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Have you noticed that the word “education” has gone out of fashion? Yep, it’s been replaced by “learning” – that horrible, anaemic little word favoured by people who believe that thinking is an elitist activity. (more…)

I can honestly say that I can think of no possible situation in which I would find the need to use the word “facilitate”. It’s got far too many syllables, for a start. (more…)

Oh, I’m perfectly happy for you to use the word “impact”.

If, that is, you’re writing a paper on ballistics, a police report about a car crash, or a summary of theories of how the dinosaurs were wiped out.

But use it to describe anything other than one object coming forcibly into contact with another, and I’ll dismiss you as an illiterate fool. (more…)

Don’t get me wrong, “boutique” as a noun is fine. It’s “boutique” as an adjective that grates. From hotels to hedge funds, it seems that everything is “boutique” these days. (more…)

Here’s something annoying that I’m spotting more and more often: journalists’ increasing use of the word “decline” when they mean “refuse”. (more…)

Shares – down.

House prices – down.

Commodities – down.

But there’s one market that’s booming: the market for disingenuous financial euphemisms. (more…)

So Goldman Sachs has announced it’s cutting ten percent of its workforce.

I’m not sure why the media has made such a big deal about this announcement – I was under the impression that the world’s greatest bastion of “meritocracy” has always had regular culls to weed out the “non-performers” and those who were “the wrong cultural fit” (for the latter read: “didn’t buy into the whole Goldman Sachs cult thing”).
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