There's a big discussion going on right now, which is being driven by some new research. The argument that people are leaving the workforce due to illness conflates two separate phenomena. So in other words, what we're seeing here is it's not that sick people are suddenly dropping out of work and becoming inactive. It's more that inactive people could be falling sick. And so why is this so hard to to unpick from the data? Well, I think as always the issue is a lack of data or confusion in the data.
A surprise peace agreement should permit desperately needed humanitarian relief for millions in the region of Tigray—but there are reasons to doubt the grinding conflict is at an end. Britain has a problem that other rich countries do not: its over-50s are flooding out of the labour market. And our correspondent attends an unexpectedly tame “crypto rave”.
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