UK welfare spending on track to hit £130 billion as claims surge

Saudi airport attacks expose deepening crisis for crown prince

A soaring number of people on sickness or disability benefits is blowing up the United Kingdom’s welfare bill and imperiling the country’s financial stability, The Wall Street Journal reported. Some seven million people — more than 10 percent of the UK population — now claim at least one of the benefits, driven by a fourfold surge in psychiatric claims, the newspaper reported. With spending on track to hit £130 billion, or $172 billion, Britain faces a looming financial reckoning as leaders struggle to make politically painful cuts, WSJ reporters Max Colchester and David Luhnow wrote.

The same edition of The Wall Street Journal’s “The 10-Point” newsletter also examined a weekend attack on Saudi Arabia’s main airport that killed at least 12 people and injured hundreds more. The strikes by Iran-backed Houthi militants exposed a deepening crisis for Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, WSJ reporters Summer Said and Georgi Kantchev wrote. With threats mounting, the crown prince is shuttling between heavily guarded palaces equipped with bunkers, the WSJ reported.

The violence threatens his ambitions to turn Saudi Arabia into a global tourism and investment hub, and his own decisions have contributed to his predicament, Said and Kantchev wrote. Rising defense and infrastructure costs threaten to siphon away funds needed for the economic diversification push, according to the WSJ.

The attacks are also wreaking havoc on global air travel. Airlines canceled more than 1,000 flights as threats to Saudi airspace jeopardize one of the last two major air corridors connecting Europe and Asia, the WSJ reported.

The same edition also covered a specialized mortgage product in the United States. Known as a debt-service coverage ratio, or DSCR, loan, the instrument is approved based on potential rental income rather than a borrower’s wealth, WSJ reporter Nicholas G. Miller wrote. The model is helping real-estate investors buy, renovate and rent out vacant and dilapidated homes, injecting capital into long-disinvested communities across cities like Baltimore, Detroit and Cleveland. The flexible loans are fueling a neighborhood renaissance while drawing scrutiny over fraud risks, according to the WSJ.

WSJ real-estate reporter Nancy Keates, while reporting on custom, architect-designed homes built for under $1 million, found that homeowners shared strategies for keeping costs down — from ditching garages to choosing less expensive materials.

The newsletter also reported that China’s 2025 gross national income per capita stood just below the high-income threshold of $14,375, with the country likely to reach high-income status for 2026 when the World Bank’s calculations come out next July. Beijing prefers its “developing” status, which allows it to present itself as a champion of Global South nations and avoid contributing to some global funds to fight climate change, the WSJ reported.

WSJ health columnist Sumathi Reddy reported that roughly two-thirds of the global population has trouble digesting lactose, but only a fraction actually develops symptomatic lactose intolerance. What some mistake for permanent dairy intolerance can be temporary post-virus sensitivity or gut bacterial overgrowth, according to the WSJ. Reddy offered practical strategies to help people enjoy some dairy while minimizing stomach trouble.

The reporting appeared in The Wall Street Journal’s “The 10-Point” newsletter, an edition curated and edited by Bharbi Hazarika and Gary Mitchell in collaboration with Editor in Chief Emma Tucker.