Forget avoidance outrage: this is what we really think about tax

Rather like a quantitative version of Hello! magazine, the Panama papers made headlines everywhere. Read all about the vast amount of money a particular celeb has got stashed away. Salivate, be titillated or be outraged, according to your fancy. The story was covered heavily by the Guardian, the in-house newspaper of the metropolitan liberal elite. […]

Frangleterre… Labour Mobility undermines Tax and Spend regimes

Pimlico Plumbers will be a familiar brand to many readers – it has a prominent advert on the approach into Waterloo station. But the company is now calling for plumbers who are fluent in both English and French, and says applicants will be interviewed by a native French speaker. This is just the tip of […]

A stitch in time. We need smarter government, but less of it

What is the connection between the content of Boris Johnson’s speech this week to the CBI, tax avoidance and evasion, executive pay, petty crime and plagiarism by students?  This is yet another one where economics can help us with the solution. Economists have long used the example of a factory which imposes costs on other […]