We should not forget that we are not immune to what happens in global markets, and must remember to take a comparative perspective.
Any sincere reading of the British economy since 2010 need acknowledge one basic thing: that the essential problem with the modern economy isn’t income inequality, but a lack of income.
Our forebears worked hard to place us in our privileged place in today’s world. But we inherited that position without having to work for it, and now we’re far more interested in spending and consuming our wealth than in earning it.
Skills shortages are directly linked to transport shortages. It is possible that better transport connections linking our small towns to our major cities could do more for productivity and employment than almost any other initiative.
The NHS which has seen its productivity collapse, and is facing enormous cost pressures as the population ages, must surely be first in line for the application of the tools as they emerge.
The system is all but designed to subsidise low wages, disincentivise productivity, and give retirees no stake in the UK maintaining a thriving, dynamic economy.
Still, the argument that tax cuts themselves lead to growth is one that the Conservative Party hasn’t been used to making since the days of David Cameron Mark One.
Unhappy employees take nearly two additional working weeks of sickness absence per year on average compared to their happy counterparts, and nearly one in ten have had sickness absences totalling more than a month in duration.
Our nation was hailed by the Economist as the “top-performing economy of 2023” for the second year in a row. That isn’t a turnaround, that’s a miracle – a miracle delivered by common sense.
This week, the Office for National Statistics informed us that the economy grew by 0.3 per cent in November. Not only was that above the 0.2 per cent expansion expected by analysts, but it was a recovery from a 0.3 per cent contraction the previous month.
Blaming the OBR is easier than acknowledging that some elements on the right have had a central tenet of its thinking rejected. Tax cuts don’t always pay for themselves.
After Brexit and Covid, five Prime Ministers and a cost-of-living crisis, a war in Ukraine and a war in Gaza, the Labour leader wishes to appeal to a weary electorate with a vision of tedium.
Many Irish policymakers make the reasonable point, if it’s a simple matter of tax rates, then why haven’t more countries simply adopted this approach? It has been in place for decades, there’s been plenty of time.
The key problem is stagnation. Margaret Thatcher’s reforms promoted mobility and opportunity. Now we are an economy which doesn’t change enough.
If we want to get re-elected sooner rather than later, we should absorb the facts rather than the myths of 1979.