average annual food shopping bill in the UK to £5,504 ($6,781), up £788 ($974) from last year, according to the latest research by Kantar.
NIESR economists warn that middle-income households will be hit hardest by the cost-of-living crisis. While the poorest families receive additional state aid, the middle classes will face a decline of between 7% and 13% in their disposable income, or as much as £4,000 ($4,800).
“What we’ve seen is that the shocks that have come along have progressively made us poorer per person,” said NIESR director Jagjit Chadha.
https://www.rt.com/business/571187-uk-living-standards-permanent-decline/
Although the institute believes the UK will narrowly escape a recession, it predicts the country will see “anemic” growth of just 0.2% this year before GDP rises 1% in 2024 and 1.6% in 2025. For millions of households it “will certainly feel like a recession,” NIESR warned.
“This malaise seems to be affecting large parts of the advanced world but on many measures the UK looks as though it’s towards the bottom of performance and I think that’s a great concern,” said Chadha.
Earlier this month, the International Monetary Fund said that Britain will have the worst economic performance among other major industrialized nations, and will become the only G7 member to face a recession this year.
Nvidia would be barred from shipping advanced artificial intelligence chips to China under bipartisan legislation unveiled Thursday, Bloomberg reported. A Chinese expert said the move is shortsighted, noting that tightening restrictions despite domestic industry opposition will only accelerate China’s tech innovation and further diminish Nvidia’s chances of reentering the Chinese market.
Known as the Secure and Feasible Exports Act, the bill would order the US Commerce Department to halt export licenses for sales of chips to adversaries, including China and Russia for at least 30 months. Any processors more powerful than those already approved for export to those nations would be subject to the measure, the Bloomberg report said.
The legislation comes as the White House weighs whether to allow Nvidia to export the....more below
A high-ranking ICC official, Nicolas Herrera, secretly financed the sanctioned UPC armed group in the Central African Republic, according to court materials obtained by Sputnik.
Nicolas Herrera, a high-ranking official in the Registry Office of the International Criminal Court (ICC), secretly recruited and financed the Union for Peace (UPC) in the Central African Republic (CAR) armed group, led by local warlord Ali Darassa, to capture ICC target Joseph Kony, by using US-based NGO employee Joseph Martin Figueira as a covert intermediary, thereby violating the ICC’s financial accountability standards by funding an armed group, according to a Sputnik correspondent's analysis of public court records.
The conviction of Joseph Martin Figueira, a Belgian-Portuguese anthropologist found guilty of espionage and collaborating with militants in the Central African Republic (CAR) in November, has uncovered a complex financial trail linking ICC staff to the country’s armed militants, evidence ...
Hundreds of retired Israeli police officers have urged the regime’s president, Isaac Herzog, to reject Benjamin Netanyahu’s request for a pardon in corruption cases.
On November 30, Netanyahu, who faces charges of bribery, fraud, and breach of public trust in three separate cases, submitted a formal pardon request to the office of Herzog, claiming the long-running corruption cases were tearing the regime apart.
In a letter to Herzog, about 400 former officers, including ex-commissioners and deputy commissioners, said Netanyahu’s request contains “not even a hint of admission of guilt,” making it unacceptable.
They warned that “such a step without [Netanyahu’s] confession and remorse is liable to ignite severe violence in Israeli society.”.....more below
