1/17 and 7/84

With impeccable timing, today we have official US government statistics saying that the top 1% of the US population have 17% of the take-home earnings. Their share has more than doubled from under 8% in 1979.

This vast gap between rich and poor, and rich and middling, has expanded fast and is now expanding exponentially faster. I have no doubt figures for the UK would show the same trend.

It also made me think nostalgically of the 7/84 Company and the play they made famous: The Cheviot, The Stag and The Black Black Oil. It had a massive effect on my teenage political consciousness when I saw it on the BBC in June 1974. There is absolutely no way the BBC would ever broadcast such a radical piece now, let alone to a prime time BBC 1 audience.