As a child, I rarely set foot in the doctor’s surgery. Not because I was super fit, rather that our GP always came to us. Now you can buy an ISA or get your ‘phone screen fixed at home but would need to dial 999 to (maybe) get medical attention there. It’s going to get worse, as GPs are now leaving the profession faster than hospital consultants, and that’s pretty fast. Thank goodness for Dr Google.
I was asked this week whether annuities are now ‘a good investment’. They’ve been recommended very rarely in recent years, since ‘pension freedoms’ allowed pretty much unlimited drawdown on pension funds and anything left to be passed on to beneficiaries free of Inheritance Tax.
AI, or at least AI talk, is everywhere and financial services is no exception. Apart from its effect on stock markets and investments – the US Mag 7 Big Tech companies will rule the world, oh, no, maybe it’ll be China etc. –
The Four Day Week was much discussed and trailed post-COVID, when remote-working looked likely to end strap-hanging commutes for good and laptops on the kitchen table were to become the ’new norm’.