I'm glad it's not just me. It is odd, isn't it?

This weird obsession that because someone is cleaning up, the rest of the country must be in rude health.

The only thing that makes a Conservative happier than Tim Martin making 40 million, is Crispin Odey making a 300 million bet against British businesses in the hope they'll fail. They love that stuff. Makes them hard before bed.

Employment does continue to ride in crude numbers but, the ecconomy is not rising at anything like the same rate, which would suggest that there are a greater number of jobs available but, that they aren't, comparatively, as well paid at they used to be
Zero hours contract anybody ?

I'm sure Sal will tell us that plenty of people love zero hours contracts. It gives them freedom. Whether he'll admit that it's usually the people who are not actually reliant on the money to feed themselves who are the ones who enjoy the freedom the most, is another thing.

I don't like zero hours contracts they are an abomination and should only be offered to employees if the employee deems it a benefit to them. There are plenty of people on minimum wage that are quite able to feed themselves with the need to use foodbanks. So I ask the question why if they can why can't others in similar circumstances - I know its heresy to say it but perhaps these who don't seem to be able to feed their children prioritise their money on other thing before food.

It is obvious to most why the economy is not rising - simple Keynsian economics - as soon as business stop investing it the forerunner of a recession - simple as.

Traditionally - or since the war - we have not in general been very good at mass manufacturing and that continues to this day. We are great innovators and niche manufacturers that is never going to drive huge economic growth.

Wages have just started to grow c3% which is slightly above inflation but just increasing pay for the same output leads to businesses being even more uncompetitive - wages increases need to tied to improved output either through better processes or more engagement.

Simple answer - housing and children.
If people are lucky enough to have purchased their property or a receiving a reasonable amount of housing benefit, they may have enough to feed and cloth their family, providing they haven't been stuffed by Universal Credit.
It's a travesty of our imbalanced society that 2 people can work full time and not be able to properly feed and house themselves without needing a government top up (housing benefit).
There used to be social housing, with relatively cheap rent for the low paid.
However, your beloved Tories thought that it would be a good idea to sell this off to secure an election victory for Thatcher and the supply of social housing has never recovered.
Your inference that some people dont manage their finances too well may also be correct but, to hide behind this and infer that it's their own fault is just cowardly and a cop out, which fails to address the desperate shortage of cheap social housing.

They didn’t even allow the council’s to keep the money from house sales.

Income from sales was spent, by the councils, on vanity projects, especially in Labour regions, keep the myth going all you want. Why, if it was so bad, did your beloved Labour keep the policy?

Social Housing still exists, but strangely the organisations managing it have sparkly new offices and car parks full of BMW's, it isn't the fault of the Conservatives, it's a societal change. Perhaps if Blair and Brown had utilised their "moral compass" a bit better, not spent billions on an illegal war, sold the gold at the bottom of the market, you know, all the other amazing decisions they made. Let us not forget Mrs Blair made millions as a "hooman rights" lawyer, but hey, socialism works, if you live in a twisted reality.

Illegal war you say? Labour you say?
I'm old enough to remember that Thatcher was politically at deaths door until the Argies got amorous with the Falklands....she was properly "fooked" until you all started waving union jacks and faux outrage about a place your kids had to show you on an atlas......I care little for the socialist/Tory debate. I bought my council flat for £X and sold it recently for 9 x £X........I did so because I could afford it, but let's be clear here, the right to buy policy wasn't about letting the "little folk" better themselves, it was about the huge cost of upkeep of this national asset being passed to the private sector....like everything the tories flogged off.
As for Blair/Brown.....Donald Trump is more left center than those two gimps...have a read of animal farm.

yawn, bore off. You don't like the UK, why you even post Jean is beyond me.

AH.......explains a lot if you think I am JeBron......senile dementia and voting tory goes hand in hand. I was born in Hertfordshire in the QEII Hospital....I believe the poster you are referring to was born in the shire of south Sydney, but as with the rest of the Brexit loving racists who don't know or wont admit they're racist, you prefer insults to debate

you really are a laughable troll...

as I said, bore off, you epitomise why The Sin Bin has become a parody of it's purpose. There is no debating with someone like you.

you wouldn't know a debate if it bit you on your bigoted 'arris old boy...you just shout a lot about reds under the beds and have an innate dislike of brown folk.

when have I EVER said anything even remotely about brown folk?

the answer you are looking for is NEVER, you are just a troll.