Where I Stand on Scottish Independence

Much of my last post on “A Just Scotland” concerned the constitutional settlement for Scotland, and in particular the outcome of the proposed referendum in 2014 on Scottish independence.

I rarely post here about overtly party political matters, though much that I write about is “political”; but the arguments for and against independence go beyond (or, at least, ought to go beyond) party politics, and I thought it only right that I should explain where I stand on Scottish independence.

I have already made up my mind how I’ll vote (though of course I have plenty of time to change it – and if I do, I’ll post about it!).

I am against independence.

My decision stems from three arguments, any one of which I think would stop me voting “yes” to independence.

The first is the outright uncertainty in what we are voting for. Fortunately, the recent “Edinburgh agreement” restricts the referendum to a single question on independence. (The precise wording is being overseen by the Electoral Commission – the wording of the question may make a big difference to the outcome.) But quite what a “yes” vote may mean is unknown: in the EU or not, in NATO or not, contributing to UK armed forces or not, in sterling or the euro (or neither) or not, the amount of debt UK national debt that will be allocated to Scotland… The list of unknowables is long. Some of these might be decided – or at least a policy decided – before the referendum, but much which be decided as part of negotiations should there be a “yes” vote. Which of course means that we won’t know what we’re actually voting for in 2014.

The second factor is the complexity. Scotland and the rest of the UK have been so closely linked since unification in 1707 that common institutions are intricately tangled, and untangling them will be difficult. Rebuilding these from scratch would be costly. One of the advantages of union is the economies of scale resulting from being part of a larger whole. At its most basic, having the infrastructure for tax collection in place is a huge boon. (Imagine the economic hiccup in switching from one tax collection system to another: just as when one changes jobs, the Scottish government would need to build up a reserve to tide the country over the gap.) It might be possible to outsource much of the bureaucratic infrastructure – I’ll bet the UK government would happily do the job (for a cost). Or maybe not: HMRC might just laugh at us, and not hand over their share. Scotland would have minimal leverage. And no representation. Even if the Scottish government were able outsource the bureaucracy for so much of our day to day lives back to London, what then would be the benefit of independence? Nothing would have changed.

The difficulty for business would be immense: the large number of cross-boarder businesses which would, one way or another, need to account for their Scottish and other UK operations separately would make this a vast, and expensive, task. (I recently had a conversation with a friend who had been working on the transfer of over 300 RBS branches to Santander – a deal that has subsequently fallen through. Both organisations had large teams working on this, and the complexity of the process was mind-boggling.) Separating two countries that have been so tightly linked would be several times more complicated – an enormous and costly task.

It is also possible that there could be a large number of talented people who migrate from Scotland to greener grass south of the boarder if Scotland gains independence, leaving the country financially and culturally poorer.

The last, and frankly killer, argument is economic. Scotland’s economy is inextricably tied up with England’s. Excluding oil and gas, Scotland exports goods and services (excluding oil) worth £45bn (2010) to the rest of the UK (ie England), more than twice the £22bn it exported overseas [pdf]. (Of the £22bn of international exports, £10bn went to the EU, £4bn to the USA and £2bn to Asia.) For business reasons, it would make sense to keep sterling: the costs of transacting in another currency could be very large.

There are at least two other options: Scotland could join the euro (though it is doubtful that could take immediate effect – the Maastricht criteria for joining the euro have a minimum of a two-year lag period, during which the nation’s currency must be in ERM II (which sterling would not be, of course); or Scotland could issue its own currency (like Irish punts before Ireland joined the euro). Given the current state of the euro and the stringent economic conditions being set by the European Central Bank, it is unlikely the Scottish government would chose that path. And the costs associated with establishing its own currency (which would have no value in the money markets and which would impose large transaction costs on business) would, I believe, make this a non-starter.

(The SNP states that “…on independence day … the pound will be our currency“, but there are many views which dispute the workability of this.)

Without an independent currency, in what way could an economy be independent? Any economic decisions made by an independent Scottish government would be subject to decisions on monetary policy decided in London or in Frankfurt – that is, fundamental decisions on interest rates and monetary supply. Fiscal policy – tax raising and spending powers – would be determined in Scotland, but it is fair to assume that the yield on Scottish government bonds (the rate of interest charged by the money markets) would be higher than that on UK government bonds, if only because the market would be so much smaller (and hence less liquid). It would therefore cost more for the Scottish government to borrow money to fund its activities.

Either way, the Scottish government would have its hands tied – by the Bank of England, the European Central Bank – or even by the financial markets. It would be independent in name only, and at great cost.

And that is why I am against independence.

Other sources I looked at when trying to set out my views include

• Fraser of Allander Institute presentation on “The Economics of Scottish Independence [pdf]“
• the UK parliament debate on the referendum question
• the Electoral Commission’s response to consultations on the referendum [pdf]
• The Guardian’s “Datablog”: Scotland independence: all the data you need

“A Just Scotland”?

Last month, just after discussing “caring capitalism“, I spent the day at an event organised by the STUC to consult on A Just Scotland.

The campaign describes this as a “more equal and socially just Scotland”. This is undeniably a worthy aim but it doesn’t actually say what it means by “just”: equal income, wealth, oropportunity? How would we know if we had got there – and can we ever get there?

I’ll admit to being right outside my comfort zone: whilst I had known that it was organised by the STUC, I hadn’t expected it to be quite so old-world (party) political. As an open meeting, covering such a broad, important topic, I had expected a wide range of views and stances. As it is, I was way to the right of just about everyone else there, and there was a somewhat lazy, unquestionning attitude from other attendees (not necessarily the organisers or those speaking from the platform) that everyone there was a socialist of one form or another.

For me, the objective of “a just Scotland” is way beyond politics. Though prompted by the desire to explore what Scotland could be like following a constitutional settlement on independence (or “devo max” or “devo plus” or – whatever!), and the STUC wanting to help shape political thinking, seeking a just Scotland is also way beyond independence: it ought to be a valid political goal whatever the outcome.

As well as old-school politics, the meeting also felt old-school: there were pre-prepared papers from the STUC, and then points from the floor – but little real discussion: the way the meeting and workshops were managed meant the audience could make their points but not really engage in dialogue with each other. I think a freer discussion might have prompted more debate – personally I’d have gone for an “unconference” format to fully explore the issues and come up with actions for engagement (though you would have expected me to say that). I’m a bit worried that by raising the topic and setting a political agenda: it is too easy to then leave it to politicians to deliver; if that had been a good idea, the STUC wouldn’t have needed to have a series of discussions to set the agenda, because politicians would have had social justice as an objective long ago. (I don’t think this is something one can just lay at the door of the coalition – nor even the 1980s, Thatcherite Conservative party: measured by the Gini coefficient, income inequality increased during the last Labour governments.)

Peter Kelly of Poverty Alliance ran through some frankly disturbing statistics on the impact of poverty, particularly on children. He said 20% of children live in low income households. (The Scottish Government’s figures show 15% of the population in “relative poverty”. Interesting, they also show the Gini coefficient for Scotland to be lower than Great Britain as a whole – meaning Scotland has a little less income inequality. I couldn’t find figures for child poverty on the Scottish Government’s site, despite a link saying they’d be there, but the End Child Poverty campaign shows 35% of families with children in Glasgow are on benefits, and whilst the average elsewhere in Scotland comes out at about 18%, the large population of Glasgow might give 20% across the nation. Of course, defining poverty is one of the ongoing difficulties.)

His main point was that these statistics are not fixed: they are the result of choices politicians – and their voters – make. Low pay has persisted for many years; the gap in education between those in poverty and those not lingers for years, with a youth unemployment rate of 12% pre-dating the recession. He saw these as issues of power and democracy – and addressing them would cut across reserved and devolved constitutional powers.

There were several comments from the floor. Most powerfully, I thought, was Andy Myles from Scottish Environment Link, an umbrella body for environmental NGOs, who said that climate change was more important than constitutional change: that is, in making decisions about Scotland, we should ask what it is we want: Scottish Environment Link have set out what they think [pdf], and they are hard to argue with.

Angus Reid read out his “Call For A Constitution” – and again, it is hard to argue with his goals. (This could be an issue: I agree we should have less poverty, more equality, better care for the environment, and everything… I want it all – but there are bound to be some conflicts: do we just leave it to the politicians to decide the priorities?)

These things are of course the nuts and bolts of politics. Someone else pointed out that the political choice people make in Scotland, whilst similar to north England, Wales and Northern Ireland, differ from those of south England, where much of the nation’s wealth is now concentrated.

There were two workshop sessions and several that sounded interesting, so I picked the two that were most closely attuned to my interests. First up was a discussion on the economy and fair taxation. There wasn’t actually much discussion about taxation – somewhat surprising given how much tax has been in the news recently – and a lot about the economy.

Economic arguments seem to be key in the debate about independence – and of course there are rarely clear answers in economics. STUC is calling for changes to the economic model to make it more just – moving to fair, progressive taxation and a distribution of wealth from the rich to the needy; but I couldn’t help thinking that much of the STUC’s thinking is rooted deeply in the old economic model of 20th century industrial orthodoxy – such as seeking to maximise employment. (The STUC’s job is of course to act for the benefit of its members – those employed, largely in the public sector.) As those present discussed way to reintroduce growth to the Scottish economy, I was once again struck by the thought that if radical change is needed, it won’t be obtained by working within the same old economic models which have clearly failed to deliver over the past fifty years.

In a world dominated by global markets, the options for Scotland – independent or otherwise – are limited. Someone pointed out that there is sufficient wealth in the world, but it is unequally distributed. Of course, in global terms, even the poor of Scotland are probably comparatively well off.

The Scottish government does have some limited tax raising powers: it could impose an additional 3% of income tax (the Scottish government held a consultation on local tax raising powers a few years ago – but using such powers might be political suicide), and it controls council tax (held static for several years – a potentially undemocratic, regressive move) and business rates. The Scotland Act 2012 will give the Scottish government more tax raising powers from 2015, although according to Jon Swinney of the SNP, this will only account for 15% of all taxes raised in Scotland. (The rest will be covered by VAT, corporation tax, national insurance and so on.)

There was much discussion of the the nature of currency post independence. There seem to be three options:

• maintain sterling
• join the euro
• establish Scottish “punt”

The last of these seems unfeasible since it would have no value in global markets: transactions with other economies would probably be denominated in pounds, euros or dollars. But if an independent Scotland had sterling or the euro, it would have no control over money supply and interest rates (we have seen how well this has worked for the smaller economies of the euro over the last five years or so). Scotland would thus not control its economy – and not really be independent at all. (For me, this is the killer argument against independence. Economically, it just won’t work.)

The second workshop I attended was on education, participation and democracy. (The briefing paper is apparently missing from the website.) Education is already wholly devolved, and the Scottish education system has always been separate (and many would claim better) than its English counterpart. The Scottish Curriculum for Excellence (on which I worked several years ago) is designed to deliver learning outcomes appropriate for each learner, for ages from 3 to 18 years (ie pre-school to leaving secondary education) and across all abilities. The curriculum is built around “four capacities” – creating

• successful learners
• confident individuals
• responsible citizens
• effective contributors

All very laudable, and clearly forming the foundations for a just society, I’d say.

In the discussion, education was suggested as the bedrock of democratic participation, and this is certainly encompassed in the curriculum capacity of “responsible citizens”. But about of quarter of Scots have problems with literacy or numeracy (compared with 16% for England – I’m not sure if the same things are being measured, but it is a guide; for the UK as a whole, about 20% are functionally illiterate). That is quite a big difference, and the Scottish Government has long had a strategy to improve adult literacy. (It also questions Scotland’s apparently superior education system.)

Comparatively low levels of literacy may also hamper economic development – and certainly reduce the options for employment.

It was said that poverty reduces participation in democracy, with a lower turnout in elections in poorer regions than rich. The Electoral Reform Society found a link between social exclusion and political engagement [pdf] – with “near universal association between political participation [electoral and political] and socio-economic status” (p20).

The election for the Scottish Parliament of 2011 had a 50% turnout whilst the turnout in Scottish seats in the UK Parliamentary election of 2010 was 64% – quite a significant difference. The difference is consistent, too: the 2007 Scottish Parliamentary election had a turnout of 52% [pdf], the Scottish turnout in the 2005 general election was 61%. I believed devolution was meant to increase engagement, but apparently this hasn’t happened.

After the workshops, there was a debate between Ewan Hunter, representing the “Yes” campagin, and Kezia Dugdale MSP representing “Better Together” (as the “No” campaign has styled itself). Frankly, Dugdale knocked Hunter’s contribution into a cocked hat – but then she is a professional politician. Hunter failed to address the topic of day – that of a just Scotland – focussing instead on the arguments in favour of independence. He highlighted one of the major problems with the Yes campaign – that voters don’t actually know what they will be voting for: the details can’t be worked out until the vote has decided. Sterling or Euro? Inside the EU or not? In NATO or not? Let alone what the financial settlement with Westminster would be – I’m sure HM Treasury would be more than pleased to offload RBS and HBoS and their billions of pounds of debt.

Dugdale did address the issue of a just Scotland, highlighting the SNP had rejected proposals for a “living wage” (which, lets face it, even Tory London mayor Boris Johnson has signed up to – albeit on a voluntary basis). She proposed to devolve power down to give communities more say (the Scottish government consulted on the Community Empowerment and Renewal Bill during the summer). My only caveat to Dugdale’s contribution was that her party, Labour, were dominant in the Scottish parliament for two terms, and failed to address the issues of poverty and inequality raised by A Just Scotland.

It was an interesting, challenging day; at a fundamental level, I agree with the objectives of the campaign for A Just Scotland, and believe that they are bigger than political parties and the old arguments between right and left; and indeed bigger than the constitutional settlement. Whatever the outcome of the referendum, these issues should be addressed: how to do that is a much bigger question.

“Caring Capitalism”?

There was a bit of an unintentional theme running through a couple of events and conversations I’ve been to over the past few weeks regarding the future of capitalism and corporations, and then last week Ed Miliband’s speech at this year’s Labour conference continued his emphasis last year on “predatory capitalism“.

Miliband was talking about aggressive capitalism which he saw as damaging the economy, and I doubt anyone could really disagree right now.

Last month I went to a talk on “caring capitalism” – perhaps the antidote to Miliband’s “predatory capitalism”. Focusing on social enterprise – as the speakers pointed out, a broad term with no real definition (though Wikipedia has a go) – as a means to create a more just society, a few different models were explored: though frankly none of them seemed particularly new.

For Helen Chambers and Mary Duffy, a social enterprise is one which exists specifically for social purposes, working within a commercial, for profit model – with a commnon principle “to do good”. Two specific organisations – Haven Products and Rag Tag ‘n’ Textile – were used as examples though the latter is a registered charity (and hence a not-for profit – although presumably just as many charities run retail, for profit operations, it does too). Both these organisations work largely for the benefit of their employees, providing opportunities to those who might otherwise not find employment.

Other objectives for social enterprises include working for the benefit of employees more generally, suppliers (such as fairtrade), the environment, and the wider community.

Whilst social enterprises might explicitly have such objectives, I can’t help thinking that most commercial corporations implicitly act in a similar fashion: a business which works against customers, suppliers or the community should not prosper, at least in the long term: if you work against customers, they will move (that’s what competition is about). Many commercial, profit-seeking organisations make large donations to charity – including banks such as the near-collapsed RBS. The rising interest in corporate social responsibility has focused investors, managers, employees and other “stakeholders” on organisations’ governance, ethics, ways of working and their internal and external relationships. (Much of this may be mere window dressing, though…)

Much of the talk was about social investment. It sounded like a wall of philanthropic finance was pouring into a small, undeveloped and fragmented sector: this could distort the economics and lead to imperfect allocation (one of the things markets are supposed to be good at – though the economic crisis has clearly dented that particular claim). But the amounts of money are still chickenfeed compared to the amounts spent by governments.

Nor is philanthropy anything new – Andrew Carnegie distributed his large wealth, endowing libraries, museums and universities; other “robber barons” such as Frick, Rockefeller and Vanderbilt did the same. Indeed, contrite financiers such as Michael Milken have tried to make amends through charitable donations and work, though the rich have long been using the gains – ill-gotten or not – to buy forgiveness.

Most social enterprises are small: perhaps it is easier of small organisations working outside the usual constraints of (non-social) investors “to be good”. Certainly large, international corporations seem to suffer from much of the criticism – perhaps because they are further from their suppliers, customers and communities: and of course one of the main advantages of large organisations – the ability to leverage economies of scale – means that someone, somewhere is paying more or getting less than smaller firms.

I still believe that outside a few industries – tobacco, arms and extractive industries, perhaps – all businesses benefit from “doing good”, if they want returning customers. Perhaps some organisation structures are better fitted for this than others – cooperatives, employee-owned firms or mutuals, perhaps. With businesses focused on customers, employees and suppliers, all organisations would be “social enterprises”: exploitation of one or oanother of these key groups would be to the detriment of the business.

Or what am I missing?

Trying to Understand the Financial Crisis…

Some time back, someone shared a new acronym with me: GFC. For those, like me, not in the know, this is apparently the hip shorthand for the global financial crisis – the economic mire that engulfs us all. It has been going on, more or less, for five years now, with every indication that it will get worse. It is its evolution from a banking crisis to a sovereign debt crisis – at least within the Eurozone – that gives me my optimistic outlook. I’ve been trying to write this post for ages, but every time I do, the story gets bigger and and seem to be constantly changing. It still is.

I have written this in an attempt to understand how we got here. I must stress that, whilst I have taken a couple of classes in economics, I am not an economist. I am sure I am missing large chunks, and I look forward to being corrected by people who have a greater understanding of these matters than I have.

“Silence Is The Question”: a dialogue

I went to my first “seasonal dialogue” last week – named because there are four a year, I’m told. The group has been meeting for several years; I was invited by a friend and former colleague, who I had just caught up with after moving back to Edinburgh.

The group consisted of an eclectic mix of about ten people, though many now seemed to freelance in one capacity or another. There was no fixed topic for discussion, though the process (based on “open space“) seemed more formal and as a result the discussion more controlled, respectful and measured than other discussion groups I’ve been to: this made for a somewhat different experience – though perhaps quieter and with less excitement of exploration as others interject. (Normally I think of control as a bad thing, imposed externally to manage or manipulate; in this context, however, the control was self-imposed by members of the group, and a positive.)

In particular, we seemed respectful of the silence. One of the formalities was a “check in” question, to set the tone; and the discussion per se didn’t start till everyone had answered the check in. And people only responded when they chose to. I have never been to a Quaker meeting, but I’m guessing it might feel a but like this.

This was quite hard work: I had things I wanted to say and ask about others’ responses to the check in, and I had to bite my tongue until everyone had had their say. (I had jumped in with my response early on, eager to get going!)

Having to wait – and to listen to others – was humbling. Silence – all too rare in our connected, clouded and device-mediated times – was a good thing. The quality of listening was high: even if it was listening to the silence.

Similarly, the ease with which we disconnected from our devices and connected instead with the group was informative. Like many people, I regularly check Twitter and Facebook, write email or text messages whilst ostensibly doing something else. In the space of the dialogue group, the desire to fill the void created by the silence by getting out one’s phone and seeing what’s going on in the outside world rather than listening to what was going on in the group – albeit silence – wasn’t an option. This felt liberating and healthy.

Silence also played a major part in the discussion later on, as we shifted from one topic to another – unsurprisingly, the silence prompted introspection, and a conversation about silence itself. That silence should be an outcome of conversation sends pleasingly oxymoronic; that it should add value to the conversation doubly so.

There was much resonance with the discussion by Richard Sennett of dialogic as opposed to dialectic, adversarial debate, particularly with respect to learning. The subjunctive and empathetic approach of the dialogue group was certainly in line with Sennett’s approach. It seemed that we were mostly learning about ourselves.

(“Silence Is The Question” is the name of a piece of music written by Reid Anderson. His band The Bad Plus play it on this video.)

Personal Learning Networks: why?

I first came across the term “personal learning network” in a blog post about five years ago (possibly this one from 2008, or this one or maybe this one – or maybe not!).

The phrase was new to me, and frankly I didn’t understand it – or rather, it didn’t seem relevant. And I am still not sure if it is relevant, because my personal learning network – defined by Wikipedia as

an informal learning network that consists of the people a learner interacts with and derives knowledge from…

is constantly changing. Back in 2008 I doubt I was thinking about personal learning much, and most of what I learned came somewhat randomly from the many blogs I read, through an RSS feed.

Following my move to London, that changed: I became involved with Tuttle, where I learned a lot, mostly through conversation, and through Tuttle, the School of Everything, and more specifically its offshoot, Everything Unplugged, a weekly meetup to discuss learning specifically and much else (ranging from politics to art and music) besides.

Fred Garnett, one of the many regulars at Everything Unplugged, recently pulled together others’ thoughts on the gathering, limiting us to 50 words. What I wrote was

A loosely-connected group of people from a diverse range of backgrounds and experiences who gather together to talk about ideas – prompted by, but not exclusively about, an interest in learning. It is essentially an ongoing, wide-ranging conversation which challenges, educates and entertains.

(Fred’s and others’ thoughts can be seen in his presentation on SlideShare.)

So Tuttle and Everything Unplugged formed part of my personal learning network. But – well, conversations are just the start. I think the internet, mediated by Twitter specifically, forms a huge part of my learning environment. Which means anyone sharing a link on Twitter may form part of my PLN. That is a whole lot of people – sufficient for it to be pointless defining it, frankly. Through Twitter, it feels like I have access to the whole world: quite a large network, and one which doesn’t benefit from mapping.

In Edinburgh, where I now live, there are alternatives Tuttle and Everything Unplugged – Edinburgh Coffee Morning, a huge range of meet-ups and tweetups, a dialogue group – ranging from the formal to the very informal, all based around conversation and with various degrees of learning attached.

And of course the internet is still out there, facilitating the exchange of ideas, learning and conversation (as well as cute pictures of cats).

Is there value in the concept of a personal learning network? I think if one has embarked on something with a clear learning objective – gaining a new skill our specific knowledge, or to obtain clearly identifiable learning objectives – it clearly makes sense: it would be the group of people on whom one relies to help meet those objectives. Even then I am not sure on the value of identifying (and hence naming and formalising) that network: I can’t see what is actually gained by doing so. (Though I doubt anything is lost.)

But outside of specific, structured objectives, when the whole world is available to learn from, specifying a discrete network seems almost to defeat the point. With self-directed, self-organised ad hoc – or even self-disorganised – learning, it seems beside the point.

Trends About Trends

William Nelson and Richard Hepburn explored some long term trends in the UK – reassessing them and exploring new qualititative techniques such as crowd sourcing. Such trends have an impact on economics and government policy, as well as fundamentally affecting the way we live our lives (ten years ago I would never have guessed the impact carrying a mobile phone would have on my behaviour!).

The themes they identified were

• changing structure of households (what Nelson called “home-alone v ‘all together now’”): there have been increases in young people staying at home, people living by themselves, couples cohabiting, and young people sharing till later in their lives.The current state of the economy and the jobs market is driving a lot of this as young people stay at home or have to because they can’t afford a place of their own (apparently leading to an increase in squatting in London and some novel approaches to communal living and working elsewhere), but of course it also has economic impacts. Immigration and demographics (which Nelson also covered) will have an effect, too.(
• “smart v connected”: drawing on “the internet of things” – the ability to give any object its own internet identifier – Nelson argued against the need for “smart objects” (all those food-ordering fridges PR-savvy white goods manufacturers say we’ll be buying) but reckoned our homes would become more connected – but under our control. He foresees us using our mobile phones as universal controllers, switching on heating, lights and cookers remotely. As technology converged, he also believed that it would be gas or electricity companies who would own the interface, not the telecoms or media companies that currently own our broadband connections, prompting competition for control of our homes: remote controlled central heating might be the killer app. (Maybe Sky will buy British Gas?)
• social networking to networked socialising: we’ve been living in a technology-mediated networked society since the advent of the telephone in the early 20th century, but we’re increasingly connected. The ability to carry the internet in our pockets has changed the way we behave. Whilst our lives might be more and more busy, we’re also procrastinating more: we might arrange to meet people, but the details – where, when, what – are more flexible and subject to change: we are less willing to commit to a fixed schedule, with frequent and repeat rescheduling. People are more willing to take the best offer that comes along (apparently 40,000 people are stood up every day!). A lot of this happens on mobiles – people are checking what’s on and booking more last minute tickets, which effects artists’ and venues’ planning and pricing strategies.Their is also an increase in “leisure as performance” – people tweeting or Facebooking (is that a verb? I guess so…) photos of themselves at events – the ease of one-to-many communications is turning us into a nation of show-offs – and sharing information about our plans to go to events becomes a currency. Interestingly, one doesn’t actually need to go to the event – you can share the information that, for instance, you’ve got a ticket for the Olympics (posting the details and a photo of the ticket, perhaps) before selling it on. Data about the event can be more valuable than the event itself.

  (It also means we are under self-imposed scrutiny: the more we share online, the more we are building the panopticon… And I am shocked that there is a data analysis firm called Panopticon. Maybe we get the future we deserve.)

• the gender revolution finally happens: decades after the 1960s, Nelson reckoned that changes in gender relations have now become so normal as to cease to be newsworthy – and when things get boring, change has happened. (I know many feminists who may disagree with this; please don’t blame me for sharing his views with you!) There are now more female graduates than male, and they get better degrees; they’re also better at getting jobs than male graduates. Nelson said that women aged 20-29 now have higher hourly wages than men (I have searched the ONS website, which is full of fascinating data, but I can’t figures split by gender and age, so I’ll just have to take his word for it!).As women become more equal to men, they are becoming less equal to each other: there are growing disparities between women. And whilst pay hourly pay might have moved in their favour, women still spend more time on housework (in the US) and are the prime provider of childcare. It’ll be interesting to see if those roles change with women having the higher earning potential.

  There may also be pressure on employers to change their models of employment (strongly rooted in the early 20th century?) to cope with highly qualified, high earning women who want to fit in childcare and their home life, too: this might add pressure to develop more flexible models of employment.

• ageing population: the “demographic timebomb” has almost become a cliche, but it remains important, affecting policy and opinions for decades. 2012 sees a spike of people reaching 65 – the results of a mini baby boom in 1946 and 1947 as soldiers returned from the war. Since Britain didn’t really recover economically for another decade or so – it was in 1957 that MacMillan asserted “you’ve never had it so good” – it won’t be until the 2020s that the wave of over-65s resulting from the 1950s baby boom reach 65.The ONS predicts that the proportion of over-60s will continue to grow whilst the proportion of under-14s is static and the proportion of those aged 15-59 decreases – hence worries of a decreasing working population having to support an increasing number of the old.
  

  Source: ONS, 2010. http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171776_237753.pdf

  None of this is news – the “demographic timebomb” has been written about for decades. But by looking at the detail, we can plan and change – both public policy and our personal choices. For instance, Willie pointed out the market for Saga will grow by 7% pa (I think – I didn’t write the figure down!), without the company doing anything at all. The effect of demographics on policy – the provision of health care, pensions and social care for the elderly, for instance, as well as indirectly affecting, say, transport, housing and industrial policies – and of course the economy

• “the youth of today”
  It was in his discussion of youth that Nelson really challenged our assumptions. The young are not hoodie-wearing rioters drunkenly threatening passers-by: Nelson gave figures from the UK for reducing youth crime, decreasing youth drug and alcohol use and a decreasing teenage pregnancy rates – not the stuff of tabloid headlines.At the same time, parents are being more protective of their children – driving them to school and managing their leisure time (back to the panopticon there…) – in part driven by a culture of fear: children are taught about “stranger danger” when other risks may be more relevant. What effect will “paranoid parenting” have on future generations? Will they learn to assess risk if protected during childhood – surely a key part of growing up? And what will such cosseting have on our children’s future health?

These are just some of the trends that Nelson has worked on; perhaps most interesting is where they intersect: for instance, the effect of the changing nature of networked socialising as the population ages; or the changing form of households when examined through the lens of changing, less rebellious youth; or the impact of changing economic power of (some) women on household structures and the balance between generations.