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Analysis and action on living standards
This post originally appeared on The Spectator With the Coalition taking pre-Budget briefing to new levels you’d be excused for thinking there’s little we don’t know about tomorrow’s statement. But here are four questions we can’t yet answer, and that will be crucial to assessing whether this is a Budget for low-to-middle earners as the Chancellor claims: … Continued
This blog originally appeared on the New Statesman The government claims to want to reduce costs and increase quality. It can’t have it both ways. This morning’s announcement on childcare ratios should be just the hors d’oeuvre before the government sets out its plans to increase childcare support for parents. According to the latest rumours, it now … Continued
This morning the government released some interesting new stats on wages. It claims that 90 per cent of people saw their earnings rise in the year to April 2013. As I tweeted earlier this week, the data source that the government are using tells a more positive story about wages than the more regular earnings data that drives most … Continued
One of the big surprises in today’s Autumn Statement lies in the new OBR projections. Growth has been revised up as expected—at least in the short-term. But wage forecasts are down. Amazingly, after today’s largely positive economic news, the squeeze on wages is now going to be even longer than the OBR thought in March. The updates reflect … Continued
First there was the crisis, then the long downturn, and now—let us hope—a labour market recovery. And as Britain and America enter the third phase of a painful economic story, a new question is coming to define political debate: how will the proceeds of the recovery be shared? The answer to this question will depend … Continued
Recent good news on the jobs front should not obscure the fact that real wages have been falling for at least four years. Overall, the wage squeeze has created a lost decade for pay New Office for National Statistics data out this morning confirms what many workers will already know: the wage squeeze continues. In … Continued
No manifesto for 2015 will be complete without a promise of a tax cut. Yesterday we got our first glimpse of what the Tories might offer. Senior party figures say they want to raise the personal allowance to £12,500, matching a pledge made by the Liberal Democrats. Ministers have pitched the higher allowance as a … Continued
Vince Cable’s announcements have allowed the Lib Dems to make the running on low pay but they still leave an opportunity to set out a tougher approach. This year’s pre-conference rumours gave unusual prominence to the minimum wage. After the consensus reached in the late 2000s, leading thinkers in all parties have begun to argue that it’s … Continued
It’s often hard to anticipate shifts in policy direction, even when they’re at close range. Like the steady build-up before a mudslide, arguments accumulate slowly but can then move suddenly, leaving the political landscape changed. Today, there are signs that such a shift may be due on the issue of low pay. With one in … Continued
Why everyone’s pretty much making it up 1. Most of today’s cuts were decided three years ago In his statement today, the Chancellor needs to find cuts in most unprotected departments of around 8-9 per cent. That number flows mainly from three things: the pace of deficit reduction; the decision to protect health, schools, international … Continued
This post originally appeared on James’s Huffington Post blog While low pay and in-work poverty have risen up the economic agenda in recent years, our policy debate has been stuck in a loop. Ask most Labour politicians about low pay and you can expect a well-intentioned but passive mixture of pride in the minimum wage and … Continued
This post originally appeared on James’s Huffington Post blog As always, it’s the policy pronouncements that attract the attention on Budget day. A cheap pint is much more interesting than the minutiae of OBR figures. But the big story on Wesndesday in terms of its impact on households didn’t come from the Chancellor but from Robert … Continued
This post originally appeared on the Huffington Post For anyone hoping to sift a nugget of gold from recent economic data, employment stats have been the place to look. In the past year, the number of people working in the UK has risen faster than at any time since 1989, a remarkable performance from an economy … Continued
This post originally appeared on the Huffington Post You can tell a lot about a downturn by the image that comes to define it. From queues outside job centres in the 1970s and early 1980s to the poll tax riots that preceded the early 1990s recession, the pictures that stick in the mind have a habit … Continued
This blog originally appeared on the Huffington Post Uncertainty continues to cloud the government’s plans on childcare. Latest rumours suggest they may now delay any big announcement until after the budget. If government sources are to be believed, the most recent plans have been scuppered by a tag team of HMT officials and senior Lib Dems. The Treasury is … Continued
This post orginally appeared on The Huffingtom Post blog There may have been few details in Monday’s renewal of Coalition vows but one key policy continues to invite debate: the government’s plans for childcare. Much remains uncertain but it does now seem clear that the government hopes to use tax relief as its key way of … Continued
This post originally appeared on the Huffington Post Few political debates have made more progress in 2012 than that around childcare. In the past 12 months, all threemajor parties have come to see reform as an economic and political necessity. Although hard policy proposals are yet to emerge, it’s now clear that one yardstick for 2015 will be the … Continued
This post originally appeared on the Huffington Post The coalition recognised long ago it has a major problem with women. This morning’s speech from the deputy prime pinister was one of the first major attempts to address this challenge through policy. The speech, drawing heavily on the Resolution Foundation report The Missing Million, looked at how to raise female employment through … Continued
This post orginally appeared on Coffeehouse David Cameron was right; the good news has kept on coming. This morning’s first estimate from the ONS puts GDP growth in the third quarter at 1.0 percent. Cue much justified squabbling over what the ‘real’ number is. A significant portion of this growth will be a one-off, post-Jubilympics bounce-back, suggesting slower … Continued
This post originally appeared on the OECD blog How did inequality and household debt interact in the run up to the 2008/09 financial crisis? Today, a new report byNIESR for the Resolution Foundation provides new evidence on that question for the UK. The new analysis confirms the severity of the borrowing situation of low income households in Britain before … Continued
Do workers reap the benefits of productivity growth? Few questions are more central to the conundrum of faltering living standards. If the 20th century was a golden era for material wellbeing in Britain, that’s explained by one factor above all others: from 1900 to 2000 UK labour productivity grew roughly fourfold, translating into unprecedented growth in real … Continued
If there are ‘no votes in skills’, as the old dictum goes, there seem to be some in apprenticeships. Hence David Cameron’s call this morning for apprenticeships to become a ‘gold standard’ qualification ranking alongside degrees from the best universities. His goal is to rectify Britain’s shockingly poor performance on mid-level skills compared to world … Continued
Backed by strong discounting from retailers, RPI fell from 5.2 per cent in November to 4.8 per cent in December, while CPI fell from 4.8 per cent to 4.2 per cent, its largest one month drop since December 2008. Stressed-out-by-inflationThat of course means inflation remains at more than twice the level of its Bank of … Continued
As economic forecasts continue to head south, it’s worth pausing to ask a simple question: Where exactly do we expect future growth in living standards to come from – even once a recovery takes hold? The list of possible answers to that question isn’t long. In fact, when it comes to household income growth, there are effectively … Continued
With the Chancellor’s autumn statement due next Tuesday, we’re all talking about growth. The ECB and Bank of England now say the UK economy is set to grow at less than half the rate the OBR forecast back in March. That makes it all but certain that George Osborne will announce dramatic downward revisions to UK forecasts when he stands up … Continued
