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Public sector largesse in the UK
Mark Littlewood
1 July 2011
7 comments

The strikes and protests witnessed in Britain's cities this week may well signal the start of a phase of industrial disputes, as public sector employees fight to retain the rather substantial...
The true scale of UK government debt
Nick Silver
26 April 2011
6 comments

A couple of years ago, in an IEA paper, I suggested that the UK’s public debt was many times larger than the official figure. Following the financial crisis, I recalculated my estimate ...
The sleight-of-hand on public sector pensions
Neil Record
28 March 2011
1 comment

Hidden in last Wednesday’s Budget speech were three short sentences on public sector pensions which will have meant little to most listeners.  …“Today we publish the result...
John Hutton’s report on public sector pensions is a step in the right direction – but he needs to go much further
Philip Booth
8 October 2010
2 comments

Yesterday we had the widely-trailed report on reforming public sector pensions. It has been put to me, including on Radio 5 Live, that now is not the time to reform these schemes. This is true. As...
It’s official – the British government owes trillions
Nick Silver
8 September 2010
comments

Earlier this year I published a report estimating British government debt at  £4.8 trillion . However, over the summer the Office for National Statistics (ONS) ...
Public sector pensions: how they could be reformed
Philip Booth
13 July 2010
comments

Audio podcast for The Economist:  
How to reform public sector pensions
Richard Wellings
7 July 2010
1 comment

Today, the Public Sector Pensions Commission - which was established in autumn 2009 by the IEA, the Institute of Directors and other groups - has released its report, Reforming Public...
Pension age should be raised more rapidly
Anthony Bouselli
1 July 2010
8 comments

" The Emergency Budget included a proposal to raise the state pension age for males from 65 to 66 by 2016. This increases the retirement age significantly earlier than the original...
OBR shouldn’t take a Bernie Madoff approach to public sector pensions
Philip Booth
15 June 2010
2 comments

Two things struck me about the OBR report published yesterday. I shall blog about the other later… The first was its treatment of public sector pensions. This is an area where the IEA has...
The real level of UK government debt is around £4.8 trillion
Nick Silver
14 June 2010
2 comments

As we have a new government and we also have a better idea about the effects of the financial crisis on the public finances, I thought it would be worthwhile to update my 2008 paper,...
Not reducing debt is the greater danger
Nick Silver
26 February 2010
3 comments

" Whilst it might be presumptuous of me to disagree with the sixty eminent economists who wrote to the Financial Times last week, I would like to refer them and the reader to my paper A...
We can’t go on like this…but who is going to stop us?
Philip Booth
8 January 2010
9 comments

Just after Christmas a number of members of the IEA’s SMPC wrote to the Sunday Times about the dire need for a fiscal plan to deal with government borrowing. In this context, it is worth...
What should Cameron cut?
Richard Wellings
8 May 2009
22 comments

The projections in last month’s Budget were terrifying. They suggest that net government borrowing is likely to reach unprecedented levels over the next three years:   ● 2009-10:...
Economics on the web (25.03.09)
Richard Wellings
25 March 2009
comments

●  Philip Booth lectures on “Catholicism and Capitalism” at Westminster Cathedral Hall (video)   ●  Gary Becker and Kevin Murphy argue that we must not let the ‘...
German think tank confirms fears over UK debt levels
Kristian Niemietz
20 January 2009
8 comments

In a recent IEA discussion paper, Nick Silver argues that official figures display less than a fifth of the UK’s actual public debt. This is because pension entitlements constitute debt in all...
Why the last laugh will be on Sir Humphrey
Nick Silver
12 December 2008
6 comments

By continually blocking reforms to public sector pension schemes, the leaders of the public sector unions may be dooming their members to an old age spent in penury. In his excellent monograph, Sir...
How I learned to stop worrying and love the demographic time bomb
Nick Silver
5 December 2008
2 comments

There is a general perception that the ageing population of developed countries will lead to some kind of crisis or demographic “time bomb”. The new IEA monograph Pension Provision:...
Are Western governments heading for bankruptcy?
Nick Silver
26 November 2008
24 comments

If you are a company, you have to include pensions liabilities as a debt in your accounts. However, governments, while professing to follow private sector practices in their accounts, turn a blind...

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