Davos vs Davos Drive: go compare
As the great and the good meet in Davos, Switzerland this week, Channel 4 News takes a graphic look at how life at the top compares with life on the ground at Davos Drive, Staffordshire.
In a sleepy ski resort in the Swiss mountains, 2,500 of the world’s most powerful people are meeting, from Iranian President Hassan Rouhani to billionaire Bill Gates.
The humble theme of this year’s forum is “reshaping of the world: consequences for society, politics and business”. But the annual conference, now in its 44th year, is famed for hosting a lot of talk, without generating much action. It is fitting that one of the top trending words on Twitter there is the management-speak “session”.
It is a far cry from the real world for most of the UK population – and from Davos Drive, Staffordshire, where Channel 4 News is reporting on Thursday night. As Social Affairs Editor Jackie Long writes: “World leaders and the global elite may be debating issues like poverty, hardship and inequality, Here, in and around Stoke, people are living it.”
In the UK, the NHS is the biggest employer. Those working in education make up the third biggest sector, followed by retail.
Meanwhile in Davos, most of the World Economic Forum delegates work in government, followed by banking and capital markets. There are 225 journalists in attendance, and 141 private investors.
In the snow-topped ski-resort, where it costs about £22 for a pizza, £150,000 will reportedly buy consultants a face-to-face meeting with top leaders.
In the UK, the same amount of money is enough to raise a child: from birth to the age of 18.
And while the top trending topics in Davos include “economy” and “growth”, the same could not be said for Stoke where talkshow host “Jeremy Kyle” was trending on Twitter on Thursday morning.