by Shapol Mohamed
We
love to boast about big things like the size of our economy, and politicians
love to boast about big cuts and big spendings. But, how would you know
something is big or not? How would you know that £300 million or £400 million
is a lot? How would you know that 32,000 airstrikes are a lot?
When
Tony Blair was campaigning to become Prime Minister he promised that the
government would spend £300 million over five years to create a million new
childcare places. Any number with an -illion at the end is undoubtedly
incomprehensible. However, is £300 million to provide for a million places a
big number? From that one million places that will be created, it will mean
that each place will get £300. Divide it by five years to find out how much
each place gets annually and you are left with £60 per place. In a year, there
are 52 weeks and that means each place is worth £1.15 per week. Is it possible
to find childcare for £1.15 per week? Maybe in parts of rural Uzbekistan but
not in the UK. So, £300 million is not a big number in this case.
Recently,
the chancellor Phillip Hammond announced £400 million extra funding for state
schools. Again, the number seems unimaginable; you sense the mental fuses
blowing at anything about the price of a home. In the UK there are ten million
students at state schools that means each child gets a one-off bonus of £40.
Therefore, in this case, £400 million pound is not a lot for state schools.
Perhaps, if children started dressing as potholes then schools might get more
funding because in the budget more money was allocated to potholes than to
improve schools.
The UK
has also been actively involved in carrying out airstrikes in Iraq and Syria
alongside with its allies. In Iraq, 15,000 airstrikes have been carried out and
in Syria 17,000 airstrikes have been carried out according to Airwars. The
reason why airstrikes are being carried out is to combat ISIS. At its very peak
(2014-2016), ISIS had between 20,000 and 25,000 members according to the CIA.
So, that means if each airstrike had killed a single ISIS member that would
have meant that not a single ISIS member would be left. Unfortunately, they are
still left. So, if airstrikes didn’t kill ISIS members who did they kill? The
answer is innocent children, innocent mothers, and innocent fathers. According
to Airwars, nearly 30,000 innocent civilians have been killed by airstrikes.
That is innocent civilians, not ISIS members. I think airstrikes can be good at
times but they should not be used in cities where innocent civilians are
killed. They should only be used in the battlefields which are mostly desert
and not cities. Furthermore, each airstrike costs £500,000. This means that in
this case, 32,000 airstrikes are too much and I think the money should be spent
elsewhere like our schools.
Almost
all numbers, in politics and economics, come with trailing zeros this is simply
because politicians try to fool us. We need to throw away the idea of lots of
zeros equals big number. Whenever we see a politician coming forward whilst
being propped up with “real" numbers and telling us of millions or
billions of this or that, spent, cut, lost, down, affected, up, down, improved,
added or saved, we just need to stop and ask ‘is this big?’ We need to get
personal with the size of the number. The size is the most important aspect and
size does matter.
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