The failure of QE isn’t an excuse for further Bank of England experiments January 28, 2013 QUANTITATIVE easing (QE) is like macroeconomic doping. America is like Lance Armstrong.” Or so a British journalist overheard at Davos. Relative to the size of the economy, of course, the UK is a more likely Armstrong than the US. Central bank asset purchases here have been about 25 per cent of GDP, compared to less [...]
HS2 cost-benefit is a worrying mix of naive projections January 28, 2013 BACK in the 1840s, almost the entire rail network we use today was built over just one decade. Yesterday, the government set out the route that its proposed new high speed rail line – known as HS2 – will take to Leeds and Manchester. It wants to build this new line in two decades. Is [...]
The Debate: Should banks be concerned by the amount of bad debt sitting on their balance sheets? January 28, 2013 YES Michael Ingram There is too much debt in our banking system, and not enough growth to service it. While a degree of forbearance by banks is desirable – to consumers and companies – it is toxic in the long term. If this continues, we run the risk of ending up like Japan, where low growth [...]
Letters to the editor January 28, 2013 Effective cuts [Re: The state is still growing – this isn’t the right kind of austerity, yesterday] The coalition’s failure to make any real dent into the deficit is indicative of its failure to undertake any meaningful reform of the state and its functions. We’ve seen salami-slicing – costs squeezed down and some salaries cut. [...]
Dear chancellor: Five steps to inject some life into a flatlining economy January 27, 2013 LAST week’s grim news that the economy is flatlining causes two headaches for the chancellor. First, his tentative deficit reduction plan is losing credibility by the day. Already he has postponed the date when he will balance the budget to the middle of the next Parliament. But his hopes of closing the UK’s unsustainable deficit [...]
Arts and the City are bound together in the interests of our wider society January 27, 2013 THROUGHOUT its history the Square Mile has always been about far more than just business. It is also part of London, part of wider society, and contributes to the life of the broader community in creating an environment conducive to serving and supporting business. Key to this is the City of London’s role as a [...]
Currency war now threatens to throw world off balance January 27, 2013 THE world may be on the brink of a currency war, if not already engaged in covert hostilities. Japan’s new government has done much to foster the idea that competitive devaluation is the order of the day, by bullying the Bank of Japan to achieve 2 per cent inflation. But even before it came to [...]
The Debate: Is there still a case for high-rise tower blocks as attractive buildings for Londoners to live? January 27, 2013 YES Ian Fletcher There are cities all over the world that have no problem with high-rise living, from New York to Singapore. Land in London is scarce and we need to make the most use of it – not only to ensure the city has space to grow, but also that we protect those green [...]
Letters to the editor January 27, 2013 Debt mechanics [Re: Economic perfect storm: The four trends that killed Western growth, Tuesday] An excellent summary of our economic troubles. But I have an inflation-related observation. Tim Morgan refers to a “shift to immediate consumption” as the cause of debt growth. But it’s wrong to blame consumers. Our economic policy is to blame. Morgan’s [...]
Official policy of debasing sterling is selling off England by the pound January 24, 2013 ABOUT two years ago, as a member of the Monetary Policy Committee, I used the title of the classic 1970s Genesis album Selling England by the Pound to draw attention to the way in which the weakness of sterling was pushing up our inflation rate. Between mid-2007 and early 2009, sterling depreciated by over 25 [...]