Nick Cohen writes in The Observer about the unwillingness of the British government to do something about tax avoidance by the super-rich, which he sees as “debauching British society”. Meanwhile new figures from the TUC show that since 2000 the pay of company executives has increased 17 times faster than average pay. It is true that the overall effect of tax and benefit changes made by Labour since 1997 has been to redistribute money from the rich to the poor, but it has not been sufficient to prevent a widening of the gap nor to outlaw the worst excesses of boardroom greed. (more…)