Politics Theory Other is brought to you by the show's supporters on Patreon and also by Verso Books

who publish lots of excellent left-wing titles, perfect for PTO listeners.

Until January 3rd, Verso have 40% off everything on their website.

Highlights this year include Bad Gays by Hugh Lemmy and Ben Miller,

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Verso's big end-of-year sale finishes on January 3rd.

Go to versobbooks.com for more information.

You are now listening to Macrodotes.

Hello and welcome to MacroDose, a podcast hosted by me, James Meadway, that brings you your weekly fix of everything economics and a quick 15-minute roundup.

Each Wednesday morning, we bring you the key stories making the news and the analysis you need to make sense of them.

In this week's episode, I'll be looking at, first, with the biggest wave of strikes in Britain for a generation or more,

can we afford to pay public sector workers properly, that the government says no.

Secondly, I'll take a look at the new plans to deregulate Britain's financial system and what they mean for any future financial crises.

Finally, with three big central banks across the world set to announce more interest rate rises this week,

we'll have a look at whether any of this is really doing any good.

On to our first story. Can we afford the public sector pay rises that striking workers are demanding right the way across the public sector, from nurses to university, lecturers to postal workers?

All of them are putting in claims, asking for pay increases that at least meet the rate of inflation that we now face, which remains very, very high.

The price of particularly essentials, everyone will have noticed food and energy has been soaring

over the last year, but public sector pay, in particular, has been held down very deliberately

by this government, not just over the last year or so, but really for the last decade.

...