LAURA SLATTERYlooks back at the week in business
DIctionary Corner: Assortive Mating
Assortive mating is the term given to the phenomenon whereby doctors bypass nurses and hook up with other doctors instead – in other words, where people with high earnings tend to marry those residing in a similarly high earnings bracket, thus living comfortably until death or divorce do them part.
The Organisation of Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) this week noted that there has been a rise in the trend, with 40 per cent of dual-income couples now belonging to the same or neighbouring earnings brackets, compared to 33 per cent some 20 years ago. This is just one of the many reasons why the gap between rich and poor is now rising almost everywhere, says the OECD.
Pay Day
Making his debut at the top of the IPO-wealth charts is one Ivan Glasenberg, whose near 16 per cent stake in the mining and commodities trading giant Glencore will value him at around €6.5 billion after it floats on the London Stock Exchange.
Glasenberg, who is Glencore’s chief executive (and a former competitive walker), is set to reap even more from the company’s initial public offering than the founders of Google did from theirs. Four more senior executives from Glencore can also consider themselves new entries on Forbes’s annual billionaires list. The Swiss-based company, which has a tradition of being secretive, was founded in 1974 by the appropriately named Marc Rich.
"The culture of secrecy which has been the hallmark of the Department of Finance must be ended"
Seamus Dooley, National Union of Journalists Irish secretary, calls for the Freedom of Information regime to be extended to cover State assets agency Nama
25m
The number of Sony customers whose details may have been hacked, it admitted this week. That’s on top of the 77 million cases of PlayStation data theft it announced last week.
Status Update
Osama cash-in: The royal merchandising frenzy has given way in the US to a glut of products celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden – including baby clothes. Stay classy.
Set switch-off: The number of homes in the US with television sets has dropped for the first time in 20 years, according to data from Nielsen. It's still at 96.7 per cent, mind.
Wheels on fire: The "manther" market (aka the marque-buying male "cougar") was back in action in the first quarter, as BMW quadrupled its profits, with growth in all regions.
THE QUESTION
Should Ireland's bank holidays be renamed?
According to Seán Kelly MEP, putting the word “bank” in such close proximity to holiday risks associating the joyous latter with the noxious former. “The tradition of dubbing Ireland’s national public holidays ‘bank holidays’ is nonsensical and should end,” said Kelly.
“Given recent negative connotations associated with the banking crisis and the obscene bonus culture which the banking sector cultivated, the time is right for a change in this area. Ireland’s public holidays should be called just that.”
Kelly’s suggestions for “themed” public holidays, however, may not be to everyone’s taste. The June holiday could become an official celebration of Ireland’s sporting life, with families encouraged to celebrate the apparently national love of sport in special local tournaments, the MEP posits, while the August holiday weekend could be linked to marine tourism through the holding of angling competitions – a boost for river towns, then, but not so great for the fish.
All this organised fun makes Planet Business long instead for recognition of less ambitious bank holiday traditions – such as sneezing, cloud-spotting and crooked picture hanging. It seems a shame just to abandon such reliable themes like nicotine withdrawal (New Year’s Day), resentful sobriety (Good Friday) and disappointment with the snooker result (May).
Of course, the May bank holiday already has a serious long-established theme given its proximity to Labour Day/ International Worker’s Day.
However, with the British government apparently mooting the idea of scrapping the May bank holiday and replacing it with a “United Kingdom Day” in October, it seems national pride is more in fashion than workers’ rights when it comes to public holidays, as with everything else.
