Why the drugs debate requires more humility November 22, 2011 THE former head of MI5, Baroness Eliza Manningham-Buller, last week called on the government to decriminalise cannabis. She thinks the “war on drugs” is not working. Like most who make this claim, she counts undiminished drug consumption as one of the policy’s failures. Liberalisers seem to agree with prohibitionists that drugs are bad for their [...]
RAPID RESPONSES November 22, 2011 Brown and out Spot on, Allister Heath [Brownonomics makes a shock return, yesterday]. The coalition’s other housing policy announcement is equally poorly thought out. It proposes to raise the discount for individuals buying their council home to 50 per cent, giving an unearned windfall to a lucky few. But this will raise only a trickle [...]
George Osborne has to hold his nerve – the UK economy needs vision, not populism November 21, 2011 EVERY day the pressure grows for the government to do something about growth. Usually this translates into calls for more borrowing and spending, special rules for struggling businesses, or other eye-catching initiatives. The government should resist. Recent history has taught us such quick wins often end up being own goals. They make the business environment [...]
Why I disagree with Ken Olisa on listing rules November 21, 2011 ZHEZKAZGAN, Sverdlovsk, Pavlodar. Not names your average investor will have heard of, but all of them are places of operation in Kazakhstan and Russia for an ever-increasing number of companies from overseas that have become members of the prestigious FTSE 100 share index. This seemingly open door to natural resource companies from countries where corporate [...]
Tightening up on loose interest rate language November 21, 2011 WOULD a rise in interest rates by the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) constitute a tight monetary policy? Not necessarily. Economists tend to refer to the “neutral interest rate” as that which coincides with output growing at its trend rate and low inflationary pressure. Austrian school economists would also stress that interest rates [...]
RAPID RESPONSES November 21, 2011 Xmas trimmings Your comment pieces by Detlev Schlichter and Andrea Leadsom yesterday reminded me of an entry in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle – “In this year [1124] before Christmas King Henry gave instructions that all the moneyers who were in England should be deprived of their members, namely the right hand of each and their testicles [...]
Elastic money is folly – we are facing a breakdown in our entire monetary system November 20, 2011 What is the disease you diagnose in our monetary system? A. We have a strange monetary system. It is inherently unstable. It’s not the natural outcome of market forces. Most people don’t appreciate that the financial system is designed by politics. It’s a fiat money system based on government-controlled money, issued without limit under [...]
We should worry about taxpayers’ exposure to QE November 20, 2011 THE governor of the Bank of England (BoE) has just sent his ninth letter to the chancellor explaining why he and his impressive team on the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) have failed to meet the two per cent inflation target for yet another quarter. The chancellor will no doubt reply that the contents of the [...]
Britain must punch its weight within Europe November 20, 2011 THE political tensions and divided philosophies across Europe have once again returned to the spotlight, following David Cameron’s visit to Berlin last Friday. Strong language has been used on both sides of this debate, but understandably so, given the high stakes. Volker Kauder, of the Christian Democratic Union, made the provocative claim that “suddenly Europe [...]
RAPID RESPONSES November 20, 2011 Think global I agree with Matthew Sinclair [The carbon floor price needs to be scrapped]. Introducing a carbon floor price is wrong. With the UK facing the troubling prospect of a decade of stagnant growth, the government must prioritise: rescuing the economy, tackling the chronic level of youth unemployment and putting us firmly back on [...]