New Left Review I/190, November-December 1991

Roger Taylor

What Did I Do During Thatcherism?

For all the moral claptrap, Thatcherism entered my personal life by way of a temptation or bribe. In 1982 I was grinding away at an academic career. I had been at it since the early sixties and, like most of my colleagues, was gasping for early retirement. To most workers my life would have seemed set in paradise. I was well paid (a fact disputed by the Association of University Teachers), I had a thirteen-hour teaching week and twenty-two weeks vacation per year. However, I felt set in concrete. Perhaps the problem was classic alienation.

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