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Now I can broadcast to an audience of several million people on the 'Today' programme. I can talk about the day's news. But on radio, believe it or not, we have notes and scripts. And while we might ad lib the odd wryly amusing asides, they come at the frequency of a suburban bus. About one every 90 minutes.

Evan Davis

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Evan Davis
Age: 62
Born: 1962
Born: April 8
Economist
Journalist
Television Presenter
Worcs
Come
Million
Amusing
Every
News
Ads
Believe
Minutes
Bus
Wryly
People
Millions
Odd
Programme
Audience
Several
Suburban
Talk
Scripts
Broadcast
Today
Notes
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Might
Radio
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More quotes by Evan Davis

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Although being economics editor sounds impressive, it does not mean I actually edit anything. It mainly reflects two decades of title-inflation at the BBC, which has given ever more status to senior reporters, presumably because it is cheaper to do that than to offer higher pay.
Evan Davis
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Britain, however, has ended up specializing in the ones you don't see as much of: defense aerospace, making drive shafts for cars, pills and drugs, designing chips that go into 94 percent of the world's mobile phones.
Evan Davis
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Historically, the British have always been rather wary of grand engineering projects - perhaps understandably, given that many of them have been delivered late and over budget.
Evan Davis
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We escaped the last big bursting of a bubble - the dotcom bubble - with a relatively light U.S. recession. On that occasion, the world economy found its way back on track fairly quickly.
Evan Davis
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Someday we'll look back on this moment and plow into a parked car.
Evan Davis
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One of the key problems is that the Germans know what they do because everywhere they go there's a 'made in Germany' label on it - they can feel proud of Volkswagens and Audis and Mercedes.
Evan Davis
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Reducing every issue to an argument can become stale but it's often a very good way of clarifying issues.
Evan Davis
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We are more likely to cheat if we see others doing so. We tend to conform to accepted norms of reasonable behaviour, rather than adhere to strict rules.
Evan Davis
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I actually profoundly think the world's a better place when economics is fairly boring... The more boring the better.
Evan Davis
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A chair's function is not just to provide a place to sit it is to provide a medium for self-expression. Chairs are about status, for example. Or signalling something about oneself. That's why the words chair, seat and bench have found themselves used to describe high status professions, from academia to Parliament to the law.
Evan Davis
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I've never enjoyed sleep as much until I got the 'Today' job. There is something about early sleep that's much better than late sleep. I feel myself going to sleep I don't just plonk my head on the pillow. It's a sort of winding-down thing.
Evan Davis
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When a population saves a lot, the funds are invested outside the country as well as inside. If the Japanese invest in the United States, it pushes their exchange rate down and makes their manufacturing more competitive.
Evan Davis
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At the BBC we've had plenty of women in good management jobs. It comes and goes but there's been plenty. On air, I think there's quite a bit more we can do.
Evan Davis
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Now undoubtedly, we face some very British challenges when it comes to infrastructure. We rightly cherish our back yards and green spaces, and we'll defend them passionately when projects are announced. We live in a democracy, and we like to debate these things, often for many years.
Evan Davis
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For industry to settle in a country, you first need electricity for electricity, you need some trained workers for trained workers, you need some schools for schools you need some money for money, you need some industry.
Evan Davis
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The new industries are brainy industries and so-called knowledge workers tend to like to be near other people who are the same. Think of the City of Hollywood. People cluster. This means you have winning regions, such as London and Cambridge, and losing regions. The people who want to be top lawyers in Sunderland are hoovered up by London.
Evan Davis
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Being funny, it turns out, is like being a bank. It's a confidence trick. As long as everyone believes in you, you are fine.
Evan Davis
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If you're not making some mistakes, it probably means you're not trying hard enough.
Evan Davis
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As it happens, I have personally been something of an enthusiast for the London Olympic games, mainly on the grounds a) that a bit of wasteland will be made nice and b) that it tends to make everybody happy that their country should be the centre of world attention for a couple of weeks in their life.
Evan Davis
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Crossrail is a prime example of infrastructure. It is a rather deadly word, but I think it is exciting stuff, the civil engineering which makes Britain tick - the bridges, tunnels, power and water networks, which bind us together.
Evan Davis