Letters to the Editor February 12, 2013 EU food testing [Re: Horse row no laughing matter – but NHS scandal even worse, yesterday] On the subject of Britain’s food chain, this article completely misses the point – along with most of the media. Food testing is an EU competence as part of the Single Market. All the faults, therefore, lie with the [...]
Retail banks aren’t safe: Politicians fool themselves to think otherwise February 11, 2013 YESTERDAY, RBS’s chief executive Stephen Hester appeared before the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards, just days after his bank’s £390m fine for involvement in Libor manipulation. In the face of scandals like these, the political debate about structural banking reform has intensified. Last week, George Osborne committed to forcibly breaking up banks if they do [...]
Runaway inflation makes Mark Carney’s flexible target largely redundant February 11, 2013 AT THE Treasury Select Committee last week, the incoming Bank of England governor Mark Carney re-iterated his desire for a more “flexible” inflation targeting regime for the UK. The Bank of England’s current remit is to keep consumer price index inflation at 2 per cent, within a band of 1 percentage point each way. But [...]
Pope Benedict saw why the capitalist system is virtuous February 11, 2013 THOSE who study Pope Benedict, who announced his retirement yesterday, have been impressed by his humanity and by his understanding of human nature. Statements he has made on the economy, written in his own hand, reflect that. The Pope, for example, did not see the problems that led to the financial crisis as solvable by [...]
The Debate: Has the reaction to the discovery of horse meat in beef products been proportionate? February 11, 2013 YES Mary Creagh The scandal of horse meat in beef burgers, lasagnes and other “beef” products has grown and grown. And it may not be a simple labelling error. We could be looking at criminal adulteration of food on an industrial scale. If checks cannot identify what is going into our food, we cannot be [...]
Letters to the editor February 11, 2013 Inheritance tax [Re: Stealth hike in inheritance tax not the answer to care crisis] It is hugely disappointing that the promised increase in the inheritance tax threshold to £1m seems to have been abandoned. Inheritance tax is particularly pernicious, and it destroys the country’s capital stock for use in current government consumption spending. An inheritance [...]
Black swans are difficult to predict but we still need maths in finance February 10, 2013 SINCE the 2008 crash, we’ve heard steady criticism of the role of physicists in finance. The terms quants, derivatives and models have all taken on nasty connotations. But if you think about mathematical modelling in the right way, this criticism is wrongheaded. One of the most prominent critiques is an argument from psychology. It suggests [...]
Don’t let the rise of the Brics mask burgeoning opportunities in the Gulf February 10, 2013 ONE of the most striking phrases in David Cameron’s recent speech on Europe was his recognition “that a new global race of nations is underway today”. Adapting to a fast-changing global economic order is critical to the continued prosperity of the UK. Over the past decade, a huge amount of focus has – quite rightly [...]
Cynical Labour has no claim to being a party of business February 10, 2013 CHUKA Umunna, the shadow business secretary, suggested in last week’s City A.M. that Labour is the natural party of entrepreneurship. This is little more than a cynical attempt at gesture politics. Like Umunna’s father, my parents came to Britain with very little and set up their own businesses. The small shops they owned created jobs [...]
The Debate: Could escalating tensions between Japan and China bring about serious economic damage? February 10, 2013 YES Nicholas Consonery In the near term, China and Japan are unlikely to negotiate a return to stability. A continued push by Beijing to weaken Japan’s administrative control over the disputed islands sustains the risk of an accident; but military confrontation is unlikely given Japan’s alliance with the US. However, risks surrounding the Japan/China relationship [...]