The UK’s Chartered Management Institute (CMI) has urged businesses to cut down on the amount of alcohol served at work events. This comes off the back of a survey, published earlier this month, which reported that a third of managers have seen harassment or inappropriate behaviour at work parties. Writing in the Guardian, management expert Stefan Stern warned that ‘the use (or abuse) of alcohol at work remains a live issue’ in Britain. Workplace drinking, he said, is ‘an ugly hangover from the past’ and ‘perhaps the time has come to draw a line under all this’.

Reading this lamentation, I can’t help wondering: who exactly is doing all this partying he talks of? It’s unlikely to be the people holding down multiple jobs to cope with the cost-of-living crisis. One in six people in the UK now works a gig-economy job at least once a week, and half of gig workers are holding down permanent full-time work, too.