Austerity Bites: A Journey to the Sharp End of Cuts in the UK

Since it took power in 2010, the Coalition Government in the United Kingdom has pushed through a drastic program of cuts to public spending, all in the name of austerity. The effects on large segments of the population, dependent on programs whose funding was slashed, have been devastating and will be felt for generations.

This timely book by journalist Mary O’Hara chronicles the real-world effects of austerity, removing it from the bland, technocratic language of politics and showing just what austerity means in people’s lives. Drawing on hundreds of hours of first-person interviews with a wide range of people, the book explores the grim reality of living amid the biggest reduction of the welfare state in the postwar era and offers a compelling corrective to narratives of shared sacrifice.