My Blog
Incentives are a better way to tackle Covid-19 than blanket lockdowns
A great deal of government policy during the Covid crisis has involved regulation. Given a choice, economists usually prefer to
Coronavirus fatality rates are way down – why has the government not taken this on board?
King Canute has had a bad press. The monarch sat on the beach on his throne with the deliberate intention
On coronavirus, governments have been the most irrational of us all
Decisions, whether by individuals, companies or governments, are often made with imperfect and incomplete information. This is so obvious as
The national productivity recovery depends on getting people back to the office
Office workers continue to display reluctance to return to their workplaces, despite encouragement from the government for them to head
Sweden shows us whether lockdown was worth the economic cost
Did Sweden get it right in its response to Covid? There is increasing interest in this question. Contrary to widespread
Busting the myth of the selfless bureaucrat
There seems to be a fundamental problem with quangos. Hardly a day seems to go by without some new story
The costs of lockdown can no longer be justified
In an otherwise depressing week, two pieces of very good news emerged from India. In Mumbai, blood tests conducted by
Great expectations: The Darwinian wars of economic and epidemiological forecasting
A key concept in modern economics is, to use the jargon term, rational expectations. The idea has dominated orthodox macroeconomics
Why you should read the small print on alarmist Covid-19 death projections
Another day, another lurid, headline-grabbing number of deaths to expect from Covid-19. This time, it was a study from the
Office clusters are as crucial to productivity as they ever were
The Prime Minister is now demanding that offices reopen to revive economic activity in the centres of towns and cities.
The costs of lockdown could far outweigh the benefits
Radical leaders such as Jacinda Ardern in New Zealand and Nicola Sturgeon in Scotland have gained plaudits through their relentless
Innovation is the only way to recover from the Covid crisis
One silver lining of the Covid-19 crisis has been a surge in innovation. Enterprising firms have invented both new products
The government should have been working on multiple tracing apps all along
The NHS contract tracing app has been scrapped in favour of a system developed by Google and Apple. Although health
History shows us that slavery is an economic catastrophe as well as a moral one
Slavery has certainly been in the headlines in the past couple of weeks. Given this sudden interest in this area
Get the Bank of England focused on the real economy
Economic policy is returning to its usual position of prominence. Fears of a major rise in unemployment are starting to
What can we learn from the Black Death? Be prepared, trust entrepreneurs, and have faith
Can we learn from history? An excellent book by Ben Gummer on the Black Death in fourteenth century Britain, The
Covid crisis has exposed the Scottish nationalists once again
In London, the Covid virus is disappearing rapidly. Hospital trusts are increasingly reporting days with no new cases at all.
Crisis could be a chance to change education for the better
In the mid-19th century, Japan was an impoverished feudal backwater. A fleet of American warships totally humiliated their navy, and compelled
The unions stand on the precipice
Len McCluskey, the leader of the trade union Unite, probably did as much as anybody to ensure Boris Johnson’s massive
Mythbusting coronavirus is vital for life to go back to normal
As the government plans the timetable for getting Britain back to work, opinion polls continue to show strong support for
