Privatising humanity

‘As the things we need to live have been repurposed as vehicles for profit, shareholders have grown wealthy while those unable to pay have been forced to go without the basics. This is a sharp, empirically grounded account of how financial power reshapes everyday life and why reclaiming essential services is one of the most important challenges of our age.’
Grace Blakeley, author of Vulture Capitalism

‘Kate Bayliss is the Sherlock Holmes of untangling the links between the impoverishment of UK citizens and the profits of the multinationals who benefit from high costs and low investment. This book should be a wake-up call to everyone, from journalists to politicians, and especially to the citizens whose most basic human needs have been used as business opportunities.’
Julia Steinberger, Professor of Societal Challenges of Climate Change, University of Lausanne

‘The basics of a human life and a dignified society – and for a small class of global investors, the opportunity of a lifetime. In Privatising humanity, Kate Bayliss lays bare the machine behind your bills: a system engineered to extract maximum returns from needs you cannot refuse. The result is a brilliant guide to a world of soaring profits for investors and broken services for everyone else.’
Mathew Lawrence, author of Owning the Future

‘This book is a necessary and very timely unpicking of the privatisation scandal and the mindset behind it. If you're wondering why your bills are so high, this explains it. If you've watched Dirty Business, read this next. A passionate defence of ordinary households and the public good.’
Cat Hobbs, founder and director of We Own It

‘This jargon-free book explains that the privatisation of water, energy and housing provision in the UK has generated many billions of pounds for the global elite, all at the expense of UK households’ health and wellbeing. The book is Kate Bayliss’s tour de force. Essential reading.’
Andrew Brown, Professor of Economics and Political Economy, University of Leeds