Should under 18 year olds get a minimum wage of £10 an hour?

It was announced today that if Labour get into power, they will introduce a £10 minimum wage, including for those under 18 years old.  See, for example, this guardian article.

Paul Johnson, the director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, has attacked the £10 an hour minimum wage proposal for under 18 year olds. He asks whether people this young need £10 an hour since they'll be living with their parents.

Apart from the fact that obviously people older than 18 live with their parents too, we can argue that about anyone. Does anyone need their hourly wage if they have any savings, or if others can help them etc? Do CEO's need £10 an hour (least of all the wages they actually get) since they can clearly survive with the wealth they already have? 

It's preposterous to decide someone's wage by considering whether others will support them. And I see no moral reason why one's age should disqualify one from the safety net of a minimum wage. You have to pay wages according to the skills they have and the work they do. Age ought not to matter.

2 women meet in the Afterlife

Two women who have recently died meet in the afterlife.

First woman says: Hi! My name is Jane.

Second woman says: Hi! I'm Mary. How did you die?

Jane says: I froze to death.

Mary says: How horrible!

Jane says: It wasn't so bad. After I quit shaking from the cold, I began to get warm and sleepy and finally had a peaceful death. What about you?

Mary says: I died of a massive heart attack. I suspected that my husband was cheating on me, so I came home early to catch him in the act. But instead, I found him all by himself in the den watching TV.

Jane says: So what happened?

Mary says: I was so sure there was another woman in the house somewhere that I started running all over the house looking for her. I ran up to the attic and searched. I ran down to the basement and searched.

Then I went through every closet and checked under all of the beds. I kept this up until I had looked everywhere, and finally I became so exhausted that I just keeled over with a heart attack and died.

Jane says: Too bad you didn't look in the freezer. We'd both still be alive.

The Wisdom of Socrates

Keep this in mind the next time you are about to repeat a rumour or spread gossip.

In ancient Greece (469 - 399 BC), Socrates was widely lauded for his wisdom. One day an acquaintance ran up to him excitedly and said, "Socrates, do you know what I just heard about Diogenes?"

"Wait a moment," Socrates replied, "Before you tell me I'd like you to pass a little test. It's called the Triple Filter Test."

"Triple filter?" asked the acquaintance.

"That's right," Socrates continued, "Before you talk to me about Diogenes let's take a moment to filter what you're going to say. The first filter is Truth. Have you made absolutely sure that what you are about to tell me is true?"

"No," the man said, "Actually I just heard about it."

"All right," said Socrates, "So you don't really know if it's true or not. Now let's try the second filter, the filter of Goodness. Is what you are about to tell me about Diogenes something good?"

"No, on the contrary..."

"So," Socrates continued, "You want to tell me something about Diogenes that may be bad, even though you're not certain it's true?"

The man shrugged, a little embarrassed. Socrates continued, "You may still pass the test though, because there is a third filter, the filter of Usefulness. Is what you want to tell me about Diogenes going to be useful to me?"

"No, not really."

"Well," concluded Socrates, "If what you want to tell me is neither True nor Good nor even Useful, why tell it to me or anyone at all?"

The man was bewildered and ashamed. This is an example of why Socrates was a great philosopher and held in such high esteem.

It also explains why Socrates never found out that Diogenes was banging his wife.

Organs of the body

All the organs of the body were having a meeting, trying to decide who was the one in charge.

"I should be in charge," said the brain , "because I run all the body's systems, so without me nothing would happen."

"I should be in charge," said the blood , "because I circulate oxygen all over so without me you'd all waste away."

"I should be in charge," said the stomach, "because I process food and give all of you energy."

"I should be in charge," said the legs, "because I carry the body wherever it needs to go."

"I should be in charge," said the eyes, "because I allow the body to see where it goes."

"I should be in charge," said the rectum, "because I'm responsible for waste removal."

All the other body parts laughed at the rectum and insulted him, so in a huff, he shut down tight.

Within a few days, the brain had a terrible headache, the stomach was bloated, the legs got wobbly, the eyes got watery, and the blood was toxic. They all decided that the rectum should be the boss ..

The Moral of the story? Even though the others do all the work... The arsehole is usually in charge.

Pub Quiz Machine

I remember back at Uni when I, amongst other students, was watching someone play a pub quiz machine. He just could simply answer all the questions, or almost all of them. I couldn't answer any of them! Not one . . Until for the jackpot it asked what fianchetto pertains to. It gave 4 options. Well I knew it was chess, which was one of the options. I spoke up. He ignored me. He thought I was completely thick I think. I spoke more loudly and he pressed chess. And he got it right and won £50. He looked around at me with some surprise and said I'd managed to win him £50. He should have bought me a bloody pint!

Name a country

Despite my appalling geography, this seems ridiculously easy. Just point to good ol' England! (extreme left). Novel way of displaying a world map though.

Can you name any country???? pic.twitter.com/73gewiekKH

— Physics & Astronomy Zone (@ZonePhysics) May 2, 2019

My Energy Bill

First of all I live in the UK and npower supply both my electricity and gas. From the 24/4/18 to 25/4/19 i.e 1 year and 1 day, my total energy bill i.e both electricity and gas, came to £952.29. That was for 3,475 Kwh's electricity and 10,744 Kwh's gas. I was paying by direct debit £80 per calendar month.

However, now the tariffs have finished I'm been switched back to the default tariffs, and my projected cost for the next year will be £1,296! But, what if I opt for the cheapest tariffs npower have to offer? Using the same amount of energy it will cost me £101 per month or around 1,212 per year. An increase from £952.29 to £1,212 using the exact same energy and using the cheapest tariffs available on npower. That's a 27.3% increase in price in the space of a year. Inflation rate is 1.9% That's a significant difference!

I think it's time to switch energy suppliers. "Which" informs me that Avro is cheapest at £985.76 assuming the same energy I used last year. Significantly cheaper than npowers cheapest at £1,212. However, it's still more expensive than what I actually paid npower for the previous year i.e £952.29. So even if I switch to the cheapest energy company I will be paying £985.76 - £952.29 = £33.47 extra. But what choice do I have?

Update (about 30 mins later). The monthly payment of £101 for the cheapest tariff was based on the figure that an npower person gave me, namely if I am to use 3,855 kwh's electricity (he never provided the details for gas). However, over the past year (I summed up the amount in each bill), I've only used 3,475 kwh's. Furthermore, the "which" site is saying the cheapest npower tariff for my energy use will only be £94 a month. So this 27% increase will be incorrect, it'll be less than that. Apparently it'll be 12 * £94 = £1,128. That's still too much though since I paid £952.29 last year.

If I do nothing it'll be going up to £107 a month.  Presumably that's a projection of how much I'll need to pay given my energy use over the past year.  12 * £107 = £1,284


These energy suppliers appear to go out of the way to try and confuse people as much as possible!