Blame restrictions on the supply of land for new homes for rising wealth inequality

Fields of Gold

Official data released last week on London house price increases in 2016 generated a lot of interest.  Given that housing represents by far the most important component of wealth for most people, it is not surprising that stories like this are read avidly. There is a feeling that the current situation regarding the affordability of […]

Paul Ormerod to speak at Economic Research Council: buy tickets now!

Volterra’s Paul Ormerod to speak at the Economic Research Council on Monday 20th February 18.30 – 20.00. Paul will be discussing why so many economists are opposed to Brexit.  Book your ticket here. A limited number of Early Bird tickets are available for £15 each. Following a Financial Times survey in January that showed that nine times […]

Paul Ormerod: why are so few economists Brexiteers?

Leading Economist Paul Ormerod wrote an article for Prospect Magazine on 9th January asking why so few economists are Brexiteers… Groupthink culture in the economics profession led the Bank of England’s Chief Economist, Andy Haldane, to admit last week that economic forecasting is in crisis. You can read the full article here.

What climate warrior Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes teaches us about punishment

Natalie Twisleton-Wykeham-Fiennes: don’t you just love her? One of the Black Lives Matter campaigners, our Nat caused chaos by occupying the runway at London City Airport, on the grounds that climate change is racist. She and eight others, including a former member of the Oxford University Croquet Club, were sentenced by the courts last week. […]

Corbyn is completely out of touch with the real debate about UK austerity

Following the Brexit vote, normal service seems to have resumed. A key question in economic policy since the General Election of 2010 has moved centre stage once again: should the government abandon austerity? At one level, the question has an easy answer. Interest rates are now so low that the UK government can borrow for 30 […]

Sorry, Prime Minister: Legislation won’t end excess in the boardroom

A key platform of our new Prime Minister is to curb what she perceives to be boardroom excesses.  “It is not anti-business to suggest that big business needs to change”, she said. One of her proposals is to allow employee and worker representatives to sit on company boards, a suggestion which has not gone down […]

Why austerity must be the order of the day for May’s chancellor

On the face of it, the Brexiteers have a bit of explaining to do. A week before the vote, Boris Johnson dismissed fears about the value of sterling, and accused the governor of the Bank of England of “talking the economy down”. Yet the economy does seem to have stalled, property funds have had to […]

Is Britain on the edge of recession? History is an unreliable guide

Concerns are growing about a marked slowdown in the UK economy. The Lloyds Bank purchasing managers’ index, for example, fell to 52.1 in April, its lowest point since 2013. The initial estimate for GDP, total output, in the first quarter of this year shows an increase of just 0.4 per cent on the final quarter of 2015. […]