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Business Daily

Factual: Money

The daily drama of money and work from the BBC.

Business Daily: Should we keep paying workers to stay at home?

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19/05/2020 GMT

Should we keep paying workers to stay at home?

BBC World Service - Business Daily, Should we keep paying workers to stay at home?

Covid 19 furlough schemes are costing governments billions - are they sustainable?

Governments are spending billions paying wages to workers who are no longer able to work due to the coronavirus pandemic. How long can we keep this up? Are we storing up problems by offering this type of unprecedented state-sponsored handout long-term?

We hear from an employee in the tourism industry who has been furloughed, a hotel owner in the North of England who has had to furlough most of his staff, as well as Torsten Bell from the Resolution Foundation think tank who originally proposed the scheme in the UK before it was adopted, and Eamonn Butler from the free-market think tank the Adam Smith Institute who argues that the system is open to abuse.

(Image: stock photo of a woman reading in the park. Credit: Getty Images.).

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