Gary Stevenson grew up poor, got rich in the City – then found himself wrestling with depression. Now he says he’s the only person on the left who really understands the British economy – and the people who wield the power

I’ve interviewed Gary Stevenson three times. First in 2020 about global finance being screwed with a capital “S”; again in 2022 about the cost of living crisis; and then last year when he published The Trading Game, his compelling memoir about life as a trader at Citibank. Now I’m meeting him for the first time in the flesh, ahead of the book’s appearance in paperback, and we’re talking about yet another crisis.

“Have you seen the news?” is the first thing he asks, presenting it like a challenge even before he says “hello”. I rack my brain distressingly slowly, like a librarian using a card index for the very first time, thinking: which bit of the news? LA is on fire; Gaza is on fire; Ukraine is on fire; a bunch of Teslas are on fire. Seriously, we’ve all seen a lot of news.

Rachel Reeves told the elites gathered in Switzerland she was relaxed about ‘wealth creation’. She’s in the minority on that

Rachel Reeves might give the impression of being someone who’s never late for social engagements, but she is increasingly late to the party. At a breakfast event on the second day of Davos, after she’d spelled out her faith in artificial intelligence and a high-skilled workforce, someone asked Britain’s chancellor how she felt about “wealth creation” – was she relaxed, in a Blairite sense? “Absolutely,” Reeves replied. “Absolutely relaxed.”

Wealth creation isn’t quite the same as just wealth, but “wealth creators” is famously the moniker the super-rich use for themselves. And so Reeves’s exceedingly relaxed tone here puts her in a minority – possibly a minority of one. As Elon Musk salutes his way into political power, not even rich people are relaxed about wealth any more. On the first day of the World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, the pro-tax campaign group Patriotic Millionaires released survey results from 2,000 high net-worth individuals across the G20: more than half of them thought extreme wealth was a threat to democracy, and over two-thirds agreed that the visible influence of the wealthy was leading to a decline in trust of the media, the justice system and democracy.

Zoe Williams is a Guardian columnist

Ryanair’s Michael O’Leary wants European airports to clamp down on pre-flight drinking. But is it really such a problem? There’s only one way to find out …

It is 10.30am on Thursday at Gatwick, and Jenny and her friend Alison, both 63, are drinking champagne. It’s an elegant scene. They are on a stopover between Barbados and Guernsey, and neither are planning to get drunk and kicked off their connecting flight. Alison describes the unique drinking culture at an airport. “We don’t know what day it is, never mind what time,” she says. “There aren’t any windows, so you can’t tell if it is day or night. Everyone is in a different time zone anyway, so nobody is looking at anyone else thinking, ‘They’re starting a bit early.’”

The perfect environment, in other words, to enjoy a morning drink. But now I’m casting around my mind for every other place on Earth where one might have a breakfast beer or glass of wine: cricket matches; bottomless brunches; weddings. In every one of those scenarios, a good number of drinkers would be carousing after half an hour. But the airport is so serene.