Letters to the Editor – 19/11 – UK entrepreneurs, Best of Twitter November 18, 2013 UK entrepreneurs [Re: Entrepreneurs now have their own pressure group – at last, yesterday] Our recent G20 Entrepreneurship Barometer found that, while the UK is one of the top five countries to be an entrepreneur (with a competitive tax system and business-friendly regulation), we still have close to the lowest score for “co-ordinated support”. The 130 finalists of [...]
A nominal GDP target could help the UK economy cope with the East’s rise November 17, 2013 THE UK economy is now accelerating strongly and, if the traditional correlations with business surveys continue to hold, growth could be 3 per cent or more next year. Furthermore, if unemployment continues to decline as fast as the claimant count has fallen in the past four months, the 7 per cent unemployment threshold set out [...]
City Matters: Business needs bold action from the chancellor to safeguard UK prosperity November 17, 2013 IN TWO weeks’ time, the chancellor will deliver his Autumn Statement, following the first few months of consistently good economic news for several years. The strong positive signs across several areas of the economy make it safe to say that the “recovery has finally taken hold”, as Bank of England governor Mark Carney noted last [...]
Why we can still save the zombie firms hindering the UK economic revival November 17, 2013 AFTER the worst recession in living memory, the UK’s recovery feels decidedly sluggish. While the US and German economies are larger than ever, the UK is still well below its pre-recession peak. Yet insolvencies are at a historic low and many businesses seem to be (just about) surviving. Why is this? According to R3, the [...]
Letters to the Editor – 18/11 – Crazy patents, Space spin-offs, Best of Twitter November 17, 2013 Crazy patents [Re: It’s time for tech firms to end their insane global patent wars, Friday] The mis-use of patents has become crazy. As the economist Gary Becker has said, patents should be a last resort, to be used when market-based methods of encouraging innovation are likely to be insufficient. More worryingly, many companies use [...]
Merchant banks no longer rule the City but their influence hasn’t gone November 14, 2013 WHEN the First World War broke out, an interesting meeting took place in the City to assess its implications. It consisted of what were then known as accepting houses: the elite merchant banks who ruled the City with unquestioned command. Run by the sons of the gentry, they made their money by buying commercial IOUs [...]
The Long View: UK leadership of the international space race isn’t entirely out-of-this-world November 14, 2013 WHO SAYS the sky has to be the limit? Britain’s space industry has ambitions to become a global leader. The sector’s new growth plan, announced this week, includes establishing a British spaceport within five years. It wants our 6.5 per cent share of the global space market in 2010 to be 8 per cent by [...]
How a new garden city could offer affordable family homes at scale November 14, 2013 LORD Wolfson’s decision to devote his £250,000 Economics Prize in 2014 to how to deliver a new garden city has raised eyebrows. The prize has rapidly become a rallying point for the most challenging questions of the day, with Roger Bootle winning last year for his treatise on how a country should exit the euro. [...]
Letters to the Editor – 15/11 – Building pressures, Best of Twitter November 14, 2013 Building pressures [Re: The Greenbelt sacred cow: It pens in the poor for no environmental gain, Monday] It is not only Greenbelt land that is being wasted. There is so much scope for Brownfield development in London. Bishopsgate Goods Yard – a 10 acre plot by Shoreditch that has sat derelict for 50 years – [...]
Stronger growth points to review of the Bank’s forward guidance policy November 13, 2013 THE UK economy is looking up – it’s official! The Bank of England delivered a hat-trick of good economic news yesterday in its latest Inflation Report projections. Economic growth is looking stronger, inflation is coming down more quickly than expected, and unemployment is now projected to be lower than in the previous forecast in August. [...]