Economy
The future of the Tories is at stake
To govern is to choose. So leadership contests for a party in government tend to come down to a key…
My Tory leadership race fantasy game
‘Black swan’ theory, developed by the writer Nassim Nicholas Taleb, refers to unexpected events that have extreme consequences but are…
The rail strikes could be the end of the line for Boris
Here I go again, in my occasional role as your intrepid transport correspondent. Last week I reported on airport chaos,…
The case for hiking interest rates
Check out these hyperventilating headlines from last week: ‘What the Fed’s largest interest rate hike in decades means for you’…
Who’s to blame for the air travel crisis?
I sincerely hope you’re not reading this on a holiday flight that’s sitting on the tarmac with no indication as…
Is the Elizabeth line worth the cost?
It’s 8.16 on Tuesday morning and I’m actually writing this on a moving Elizabeth line train. Moving in the sense…
The one thing Netflix could do to keep me subscribing
Anecdotes and statistics should never be confused, but let’s do just that to build a composite picture of today’s UK…
How much did Emily Maitlis cost licence fee payers?
Off duty How many non-doms are there in the UK? – In the year ending 2020, 75,700 people filled in…
Could we be heading for a second Covid recession?
The political story for the moment is the cost of living crisis. But by the end of the year could…
How men’s pants predict economic crashes
Should you happen to spot me these days lurking outside a Calvin Klein boutique, notebook in hand, I assure you…
Is this the end of borrow and spend?
Since the spring statement last week, Rishi Sunak has been dealing with complaints from all sides: the right have been…
The moral of P&O: too many strategic assets are in foreign hands
P & O once stood for ‘Peninsular and Oriental’, with pleasant connotations of sailings to Cadiz and Constantinople – but…
Letters: We’re all still paying for the financial crash
Don’t blame the banks? Sir: Kate Andrews struggles to disentangle the causes of the developing cost-of-living crisis (‘Cold truth’, 19…
The moral courage of P.J. O’Rourke
Was it Socrates who said that chaos was the natural state of mankind, and tyranny the usual remedy? Actually it…
Bad news, Governor: the wage-rise spiral is already raging
I’ve had the opportunity recently to take part in wage-rise discussions for several small entities in which I’m involved. The…
The Chancellor's horrible task ahead
Whether Rishi Sunak is prime minister or still chancellor this spring, fate is handing him a poisoned chalice. Looking back,…
This government’s greatest failure is economic
‘The main job of a government is to ensure that the economics don’t go wrong.’ So argued an economist friend…
Has Boris made you better off?
Despite the political misery for Boris Johnson as he ends the year, he has a big hope: that salaries will…
The economic impact of the latest Covid restrictions
We don’t yet know whether the Omicron variant will drastically accelerate the spread of coronavirus, or whether it will circumvent…
Running on empty: the government is out of fuel – and ideas
The government has no ideas and no direction
Is the inflation panic over? Probably not
So, is the post-Covid inflation panic over? That is how it looked last month, when the government’s preferred inflation index,…
Covid pingdemic takes its toll on Britain's economic bounce-back
The arrival of ‘freedom day’ on 19 July enabled people to return to concerts, festivals, and ditch social distancing, but…
No. 10 is distorting the economy
Job vacancies at a record high, a shortage of 90,000 lorry drivers, farmers complaining about a lack of seasonal workers,…
Britain’s Covid economic bounce back is less impressive than it seems
The UK economy is rebounding at the fastest rate in Europe, and faster even than the United States: that is…
The crisis in Lebanon is a warning for the West
Lebanon is trapped in a nightmare of its own making
