Put 10 economists in a room and you’ll have 11 views, they say. But why are these pundits so keen to socialise? A letter to a newspaper suggesting early public spending cuts has to be signed by 20 economists: 60 then put their name to the counter view. How many make a quorum?
(more…)

A report detailing the gap between Britain’s rich and poor has been met with universal shock and promises to narrow the divide. But why? Isn’t inequality not only inevitable but desirable?
(more…)

As the UK economy’s return to growth was slower and lower than expected, should we prepare for a return to recession? That could be the second dip of a W-shaped curve - but it might even stem from a revision of the figure that seemingly ended the slump.
(more…)

Everyone agrees the government must return a sick economy to health. The disagreement is how quickly to do it. Too much medicine could kill the patient; too little allows the disease to fester.
(more…)

Criticising what regional development agencies do is easy but doing without the RDAs may still be hard. The Conservatives are pledged to axing the state agencies but should their powers be passed up to central government or passed down to an even more local level?
(more…)

What’s going on at the Competition Commission? Er, not much. If the sale of Friends Reunited hadn’t been referred there, the watchdog would have only one case on its books by the end of November 2009.
(more…)

The official figures showing the recession is not yet over were a surprise. But what if they are revised to show the economy was actually growing after all? It would change not only our outlook but our faith in all statistics.
(more…)

The Conservatives should not chide Labour for selling the family silver at the wrong time: the party that invented privatisations sold a stream of state assets at low prices when it was in government. And Gordon Brown has twice called the market correctly in raising billions of pounds of capital from the private sector.
(more…)

This is an old-style financial crisis but not all the old answers will work. Freezing the pay of doctors and judges may have worked for the Wilson and Heath governments but it has little impact when inflation is negligible or negative.
(more…)

When politicians run out of new ideas they come up with old ones. If the proposed National Investment Corporation for financing small firms looks familiar it’s because you’ve seen it before – and more than once.
(more…)