Colin Lindsay

How the G.O.P. Bill Saves Money: Paperwork, Paperwork, Paperwork

One accurate way of thinking about the Trump bill is that is is a massive wealth transfer from the poorest to the richest.

That wealth transfer is built on administrative burdens: the savings depend on making it harder for eligible claimants to receive benefits.
www.nytimes.com/2025/06/29/u...

Bar graph showing number low income households going without the essentials: May 2022 6.9 million Oct 2022 7.2 million May 2023 7.3 million Oct 2023 7.3 million May 2024 7 million Oct 2024 7 million

Today bills go up.

@jrf-uk.bsky.social October cost of living tracker found 60% of low income families had gone without essentials in the previous 6 months - a figure barely changed in 2.5 years.

This increased to 88% where a family receives disability benefits.

And that’s before the cuts

Navigating Digital Welfare: A Multi‐Level Maze? Greater conceptual and empirical engagement with welfare state complexity is needed in studies of digital welfare. This article explores how existing concepts such as welfare systems, subsidiarisatio...

New article: Navigating Digital Welfare: A Multi-Level Maze? In Social Policy & Administration. I argue that greater conceptual and empirical engagement with welfare state complexity is needed in studies of digital welfare. (OPEN ACCESS) onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

https://www.sgsss.ac.uk/studentship/disabled-peoples-lived-experiences-of-benefit-reform-and-the-costs-of-disability/ ESRC-funded Supervisor-led Studentship Disabled People's Lived Experiences of Benefit Reform and the Costs of Disability University of Glasgow Supervisors: Professor Sharon Wright, Professor Charlotte Pearson, Dr Clementine Hill O'Connor Deadline 10 April, 5pm BST References due 16 April, 5pm BST To apply go to apply.sgsss.ac.uk Picture of historic stone Glasgow University building with green grass, trees and sunshine.

Spread the word! Exciting new fully funded PhD opportunity to research disabled people's lived experiences of benefit reform and the costs of disability.
Deadline: 10 April
@uofglasgow.bsky.social @uofgussp.bsky.social @uofgsps.bsky.social @sgsss.bsky.social @clemmiehilloconnor.bsky.social

Book about Women and Welfare Conditionality: lived experiences of benefit sanctions, work and welfare by Sharon Wright

My Women and Welfare Conditionality book shows how hard it already was for disabled women to manage work and welfare before the new cuts. Research shows that poverty worsens health.

Important new publication from my top colleague @jaywiggan.bsky.social…

Exactly this.👇 There’s a colossal amount of evidence that people on sickness benefits are, erm, sick… driving people into poverty is not going to change that…

Trump Says Recession Unfortunate But Necessary Step To Get To Depression WASHINGTON—Warning that Americans should brace themselves for an economic “period of transition,” President Donald Trump told reporters Monday that a recession would be an unfortunate but necessary step on the way to all-out depression. “Look, what we’re doing is very big and will cause some pain, but that pain is necessary to cause total economic […]

Trump Says Recession Unfortunate But Necessary Step To Get To Depression
theonion.com/trump-s...

It might seem crazy that so many left-wing thought leaders—and even entire media brands, such as the Guardian—would walk away from huge followings on X in exchange for a relatively tiny audience of like-minded souls on Bluesky. (The site’s total user base is well under a tenth of X’s global following.) But the move made sense as an expression of the left’s growing hypersensitivity to ideas leftists find offensive. Having emerged from the intersectional hothouses of academia, many progressives today view policy disputes through a therapeutic lens: They see themselves—and the marginalized groups they claim to speak for—as victims of trauma. The solution to that trauma is not rigorous debate. Quite the opposite; they need protection. Exposure to dangerous speech could threaten their mental stability. So progressives now treat opposing ideas not as errors that need to be rebutted with facts, but as dangerous contagions that must be quarantined.

Thought I'd seen the dumbest, most ignorant take on Bluesky last year, but I was wrong. This person is living in a world that only exists in their own mind.

As far as I can tell, the author is not even on Bluesky, so they've just fantasized what must be happening here.

Lovely story here from @glasgowbell.bsky.social… 🙂👇

Hugely enjoyed this excellent event with top Scottish author Lisa Ballantyne…

How EDI, cancel culture and bad boards are killing our universities With British institutions copying the likes of Harvard in stifling free speech, the only way back to reason is explicit guarantees for academic freedom

Reminder that "free speech" champion Niall Ferguson, as a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution, commissioned "opposition research" on an undergraduate whose politics he didn't like...😉

archive.ph/gJwoL

How can policy boost productivity growth? | Institute for Fiscal Studies At this policy conference, four panels of experts will give their perspectives and recommendations on four key areas of the UK’s productivity problem.

CONFERENCE: How can policy boost productivity growth?

Tuesday 25 March | 9:30 – 16:30 | Church House, Westminster

Four panels and keynote speaker Jonathan Haskel will give expert perspectives on the UK’s productivity problems.

Join the waiting list to attend here:

Drs Rachel Clarke & Olena Parichuk standing in front of the Hospice Ukraine Land Rover

If you are reeling from Trump & Vance's disgusting performance towards Zelensky last night, might you consider donating to www.hospiceukraine.com, the tiny charity I set up with Henry Marsh to support local Ukrainian palliative care teams?

We delivered this Land Rover to a rural hospice in Dec...

DOGE is dismantling all aspect of civic tech in the federal government - both 18F and the US Digital Service were the hubs for skilled technologists who wanted to improve public services. They are now being pushed out of government.

Sticking with the mission: no time for the UK government to lose momentum - LGiU Dr Ian C Elliott asks if the UK government has abandoned its mantra of mission-driven government for economic growth at all costs.

Interesting article for us from @ianelliott.bsky.social asking whether the UK government's mantra of mission-driven government has given way to economic growth at all costs #localgov
lgiu.org/blog-article/sticki...

Tonight!

Saint Mungo on the facade of Saint Ninian's Church on Pollokshaws Road on the Southside of Glasgow. You can tell it's Saint Mungo because of the dead fish with the ring in its mouth at the base of the statue.

Cont./

#glasgow #architecture #sculpture #stmungo #pollokshields

School breakfast clubs in England ‘will be used to justify keeping the two-child benefits cap’ As the education secretary announces the first primary schools to offer free breakfasts, Labour MPs question the commitment to fighting poverty

An ambitious child poverty strategy must put cash in the pockets of the worst off.

Hope this article is just flying a kite - a strategy that ignores the evidence would be embarrassing

www.theguardian.com/education/20...

NOIR: Truth, Lies and Moral Ambiguity with the Scottish Writer Lisa Ballantyne - Institut français · Écosse Lisa Ballantyne is the internationally bestselling author of five novels. Her debut, The Guilty One was nominated for an Edgar Allan Poe Award, Longlisted for the International IMPAC Dublin Literary A...

Looking forward to a terrific evening with brilliant Scottish author Lisa Ballantyne @ballantyne-writer.bsky.social this Tuesday at the Institut français d’Écosse in Edinburgh… still a few tickets available…
www.ifecosse.org.uk/events-agend...

Fix arts degree underfunding to turbocharge UK’s creative economy Talent pipeline for the UK’s £100 billion creative arts industries is under threat as universities shutter loss-making arts degrees, says Ravensbourne vice-chancellor Andy Cook

Opinion: The talent pipeline for the UK’s £100 billion creative arts industries is under threat as universities shutter loss-making arts degrees, says Ravensbourne vice-chancellor Andy Cook

#AcademicSky #EduSky

The old Marlborough sign is up ahead of tomorrow's reopening 😍 Every time I post something about this old haunt, it seems like half the south side got married there back in the day 😂 Will be curious to see what they've done with the place.

#Glasgow

Fascinated by Lisa Nandy’s theory of being DCMS Secretary.

Excellent piece by @tomcalver.bsky.social debunking the myth that migrants who come on "dependant" visas don't work/contribute (1/2)

www.thetimes.com/article/48e9...

Probably just me but the guy on the left of row two looks helluva like Noel Gallagher … mural on gable wall of University of Strathclyde building on Nth Portland St, Glasgow

Welcome to trove.scot | The key to Scotland's past betaThis is a new service. Yourfeedback - external linkwill help us to improve it.

This new website is phenomenal: 3 million records covering 5,000 years of Scottish history, pulling together various resources from Historic Environment Scotland into one platform. Great stuff 👏

The right kind of growth for everyone: policy challenges during the digital and green transformations Abstract. The UK, like other Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) economies, has experienced a dismal decade and a half since the

Not sure how often this link works for free, but here is my latest article, 'The Right Kind of Growth for Everyone': academic.oup.com/cjres/articl...

The most important thread you'll read today. In brief: Europe has the power to save Ukraine and slip into the leadership position America has vacated. It must grasp it. And Europeans must pressure their governments to do so.

Can AI solve the peer review crisis in economics? New study explores AI’s potential and biases in evaluating research papers

Can #AI fix #PeerReview?

In a new IZA DP @patpat.bsky.social et al. tested an LLM on 9,030 submissions. It ranks quality well but favors elite institutions, famous economists & men—while struggling to distinguish AI-generated papers from real research.

newsroom.iza.org/en/archive/r...

Screenshot from a Daily Telegraph article highlighting the difficulties GB News has had in attracting advertisers. Text reads: "For GB News chief executive Angelos Frangopoulos, countering the threat from Stop Funding Hate (SFH) has been a constant worry since the station was founded: “We were cancelled before we launched,” he tells me. “The jungle drums were beating on social media before we even got going”. And he admits that this campaign was effective: “Stop Funding Hate played a really central role in positioning us as a ‘hate’ outfit. But their opposition is"

"For GB News chief executive Angelos Frangopoulos, countering the threat from Stop Funding Hate (SFH) has been a constant worry since the station was founded" - Daily Telegraph

Your support can help keep up the pressure: www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/stop-gb-news