New research suggests that, contrary to dismal official statistics, Britain’s economy has actually been enjoying a two-year productivity boom.

Productivity – the economic output of each worker per hour – has been growing by 1.1% a year since late 2024, according to the Resolution Foundation. That’s far higher than the official 0.2% estimate from the Office for National Statistics. The think tank argues that its analysis of  HMRC payroll data and tax returns from the self-employed provides a more accurate representation of the workforce than the much-criticised ONS Labour Force Survey.

What did the commentators say?
The introduction of AI into sectors like IT and financial services could be “boosting output per hour”, said Mehreen Khan, economics editor at The Times. Increases in employment taxes might also have led to hospitality and retail job cuts, making the average worker in that sector appear more productive.

“But neither explanation is borne out by the data,” said Simon Pittaway, the Resolution Foundation’s principal economist. The share of the workforce employed in hospitality is not lower than it was in the late 2010s, and AI is more widespread across different sectors of the economy. “The UK’s productivity recovery has been achieved by the same workers, doing the same jobs, and working in the same sectors.”

The UK is now in “an OK place”, said Morgan Stanley’s chief UK economist, Bruna Skarica. Well, that’s true of “the top end” of Britain’s economy, said Mihir Sharma on Bloomberg, but “the bottom is struggling”. Slowing wage growth, fewer job vacancies and rising unemployment all tell an “uncomfortable” story. Britain has had a “K-shaped recovery” since Labour took office. Its “nascent top-end revival is worth protecting” but policymakers must think harder about “how to get young people, and those in AI-exposed professions, in on those productivity gains”.

What next?
When productivity in the US “picked up after the pandemic”, it continued to stay strong, said Reuters; Skarica at Morgan Stanley expects a similar pattern in Britain. But the recovery “needs to be sustained and built upon if it’s to lead to big improvements in living standards”, said Pittaway at the Resolution Foundation. 

Dolly Parton’s extraordinary back catalogue has “long taken on a life of its own outside country music”, said Alexis Petridis in The Guardian. And perhaps no song has done that more than “Jolene”, her 1974 hit which has, so far, been covered more than 90 times. 

‘Cocktail of mixed emotions’
Parton “amassed countless hits and accolades,” said USA Today, “but few songs have stood the test of time quite like her beloved tune ‘Jolene’”. The song first appeared on her 13th studio album, released in October 1973, and it reached No. 1 on the US chart in February 1974. It was inspired by a “red-haired bank clerk” who had been flirting with her husband.

The song not only became “one of the most renowned songs in country music”, it also “transcended genre lines”. In 2004, it was No. 217 on Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Songs of All Time” and, in 2021, it reached No. 63 on a revised list. “Jolene” has become a “constant presence” in pop culture, “with multiple generations discovering, covering and falling in love with the tune”.

A large part of the song’s appeal is how “open-ended” and relatable it is, said Annie Zaleski on country-music magazine The Boot. We may know how upset the “inadequate” protagonist is, but “we’re not quite sure how her story ends”. Some of the final lyrics – “I had to have this talk with you / My happiness depends on you” – can be interpreted as “breezy, a stern warning shot or downright passive-aggressive”. In just three minutes, Parton digs into a “cocktail of mixed emotions – jealousy, anger, sadness, fright – that, to this. day captures the complicated dimensions of the human condition”.

Blending story with musical drama
In “Jolene”, as well as other major hits such as “I Will Always Love You” and “9 to 5”, Parton shows herself to be a “skilful musician” who knows “how to blend the story of lyrics with the drama of music”, said creative arts academic Wendy Hargreaves on The Conversation. 

The chords “pound out an appropriately bleak minor key, ascending to higher chords with each dramatic call of the name ‘Jolene’”. Underneath the accompanying vocals, an “intriguing, rapid-fire, finger-picking guitar” maintains an “incessant motion that not only adds tension but draws admiration for skilful playing”. Her lyrics tell the story, and, importantly “her music matches it”.

A woman is carried to safety after flash flooding hit Devghat in Nepal’s Nuwakot district. At least 31 people have been killed, and hundreds of tourists are missing, after sudden massive floods and mudslides on the Nepal-Tibet border.

Prakash Mathema / AFP / Getty Images

Anthony Bourdain (pictured above, far right) was a world-famous chef and “one of the best food memoirists of all time”, said Izzy Titherington in The i Paper. His “seminal” 2000 book, “Kitchen Confidential”, was an “unfiltered” portrayal of “work in professional kitchens”, including everything from poor food practices to his own “struggles with drug use”. These other culinary memoirs simmer with similar passions.

Blood, Bones, and Butter by Gabrielle Hamilton
“If Bourdain wrote like a rock star, Hamilton writes like a poet,” said Abhya Adlakha in Esquire India. She rose to fame at the helm of Prune, which she described as a “tiny restaurant with 30 seats and a kitchen the size of a school bus”. Bourdain called her “magnificent” book “simply the best memoir by a chef ever. Ever.”

The Devil in the Kitchen: Sex, Pain, Madness and the Making of a Great Chef by Marco Pierre White
This is simply “exhilarating”, said Titherington in The i Paper. White gives us an insight into the “obsession and sacrifice” behind his journey as the “youngest-ever chef in the UK (and the youngest anywhere at the time) to earn three Michelin stars – and then the first to give them all back”. 

Cellar Rat by Hannah Selinger
“If you harbour romantic ideals of what it’s like to work in a fast-paced, high-pressure restaurant, here’s a reality check,” said Jim Webster in Smithsonian Magazine. Selinger’s “raw” memoir covers her years working in some of New York’s “most recognisable temples of gastronomy”.

Accidentally on Purpose by Kristen Kish
Having grown up as a South Korean adoptee in the American Midwest, Kish “interlaces kitchen anecdotes” and “the rigours” of restaurant life “with deeper reckonings about identity, belonging and love”, said Saskia Kemsley in The Standard. Still only 42, Kish won the 10th season of the US TV series “Top Chef” and then became the “Emmy‑nominated host of the show”.

What Farage can teach Prince Harry
Mary Harrington on UnHerd
Prince Harry, writes Mary Harrington, is “trying to reconcile two mutually exclusive kinds of fame”: “high-profile public service” and “individual celebrity”. The obvious parallel here is Nigel Farage, who “has always indecorously blurred the lines between lucrative” celebrity appearances and “purportedly selfless public service”. Harry is “clearly angling” to be a “Premium Economy sort-of-royal” but, as Farage demonstrates, “trying to combine celebrity with public service” is a surefire way “to make yourself maximally vulnerable to press harassment”.

Around the world, people are rejecting divisive and dangerous politics. We can – and must – build on that
Gordon Brown in The Guardian
We’re “descending” into a world where “brute force dominates”, writes former prime minister Gordon Brown. But global surveys show people reject this “zero-sum game”, and want to “counter” it with “cooperation across borders” to uphold international law and human rights, and “take action” on AI and the climate crisis. It’s “time to discuss how we move from a world” in which the US and China rule “on the big issues”; “our citizens” look to us for hope of a better future.

Birth plan, Devon-style
Carol Midgley in The Times
After the closure of a north Devon maternity ward, “pregnant women are being taught how to give birth in their cars”, writes Carol Midgley. They’ll need “blankets, towels and water” in case, “on the long journey” to hospital in Exeter, they “have to stop and push out a small human”. I suppose it’s “logical” in a country where “a lack of NHS dentists” means people are “extracting their own teeth”. Coming next: “how to examine your own prostate using a slotted spatula”.