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If only charities and churches could be more reflective about tax
Philip Booth
12 July 2013
1 comment

The aspect of the tax avoidance debate which most exercises organisations such as Christian Aid is the issue of the taxation of companies with subsidiaries in poor countries. Christian Aid links tax...
Give Parliament a year’s recess!
Philip Booth
8 May 2013
comments

It seems a pity that a government whose main economic problems are an inability to control government spending and low economic growth has responded to the local election results by writing a Queen...
Playing games with economics
Philip Booth
2 January 2013
6 comments

There has been a huge growth in game theory in undergraduate economic courses in recent years. Indeed, some universities seem to think it should form the main pillar of study. This was brought home...
Cut more, regulate less
Richard Wellings
22 August 2012
4 comments

Relying on growth was always going to be a risky strategy. Yet a healthy recovery, with robust GDP increases of 2%-plus, formed the core of the government’s deficit reduction plan. In this...
Stagnation Britain: Osborne has played his hand extremely badly
Philip Booth
26 July 2012
2 comments

The statisticians will be arguing about the last quarter’s growth figures for years. Was it really a 0.7 per cent fall in national income, a 0.9 per cent fall or a 0.5 per cent fall? If it...
Cameron is wrong to pressurise firms into putting more women on their boards
Len Shackleton
14 February 2012
1 comment

David Cameron’s trip to the Nordic-Baltic conference seems to have reinforced his view that companies should be pressurised into putting women on their boards. At present he favours Lord...
Ted Heath was right - the EU single market is not a free market
Philip Booth
28 November 2011
1 comment

Last week, the IEA held a discussion on the EU. There were some prominent euro enthusiasts there, together with a large number of sceptics. I was somewhat surprised by the enthusiasm of the free-...
McDonald’s withdrawal from Bolivia: capitalism in action
Kristian Niemietz
22 November 2011
15 comments

BBC World’s Latin America section has provided a sympathetic review of a Bolivian documentary titled ‘¿Por que quebró McDonald’s en Bolivia?’ (Why did McDonald...
Regulation is deterring employers from taking on new workers
Len Shackleton
16 November 2011
1 comment

The labour market statistics released today do not make the greatest reading. UK unemployment rose by 129,000 in the three months to September, with youth unemployment rising above a million. As...
Urgent need to simplify the tax code
Mark Littlewood
26 August 2011
1 comment

The Taxpayers’ Alliance has released some interesting research coming out of its 2020 Tax Commission. HMRC is simply failing to collect tax revenues – to the tune of about £25...
Ha Joon Chang: confused on bounded rationality and economic regulation
Mark Pennington
17 August 2011
comments

In this third and final of the series on Ha Joon Chang’s critique of ‘free market economics’ I examine his account of ‘bounded rationality’ and the case for greater...
The Government needs to act in order to stop Britain slipping further down the Index of Economic Freedom
Ruth Porter
12 January 2011
comments

The latest edition of the Index of Economic Freedom has just been published, and for the second year in a row the UK has slipped down the rankings. Now with a score of only 74.5, two points...
The real debate – “laissez faire” versus “hands-on” government
Mark Littlewood
20 December 2010
2 comments

The so-called ‘cuts’ have dominated the political agenda since the coalition government was formed in May. In totality, the cuts are extraordinarily modest, amounting to a real terms...
Is the smoking ban to blame for the high rate of pub closures?
David Atherton
7 September 2010
9 comments

Labour leadership candidate David Miliband has been posing as the champion of the Great British pub, saying he can save it by confronting large breweries over the beer tie. Under the beer tie, a...
A free economy, virtue and externalities
Philip Booth
6 September 2010
comments

Opponents of a market economy often decry the operation of what they perceive to be selfishness in the market as well as problems of market failure such as the existence of externalities. Whilst I...
Vince Cable risks promoting another financial crisis
Philip Booth
28 July 2010
comments

Vince Cable suggested on Sunday that the payment of bank bonuses and dividends should be linked to whether or not they lent more to businesses. It is not clear exactly what he meant and there was no...
Abolish the annual Finance Act and cut tax collection costs
Philip Booth
23 March 2010
2 comments

            This interview with Philip Booth was conducted by Reuters for their Great Debate blog. 
Micro-management to continue – the “Brownborne” era
Philip Booth
26 October 2009
comments

It is difficult to know where to start in writing a blog post about George Osborne’s proposals to ban high-street bank bonuses in cash of more than £2,000. Let me, instead, raise a...
Privatising Royal Mail: now is not the time
Ian Senior
22 October 2009
4 comments

Way back in 1970, the IEA published my first monograph recommending the abolition of the then Post Office’s letter monopoly. In 1983, I followed up with Liberating the Letter: A proposal to...
Let’s risk under-regulation!
D. R. Myddelton
1 October 2009
2 comments

Businesses are more regulated today than ever. But trends go on until they stop. With Arthur Seldon, I believe we should take more risks of under-regulation. The straw man of “perfect...

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