In Brixton, some community-minded souls are taking their movement to a natural extreme — they’re setting up a new currency. The Brixton Brick is modelled on similar schemes in Devon and elsewhere. The idea is that keeping money in a community increases its benefit to locals as it circulates round the houses, rather than going off to a multinational company or somebody’s offshore bank account. The plan has already attracted the attention of the......

Ugh, splitting the bill. At worst it’s like showing your parents around the touristy bits of town — expensive, unfun, leaving everyone involved with the feeling that they’ve been shafted. Inevitably someone skips the starter; someone else orders two sides; somebody's off the sauce; puddings either divide opinion or are themselves divided by two or more diners. Simple game theory points to one way to sort this out. Before the meal, everyone should agree......

The Gordon Brown statue saga has intrigued psephologists and, er, wax-ologists for months now: would our embattled PM be given his own waxwork at Madame Tussauds, or have the curators bargained that, with the odds of his removal ever-shortening, the task of crafting those craggy features into a lifelike visage isn't worth the effort? As we reported earlier this month, Tussauds turned the decision over to a public vote. The results are in: nearly......

One of the reasons our economy could be in a real mess this year is that the price of basic stuff like fuel and food is going up fast. That means that it’s difficult for the central banks in Britain and Europe to justify lowering interest rates to encourage us to spend more — because spending would spur more inflation, which could get out of control. In developed countries, inflation is kind of like......

When this small bit of Londonist launched its IPO this summer, we had no inkling that the economy would soon be in very choppy waters. Since then we’ve seen a bank run, huge corporate losses, and grim warnings across the board. And yet somehow, bankers are still getting huge bonuses, people are still spending money they don’t have, and the rich-poor gap is getting wider and wider. All of this has left us quite......

Recently we've been doing some research on Scotland, and while we haven’t come to any firm conclusions on the West Lothian question, it has prompted us to wonder – would London be better off as an independent country? We’d keep more of our tax money to begin with. It’s been estimated that London subsidises the rest of the UK to the tune of £13 billion a year – so that’s Crossrail paid for by......