Will Rachel Reeves' NI hike crush UK economic growth? Rachel Reeves wants growth, and it’s thought she’s going to seriously increase employers’ national insurance contributions, which is most likely to stop that happening. Why is she adopting such an absurd approach to the economy?
Labour’s solution to the water industry crisis is to do anything but what’s needed
Funding the Future
Labour’s solution to the water industry crisis is to do anything but what’s needed
The FT carries a report this morning that notes that: Water regulator Ofwat could be overhauled or even replaced under the most far-reaching revie...
 When it comes to the water industry, Labour will do anything but nationalise it to make sure that we get the clean water that we need. That literally defines them as an existential threat to our well-being.
Trump, the fascist, threatens us all
Funding the Future
Trump, the fascist, threatens us all
The FT carries an article this morning that begins by noting that: Donald Trump’s longest-serving White House chief of staff has said the former...
 If you’re not terrified by the prospect of Trump winning the US Presidential election, what is wrong with you?
Don’t trust Wes Streeting’s NHS consultation
Funding the Future
Don’t trust Wes Streeting’s NHS consultation
Do I have to talk about Wes Streeting this morning? It seems that I do because the government’s resident smug boy is out and about talking about ...
 Wes Streeting’s plans for the NHS are all about making profit for big business. Nothing he’s talking about will improve healthcare outcomes, because that’s not their purpose.
There’s no electricity or water for Keir Starmer’s planned investments Keir Starmer wants high-tech investment in the UK that will demand massive new electricity supply and water supplies we simply have not got, and all for not many new jobs. Why doesn’t he grow UK small business instead?
Keir Starmer says he wants a bonfire of red tape? Keir Starmer has said he wants a bonfire of red tape. That is the same goal that ended at Grenfell when David Cameron promoted it. What it actually means is that consumers take the risk in society and those who create the risks don’t and there’s not an iota of sense in that.
When it comes down to it ‘stuff’ doesn’t matter that much Having to clear my late father’s home recently, it became very apparent how the material focus of economics is wrong. What he had mattered for little in the end. The memories he left did. So why does economics get this so terribly wrong?
The fiscal rules we need
Funding the Future
The fiscal rules we need
I posted this Tweet yesterday: The Tweet was, I admit, inspired by a comment someone made here, but in posting it I was not just making a p...
 Economics is about the allocation of scarce respources. Money is not a scarce resource as far as government is concerned: it can create all it needs, and we require that it does so. In that case what is the obsession with monetary fiscal rules about and why aren’t we talking about real issues, like tackling poverty, poor housing and insufficient pensions?
Modern monetary theory is not a policy Some people seem to think that modern monetary theory (MMT) is a set of policy options a country might adopt. It isn’t. It’s a description of how the economy of the country we live in really works. What’s powerful about it is that it describes actually happens – and so leads to better decision making.
Why aren’t young people working? Thirty-eight per cent of young people who could work are not doing so. They’re not lazy, or indifferent. Nor have they dropped out. They just can’t fit into the machinery of conformism that modern employers demand of them. As a result, vast numbers of talented young people aren’t delivering of their best for this country.