Do Budgets really matter?
All eyes will be on George Osborne’s Budget today. An immense amount of media attention and serious commentary will be devoted to it. But do Budgets really matter? How much difference would it make if successive chancellors simply did nothing, apart from indexing various allowances and benefits in line with inflation? From time immemorial, British […]
Does Miliband understand the importance of incentives?
Ed Miliband has long had a problem with voters not perceiving him as “normal”. His famous struggle with a bacon sandwich in some ways says it all. But at a much more important level, he seems to have little or no empathy with one of the most fundamental of human motivations. The most profound insight […]
Will the internet lower long-term growth – or do we need to embrace change?
Are we doomed to secular stagnation, to permanently lower rates of economic growth? The debate was sparked off nearly a decade before the financial crisis by the top US economist Robert J Gordon. He took a pessimistic view of the impact of the new wave of technology on productivity and economic growth. The latest contribution […]
The Prospects for property in 2015
Strutt & Parker and Volterra Partners held their annual conference, Prospects for Property, on Wednesday 28th January 2015 at the Royal Institution of Great Britain, London. Nearly 300 property developers and fund managers attended. The research presented at the event gave a view on the outlook for the UK economy, macro property view and individual […]
Volterra make the economic case for a new garden suburb in Northumberland
Volterra recently assisted property developer Lugano in assessing the economic case of a new housing development on green belt land at Birney Hill Farm in Northumberland. The plans are for a garden suburb type development of 280 houses set within farmland and allocating 17.9 hectares to on-site public space. The proposal was initially rejected by […]
Volterra reviews TfL’s Economic Appraisal Guidance
The Volterra team recently undertook a review of the transport appraisal guidance used by Transport for London (TfL). The review focused on improving the current Business Case Development Manual, which is used by TfL to determine if a new transport scheme should be given funding. We were able to give insights across a range of […]
Popular culture is the driving force of inequality
The Oscars have come and gone for another year. Winning an Oscar is very often the basis for either making a fortune, or turning an existing one into mega riches. Jack Nicholson has an estimated worth of over $400 million, and stars like Tom Hands and Robert de Niro are not far behind. Even winners […]
Crocodile tears for the poor
INEQUALITY is now a buzzword in Britain. Scarcely a week goes by without a new publication by an academic or journalist lamenting the levels of poverty facing swathes of the population. They are bolstered by a complicit metropolitan liberal elite, who shed crocodile tears for the poor, while ruminating on the current situation. Unfortunately, much […]
Shouting at the supply-chain: is there a better way?
EVERY year, the supermarkets hire substantial batches of high-flying graduates to work in their buying departments. The urban mythology is that these expensively-educated young people are paid to shout down the phone, browbeating suppliers to offer yet more discounts. This hectoring seems to be at the heart of the recent decision of the Groceries Code […]
Can Game Theory Help the Greeks?
Game theory is a big topic in academic economics. It is scarcely possible to graduate from a good university without exposure to its abstruse logic. So perhaps the Greek government, replete with economists, is using game theory to plan its tactics. Or is Chancellor Merkel herself being briefed with calculations carried out deep in a […]
