Tom Rees

It’s not just Brexit that’s dried up the flow of European Union workers the UK used to depend on. From Poland to Portugal, EU economies are generating more jobs and better wages than Britain.

Hawkish former Bank of England rate-setters warned that interest rates will need to soar as high as 6% to stamp out inflation, a level the central bank has identified as painful for households and businesses.

Britain’s farming, truck driving and bed & breakfast industries are among the most reliant on a silver-flecked workforce on the brink of retirement, putting them at risk of future shortages unless they find an influx of younger staff.

Britain’s pandemic-era “excess savings” are still fueling inflation, said Bank of England policy maker Catherine Mann.

While a post-pandemic burst of inflation has abated across much of the developed world, Britain is still stuck with the highest price growth among Group of Seven economies. The Bank of England has responded with the most rapid series of interest rate rises in a generation, worsening a cost-of-living crisis. Here’s how we got here, and whether there’s any relief in sight.

UK housebuilding is contracting at a pace seen during the financial crisis property crash 14 years ago as borrowers are squeezed by a surge in interest rates, a closely watched survey found.

Britain isn’t accustomed to the waves of labor unrest that can be a fact of life in countries where the right to strike is enshrined in law. Until recently, it appeared that coordinated, nationwide walkouts were largely a thing of the past, thanks partly to union-busting reforms pushed through by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher in the 1980s. But as living costs soar, and even some people with jobs turn to food banks in order to eat, hundreds of thousands of UK workers are wielding their collect

The UK government’s social mobility adviser along with a former Conservative minister added their voices to criticism of the Bank of England pandemic stimulus program, saying it widened the gap between the rich and the poor.

A London commuter town effectively declared bankruptcy, after a risky investment spree meant to offset a central government funding squeeze backfired and left the local authority — which covers a population of just over 100,000 people — facing a £1.2 billion ($1.5 billion) deficit.

British workers have missed out on a Europe-wide trend toward more leisure time and fewer hours on the job, compounding a miserable decade in which living standards stagnated.