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Urban Planning and the Poor
Mark Pennington
31 August 2011
10 comments

Many government interventions in markets though they are often justified in terms of the ‘public interest’ work to the disproportionate benefit of organised interests – often the...
Regulating shop opening hours harms both consumers and workers
Karthik Reddy
16 August 2011
comments

‘Hundreds of thousands [of workers] should not have to stand to attention late into the night for the mere convenience of a few yuppies!’ These passionate words, uttered by German union...
ICB Interim Report – the wrong answer to the wrong question
Andrew Lilico
11 April 2011
2 comments

The fundamental problem in the banking sector is that bank creditors are not exposed to risk of loss. Who are the bank creditors? There are two key sorts: bondholders and depositors. So any useful...
Osborne made a start on deregulation, but there's a long way to go
Mark Littlewood
24 March 2011
comments

This was always going to be a rather modest budget. Having set out the Comprehensive Spending Review last year, the government had already decided its broad plan; we were never going to see much...
Plurality or not?
Mark Littlewood
4 March 2011
1 comment

With all the provisos attached to News Corp’s takeover of BSkyB, opposition to the deal has surely now been diluted. But there are, perhaps, two groups who can still legitimately complain...
If we want to improve the supply-side we need greater efforts to deregulate the labour market
Len Shackleton
18 February 2011
2 comments

A key part of promoting supply-side improvements in the UK economy has to be the loosening-up of employment regulation. Although the UK still has a rather freer labour market than some of its...
Economic liberalisation and the growth agenda: actions speak louder than words
Philip Booth
17 February 2011
7 comments

The government has realised belatedly that it wants to pursue an agenda for  ' growth '. The problem with this sort of language is that it encourages government...
The Coalition must create a culture of entrepreneurship, rather than entitlement
Mark Littlewood
15 February 2011
comments

Going for growth is the key challenge for the Coalition. In fact, pretty much all their eggs are in the growth basket. If GDP does not show a marked and impressive upward swing over the coming...
Liberating the social housing sector
Peter King
14 February 2011
1 comment

It has often been said that Britain has the best-housed poor in Europe. Social housing is provided to a high level with heavily subsidised rents and with further assistance to help non-working...
Planning and the supply side of the economy
Philip Booth
14 February 2011
2 comments

Editorial note: Supply side week Supply side liberalisation should be at the top of any government's agenda. It is particularly important during a recession when economic resources need to be...
Cut out the red tape and get us back on track
Nick Hayns
27 January 2011
comments

It is not easy running a business in this country. You might think I'm making reference to the recession, and, indeed, that is certainly something that has served to heap misery on this nation...
Politicians should keep their noses out of bankers' bonuses
Philip Booth
11 January 2011
5 comments

Nick Clegg today said that he understood bonus anger. I think that any sane person also understands bonus anger. It is therefore incumbent upon politicians to explain patiently, and with sensitivity...
A tale of three capitalisms
Kevin Dowd
18 October 2010
10 comments

One of the most important issues in the ongoing economic controversy is whether the crisis is due to a “failure of capitalism”. What both sides of this argument often overlook, however,...
Bonfire of the quangos is mostly hot air
Richard Wellings
14 October 2010
8 comments

There are over 1,000 quangos in the UK. Today’s news that 192 of them are to be abolished appears to be concrete evidence that the coalition is taking radical action to reduce the role of...
Equality Act shows coalition isn’t serious about deregulation
Richard Wellings
2 October 2010
9 comments

The Equality Act came into force yesterday. It strengthens anti-discrimination law and will make it easier for members of specified groups to win claims for discrimination, harassment and...
Jamie Oliver’s lesson in big government
Ruth Porter
29 September 2010
1 comment

The level of critique by self-righteous foodies on TV has reached new heights recently with Jamie’s American Food Revolution. The programme makes for astonishing viewing – school...
Demands for extra bank capital are hampering the recovery
Tim Congdon
5 August 2010
1 comment

The central constraint on economic recovery in the leading economies since mid-2009 has been officialdom’s pressure on banks to raise their capital/asset ratios. Also relevant – but to a...
Pssst! Wanna boost kids’ smoking? Have a display ban!
Patrick Basham
15 July 2010
24 comments

Public health regulations frequently serve exclusively to prevent legal capitalistic acts between consenting adults. But the fact that prohibition’s history is a history of failure never stops...
British government DEFAULT
D. R. Myddelton
9 July 2010
4 comments

It is distressing to witness yet another piece of financial chicanery by the British government, which now proposes to substitute the Consumer Prices Index for the Retail Prices Index as the “...
Reasons to be negative about the UK’s growth prospects
Tim Congdon
26 May 2010
7 comments

In the 15 years to 2007, the British economy had on average faster growth (by about 0.5% to 0.75% a year) than its large European neighbours. A similarly benign context of rising trend output and...

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