Paul Spicker

Paul is Emeritus Professor of Public Policy at the Robert Gordon University, Aberdeen. He mainly writes on poverty, benefits, social justice and social policy.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

The most plausible explanation is not that this obscure article has been used to train AI, but that a big chunk of my other writing has been - a million words in 60 scraped pieces, including 14 of 23 books. So my writing style has been judged by its similarity to my later work.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

I tested something I'd written myself: my first academic article, published 45 years ago. It came in at 77% AI-generated.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

I'd love to think that someone out there had read and liked it, but sadly I've no reason to believe that: it has no (zero) citations on Scholar. I've done a little better since ...

[JezzasLastStand @JezzasLastStand]

@PSpicker That could be because so many people have plagiarised it?

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

I tested something I'd written myself: my first academic article, published 45 years ago. It came in at 77% AI-generated.

[Prof. Devi Sridhar @devisridhar]

Exact same issue for me- I know my previous books and articles have been used to train AI (looking at you anthropic)- & when I run previous articles (written pre-AI) into AI checkers, they can come back as high as 90% AI. It's not artificial intelligence- it's collective human intelligence.

[Michael Foran @michaelpforan]

Taking both of these points together you can conclude:

1. Excluding men from a women’s facility is less favourable treatment, even if they have access to a men’s facility.

2. If that exclusion is because of sex, that is unlawful unless there is an applicable exception.

3. On a basic comparator test this is clearly direct sex discrimination: if the man was female he would have been included.

4. Since you can only rely on the Schedule 3 exceptions if you’re operating a service based on biological sex, anything other than that is not covered.

Therefore a service based on anything other than biological sex which excludes men from a women’s service (and vice versa) necessarily engages in unlawful sex discrimination without an applicable exception.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

Poverty is really about social relationships; but even if one insists it's all about low income, this is ill-informed. Prices are relative - they reflect demand, and so the ability of *other people* to pay. Therefore the value of income is also relative. https://t.co/Z5aSMPpKrC

[The Critic @TheCriticMag]

Defining “poverty” upwards makes for bad economics, argues @worstall
https://t.co/VHxq8Mjqvk

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@vick55top Tell me why this is not like Ronan Point. https://t.co/ZPMNrjGxr9

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@HamishMcRae5 writes in the i paper that "If people have to pay more in tax they will have less money to spend on other things." That isn't a problem for transfer payments - higher taxes to pay for higher benefits. There's no good economic argument for child poverty.

[Bristol Uni Press @BrisUniPress]

"Countries that have cut back on certain types of #Benefits have nevertheless found themselves constrained to leave some forms of income support in place...It’s not an inevitable truth, but it’s something that can be charted and seen." @PSpicker @geomill
https://t.co/kqbU1G8Wu8

[Bristol Uni Press @BrisUniPress]

Listen to @geomill and @PSpicker talk about some of the historical roots, moral foundations, and practical workings of different #Welfare systems. #WelfareState
https://t.co/kqbU1G8Wu8

[Bristol Uni Press @BrisUniPress]

New in the ‘What Is It For?’ series, ‘What Is the Welfare State For?’ discusses the institutions and methods that characterise #WelfareStates around the world. @PSpicker

https://t.co/0I5uYVOvEo

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@premnsikka Private equity doesn't rely on 'profit', in the conventional sense, so much as on the extraction of value - often achieved by converting current value into long-term debt. The model represents an existential threat to public services.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

My new book has shipped: https://t.co/MTFU1mMbKU .

"A brilliant critical contribution and powerful overview about how we got here and what is at stake" (Camilo Perez-Bustillo)

"Concise and superbly written" (Daniel Béland)

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@policyatkings @kcl_sfg The key question I have is this: what has been done to mitigate the known vulnerabilities of RCTs - the risk of random findings (e.g. https://t.co/fdRxGDaMML) , and 'bracketing off' the things that matter (see Pawson and Tilley, Realistic evaluation).

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

After 25 years and more than eight million views, I am closing down my educational website, 'An Introduction to Social Policy'. A legacy copy, and my blog, will still be available at https://t.co/xpAHaYsZ0D

Other posts will be at @paulspicker.bsky.social

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

It doesn't seem to matter how many warnings are posted, some kids playing in the cemetery will try to bring dead ideas back to life. Zero-based budgeting implicitly favours 'core' (in-house) spending over 'peripheral'. Voluntary organisations beware.

[Professor Christopher Painter @PrfChrisPainter]

Zero-based budgeting is back, reviewing all spending commitments to determine their contribution to key objectives/outcomes - despite being lectured on this platform by 'budgetary experts' about wasteful spending, including those objecting to WFA being targeted on the most needy.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

The concern about algorithms and surveillance of the poorest people seems to be blossoming as an issue internationally. https://t.co/w9FmZFrvaR

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

A legal case in France is challenging the principle that the benefit authorities can select suspects to monitor by using an algorithm.

https://t.co/O7bJhRuFzO

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@kateesummers I've written both on managed complexity and on using different elements in the income package, rather than personalization, to achieve different outcomes. The claimed 'simplification' of UC was always nonsense.

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

Hardly new, people. Richard Titmuss wrote about this 60 years ago and I've been on it for 20.

[LSE British Politics and Policy @LSEpoliticsblog]

💥New! The apparent simplicity of Universal Credit conceals the complexity of people’s different circumstances. @kateesummers and David Young argue that Labour's welfare reforms should recognise complexity and relieve claimants from managing it alone.

https://t.co/m63QEFfthR

[Paul Spicker @PSpicker]

@jdportes @Heather_Rolfe @britishfuture We see the same pattern in public rejection of social security, where only about a fifth of spending is for people out of work and most of that is for long-term sickness. Stigma fuels the misperception of numbers.