The phrase ‘too big to fail’ can be interpreted in two ways – either to suggest that really big institutions are inherently stable thanks to their size and complexity (as they once said of the Titanic) or that the failure of such entities would leave such a big hole in the economy that governments cannot […]
When we look back at the Victorian era, one thing that puzzles us is how, with an economy a fraction the size of ours, they managed to build so much infrastructure. Well puzzle no more, because John Kay has an answer (and it’s a remarkably simple one): they paid a lot less for it: “The […]
As leader of the Conservative Party and Chancellor of the Exchequer, the performance of David Cameron and George Osborne – unlike most their colleagues – can be readily reduced to simple numbers. For a party leader, the key numbers are psephological – votes gained, seats won, size of parliamentary majority. For a Chancellor, the key […]
Earlier this month, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, international business editor of the Daily Telegraph, marked a sombre anniversary – the first five years of the ongoing global economic crisis: "Some date the crisis to August 9 2007, the day it became clear that Europe’s banks were up to their necks in US housing debt. The ECB flooded […]
Last week, the Deep End featured Anatole Kaletsky’s argument that money created through Quantitative Easing (QE) should be given directly to the general public. Since then, Simon Jenkins, writing for the Guardian, has added his voice to this call: “British economic policy is like the Olympic Park without the athletes. It is barren of activity […]
An excellent and timely post from Fraser Nelson on the Spectator’s Coffee House blog. His subject is the pressure on young people to get into university at any cost: "…in the 22 years since I left school, the government has added to the pressure. It has made a switch from providing university education to actually […]
When people complain about the rich getting richer, they’re usually thinking about the interests of those who aren’t rich. But why would the rich want to get richer? Surely, after a certain level of wealth, there’s not much point – there are only so many caviar sandwiches one can eat in a lifetime. An intriguing thought-experiment on the Interfluidity […]
In his column for Reuters, Anatole Kaletsky ventures into the wacky world of quantitative easing or QE. Faced with a never ending run of economic bad news, the authorities, he says, have two basic options: "They have essentially two options. They could do even more of what the Fed and the BoE have been doing since […]
These days, our politicians are often accused of having no experience of the ‘real world’, as if working in a think tank or advising a minister is to book a one-way ticket to fairyland. Is this a fair criticism? Admittedly, the CVs of Messrs Cameron, Clegg and Miliband aren’t exactly black with the grime of quotidian existence, […]
Understanding the world of finance is not easy. The key concepts can be so thoroughly counter-intuitive that the best way to explain them is by means of an allegory. For instance, the economics blogger, Frances Coppola, tells the tale of a mysterious shoebox to explore the idea of fractional reserve banking; while on the EconoMonitor […]
In the second quarter of 2012, the British economy shrank by 0.7 per cent. Upon hearing the news last week, the British commentariat rose up as one and demanded that something be done. But as Chris Giles points out in the Financial Times, "the correct "something" is entirely dependent on the true underlying health of […]
In many ways Maurice Glasman – now Lord Glasman – is an old-fashioned socialist. In other ways, however, this sometime guru to Ed Miliband is one of the most authentically conservative thinkers in the country. Consider the following piece for the Guardian, in which he gives both barrels to Keynesian stimulus and – by implication […]
Those who compare the financial sector to the gambling industry show little understanding of either. Whereas casinos, bookies and the like carefully manage their level of exposure to potential loss, the banks have opened themselves right up to the most extreme of downside risks – the so-called ‘black swan’ events popularised by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. […]
When it comes to the great financial scandals of our time, how much of the moral high ground does the Labour Party deserve? Very little when you consider who was in charge at the time that things went so badly wrong. And yet, as each new misdeed comes to light we see Eds Miliband and […]
Supermarkets come in for a lot of stick – some of it deserved. But the critics lack credibility if they don’t also recognise the remarkable achievements of the likes of Tesco and its former chief executive, Sir Terry Leahy. The point is well made in Charles Moore’s Daily Telegraph review of Leahy’s new book, Management in Ten […]