Britain is the bolthole for crooked money from all over the world

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More than 87,000 properties in England and Wales, worth £100bn in total, are owned by anonymous companies registered in tax havens.  (The Week, 23 March 2019)

If you think this is sleazy, wait until Britain is out of the EU.  Given the main cheerleaders of Brexit one has to conclude that one motivation of the better- off Brexiteers is to build on the UK’s reputation as a the money laundering centre of the world, attracting the most disagreeable people.   It is up there already.  In the part of London I know best a big proportion of properties are owned by (corrupt?) foreigners, Russians being prominent.  Ordinary British people can’t, of course, afford these homes, whose values have sky- rocketed, leaving rows of usually empty houses owned from abroad.  Meanwhile,  the  building of new homes used to be the task of local councils, but successive governments have reduced their powers and their financial resources.  Homelessness continues upwards.

One of the few possibly positive  outcomes of Brexit, I thought ( in more charitable moments) was that, once a large contingent of ordinary working immigrants had left the country, the homelessness and affordability problem would improve.  Maybe it will, but then there will be no one to do painting, carpentry, plumbing or electrics.

Epicureanism is based upon pleasure in life, not just for the out-touch super- rich, but for everyone.  A secure roof over your head and the financial ability to pay for its upkeep is a core principle of Epicurean decency. The rich people who agitated for Brexit will always be able to afford pleasant, well-kept homes.  Others, alas , will not.

Reconnecting with the voters

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If we really want the parties to reconnect with voters, we should import – from Australia, say, or Brazil – a far more important innovation: compulsory voting. Obliging people to cast a ballot may sound illiberal: but it has the huge advantage of forcing political parties “to reach beyond their comfort zone”. Labour could no longer seek to win elections by “wooing public sector, welfare-dependent and unionised voters”, or the Tories by wooing “the propertied, wealthy and rural”. It would also put an end to the favouritism shown to older voters. That 76% of pensioners voted in 2010, but only 44% of eligible first-time voters did, explains why the heaviest cuts have fallen on younger people with families. With compulsory voting, parties would have to consider the effects of their policies on everyone. Insisting that voters devote 20 minutes of their time once every four or five years to the act of voting seems a small price to pay.  (Tim Montgomerie,  The Times).

 Yes, this is very do-able and it works fine in countries like Australia. Opponents would be libertarians (wrongly , in my opinion.  A government should govern for all the people, and all the people should get to choose).  The other people who would strongly object are the very people who have been trying to prevent the poor and  people of colour (a.k.a presumed Democrats) from voting, or gerrymandering the constituency boundaries, which amounts to the same thing.  In any case, not voting is not some kind of political statement  – it’s a lazy person’s cop- out.  Every citizen should vote!

 

Five things you shouldn’t do

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Don’t smoke

The Hisayama Study, an ongoing investigation of a suburban Japanese community, has found that smoking in mid to late life not only raises the risk of lung cancer, but also ups the chance of developing dementia. Smokers who quit, even in their 40s or 50s, didn’t see the same rise in risk.

Don’t binge on booze (or go teetotal)

Too much is bad, but so is too little. The latest large studies on alcohol consumption suggest that those who drink excessively or give up completely are more likely to suffer cognitive decline.  Those who drink moderately fare better.

Don’t retire early

The Whitehall Study, which followed some 3500 UK civil servants as they aged, found that retirement seemed to accelerate cognitive decline, especially related to verbal memory. (Yes, this is a sweeping statement –  it depends what you do in retirement.  My wife and I wrote music for twenty years, which is excellent for the brain, hers, anyway).

Don’t gulp down sugar

Even one extra sugary drink a day is associated with having significantly reduced total brain volume. That was the finding of a 2017 study looking at nearly 4000 people. That drink also worsened memories of personal experiences.

Don’t lose those last few pounds

Being a healthy weight is an all-round good idea. But don’t go too far. A study that investigated the diets of some 2 million people over 20 years found that, compared with people of a healthy weight, underweight people had a 34 per cent higher risk of getting dementia. ( New Scientist 26 Jan 2019)

All these studies do seem to have one underlying idea or conclusion behind them : no need to metaphorically wear sackcloth and ashes and be miserable in pursuit of health.  Do what you enjoy, but do it moderately.  This is what Epicurus was teaching in ancient Athens.

 

Evolution

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Only 40% of adults in the United States believe evolution to be “true”.  A third of American adults positively believe it to be false, presumably believing that God delivered man and woman,  fully formed, to the Garden of Eden five thousand years ago, as per one of the Hebrew creation myths (there were two of them – read Genesis).  And 78 % of all American adults are happy with the idea of natural selection in plants and animals, just so long as the word “evolution” is not mentioned in the same breath. It must be reassuring to think we are SO special, us humans! 

This ranks the US with Turkey in terms of resistance both  to reason and to scientific discovery, which begs the question, “ What is the role schools and teachers in America?”  Are the teachers simply babysitters, keeping an eye on phone- obsessed kids while their parents are out at work?  What are children learning?   Good question. There are doubtless many children who are open- minded and who reject the long- discredited, but stubbornly- held beliefs of their parents.   But while we still have adults who seriously believe that Genesis states the literal truth about creation, we have to put up with a vocal section of the population who reject every aspect of science, but who hold very significant political power.   

You can’t make America great again when such large numbers of your fellow citizens trash science, scientists and professional research, and elect Know Nothing people who regard anyone educated as “elite”.  Most of the scientists and researchers I have ever encountered were good, nice, interesting and articulate people, but “elite”.   Hardly.

Ignorance rules.  Was it like this fifty years ago?

Unhappier and unhappier

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According to data produced by the General Social Survey Americans are getting more miserable.  On a scale between 1 and 3, where 1 represents “not too happy” and 3 means “very happy”,  Americans on average give themselves 2.18.  In 1993 the figure peaked at 2.26.  The downward trend has been confirmed in the latest World Happiness Report, the overall life satisfaction of Americans falling 6% between 2007 and 2018.  Reasons given for the fall include:

  •  Social media:  young people, alone on their phones or computers, watching others who seem  so good looking, apparently successful, earning good money, with plenty of friends.
  • The opioid epidemic
  • The poor state of health of very many Americans, linked with soaring health costs and the sheer frustration of dealing with health insurance companies, whose objective in life seems to be not to pay out.
  • The gig economy and chronic economic insecurity.
  • Wretched housing and lack of local amenities experienced by black people, plus the insecurity caused by guns.
  • The general feeling of helplessness in a society which is dominated by a very rich 1%, the perceived unfairness and the corruption caused by too much money being flung at politicians in return for favours.
  • The catch-22 situation that young people find themselves in – they are told they have to go college or university to get a good job, but in the process acquire huge student debts that often prevent them saving enough to buy their own houses.

In the Republican desperation to reduce taxes and benefits, aimed at the poor, to jthe benefit of their election donors we have got it all wrong.  Society should not be so skewed and so unfair.  We will surely pay for it.