Paul Johnson

Thanks Matt. I too can recommend @samfr.bsky.social great book. Glad you like mine too.

NEW PODCAST: How to fix UK pensions?

@pjtheeconomist.bsky.social is joined by Carl Emmerson and @laurenceobrien.bsky.social to discuss whether people in the UK will be able to afford a decent standard of living in retirement.

🎧 Listen here: ifs.org.uk/articles/how...

Quote from IFS Associate Director Tom Waters: "These changes more than halve the saving of the package of reforms as a whole, making the Chancellor’s already difficult Budget balancing act that much harder. The decision is to protect existing health-related benefit claimants from the reforms, thereby making the savings entirely from new claimants to these benefits. This will create big differences – thousands of pounds a year, for many years in some cases – between similar people with similar health conditions who happen to have applied at a slightly different time."

NEW: Changes to health-related benefit reforms would reduce saving from the planned bill by £3 billion in 2029–30, but would create a huge difference in support between claimants.

Read Tom Waters, @eduinlatimer.bsky.social and Matt Oulton's new briefing here: ifs.org.uk/articles/cha...

Climbdown on benefit changes will hit public finances by c£3bn. Adds to Chancellor's problems, but not huge. Real problem is this, plus climbdown on winter fuel payments, suggests govt can't make any cuts to spending. With no fiscal headroom leaves taxes as only margin of adjustment.

No 10 gags civil servants to stop them speaking out in public Senior officials are told not to make unvetted comments, leading to events being cancelled and claims of a chilling effect on free speech

"Chilling", "heavy handed", "misguided", "astonishing and unworkable" just some of the comments.

Having worked in and with civil service for a long time I can confirm all of those. We need more, not less, open engagement of civil service in policy discussion.

www.thetimes.com/uk/politics/...

The government should not ban public servants from speaking in public | Institute for Government New guidance will damage the quality of government and public discourse.

Frankly outrageous from the govt. This new, and I think unprecedented, ban on civil servants speaking in public will damage public debate, politics, policy making and the civil service itself.

What are they thinking?

www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/comment/gove...

IfG banner for an event titled 'The Expert Factor Live' on Monday 23 June, 18.00-19.00. Speakers: - Paul Johnson, Director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies - Anand Menon, Director of UK in a Changing Europe - Dr Hannah White, Director and CEO at the Institute for Government

TONIGHT: The Expert Factor Live! 🎧🚨

Join us at 18:00 for a special live recording of The Expert Factor, the podcast for people who haven’t had enough of experts.

With @drhannahwhite.bsky.social @anandmenon.bsky.social @pjtheeconomist.bsky.social www.instituteforgovernment.org.uk/event/expert...

I chatted to @pjtheeconomist.bsky.social and @benzaranko.bsky.social about the major problems in the Crown Court: what’s gone wrong, and how can we fix it? Have a listen to find out!

Loved speaking with @benansell.bsky.social about our poor productivity growth and what we should do about it. Do listen.

We had far too much fun recording this. Perhaps the effects of sleep deprivation. Do have a listen

Very striking this. Spending on the new childcare entitlement is turning out to be much greater than expected. What we don't know is whether this is because more parents have been tempted into work, or are just substituting for informal childcare

Expanding the welfare state is an expensive business

Apparently a serious bottom up review of administration costs revealed that all departments should be making exactly the same reductions over the exactly same period, irrespective of whether overall budgets are rising or falling. Irrespective of anything in fact.

Hmmm

Essentially all of the increase in defence spending counts as capital. Therefore, according to fiscal rules, OK to fund through borrowing. But is that appropriate, esp as this looks like a permanent increase?

Please look at this chart, so that the embarrassing amount of time I spent last night calibrating the size of each circle to correspond to the £ increases wasn't all a waste.

Defence and net zero the biggest winners on capital funding: says a lot about government priorities.

Love this chart! Very high fraction of additional capital spending going to defence and net zero.

Public service spending rising faster than national income over this parliament. Rose much faster than national income 2019 to 2024. Result is almost 3% more of national income on public service spending 2019-2028. That is a big increase in size of state.

More important point is that these monthly GDP figures are close to meaningless. Just noise. Up in March down in April. Big picture: growth is feeble and we should ignore monthly ups and downs until a consistent picture emerges.

In which the Guardian continues to push the line that we don't need to build any houses, there isn't a supply problem. It's all those speculators and landlords. Just extraordinary.

One for the fiscal enthusiasts:

This Spending Review marks the first proper shift towards what we might call "PSNFL-friendly" policy: more loans, equity investments and guarantees, which don't count against the government's chosen debt rule. Suspect we'll see more of this in years to come.

All you need to know in an easy to listen one minute and thirty seconds

3 per cent a year increase in NHS spending. That does mean virtually nothing on average for current spending elsewhere. Can't yet tell who winners and losers are. Would be nice if chancellors actually gave us the useful facts and figures in their speeches.

Not sure I've ever listened to a chancellorial speech so hard to work out what is happening. Rattling off huge number of figures making it look like big increases in spending on everything.
Bear in mind current spending on average on all other than NHS not rising over SR period.

Note wording on police funding. Increase in "spending power". Implies that higher precepts from local taxes will play their part.

Should the chancellor really be talking about Southport pier and Kirkcaldy high street? These are not decisions that HM Treasury should be involved in. Absurd over centralisation. (At least rhetorically).

Review of "Green Book" looks designed to favour investment in particular areas rather than where economic return is greatest. Good news for North and Midlands. Bad news for London and South East.

Though in reality she's cutting current spending from overseas aid to fund other domestic spending. The defence increases are almost entirely capital. It's not a shift from ODA to defence but from ODA to other priorities with extra capital allocated to defence

It’s 50 years since Denis Healey raised the basic rate of income tax. No Chancellor since has done so. In fact rate repeatedly cut. If Rachel Reeves finds she needs more money in the Autumn maybe it’s time to break that 50 year taboo.

We are getting more revenue than ever from corporation tax. That is a big surprise. Given international competition the demise of CT revenue has long been predicted. Have a listen to find out more.

My colleagues have come up with a brilliant new tool which allows you to see how and where government spends our money and how that has changed over time. Do have a play!

This is very good indeed. I hope it will be widely read and acted upon in Treasury and Number 10.