Money
‘Teaching someone to draw is teaching them to look’: the year’s best art books
Subjects range from a Paleolithic bone carving to Banksy’s graffiti, via colour concepts, romanticism, tattoos and mirror painting
We’re all caught in the insurance trap
In they pour, one after another, cheerily thudding on to the doormat: ‘Thank you for insuring with us again! Now,…
How to buy a house that isn’t on the market
There are many, mutually reinforcing causes of the property crisis: it is too easy to borrow; there are too many…
The real test for the republic
It’s always intimidating to write for a readership more clued up than you are. I file this on the very…
Labour’s new cabinet divide
There were no civil servants present when ministers gathered for their weekly cabinet meeting on Tuesday. The reason? It was…
Rachel Reeves is taking us back to the 1970s
The first fiscal event to be delivered by a female Chancellor of the Exchequer is a landmark moment, but in…
Still hunting for a Trump trade? Gold may have further to rise
Anyone hunting for a ‘Trump trade’ at this late stage has probably missed the US election bus. If you bought…
The Murdochs’ next move: Rightmove
Next month’s Budget tax raids on capital have provoked a festival of creative doom-mongering on the fringes of Labour’s conference…
Why people would hate a property tax
My friend Tim Leunig is a cerebral thinker of the best kind. Though not party-political, he has worked for Tory…
How big business pushed up vet bills
I was on my way to a Pilates class when I spotted Paul waving at me urgently from across the…
Who’ll be blamed for Rachel Reeves’s tax hikes?
Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt entered Downing Street with one mission: to clean up the public finances after Liz Truss’s…
‘Nationalise Google!’: the techno-optimists hoping to save the world
Future House is a weird private members’ club. There’s a mattress on the floor for napping, a bathtub designed to…
Abba’s genius was never to write a happy love song
Benny and Björn may have composed some of the catchiest tunes ever, but even their bounciest melodies are ballasted with melancholy
The beauty of mid-range products
Once or twice, when on a crowded overnight flight, I have taken a sneaky stroll through the different cabins for…
Britain has an entitlement problem
An Institute for Fiscal Studies paper, published at the end of last month, makes grim reading. Through the prism of…
Price caps are a slippery slope
Sometimes it’s the little things that depress most. I groaned last week to hear the news item. The government is…
Why do people assume I am posh?
If we cram any more doctors into our spare rooms we can put a sign outside advertising NHS accommodation. We…
The UK is right to keep faith in crypto
It will be a charter for fraudsters. It will usher in an open-season mindset for money launderers and criminals. And…
Has Hunt restored the government’s fiscal credibility?
Jeremy Hunt set out at the start of the weekend with one goal in mind: that when the gilt markets…
