Poor numeracy 'blights the economy and ruins lives'
Poor numeracy is blighting Britain's economic performance and ruining lives, says a new charity launched to champion better maths skills.
The group, National Numeracy, says millions of people struggle to understand a payslip or a train timetable, or pay a household bill.
Government figures show almost half the working population of England have only primary school maths skills.
A government spokeswoman said poor numeracy was a national scandal.
The new organisation quotes from research which suggest that weak maths skills are linked with an array of poor life outcomes such as prison, unemployment, exclusion from school, poverty and long-term illness.
'British disease'
It also wants to challenge a mindset which views poor numeracy as a "badge of honour", promising to name and shame public figures who boast of being bad at maths.
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Like the comments?
"" Half the population appears to be functionally innumerate with 'government figures show almost half the working population of England have only primary school maths skills' and half the population has a IQ below a hundred. I'm not claiming causality here but there may be a powerful link between these two astounding figures? So....why should half the population be blighted by a below average IQ? ""
