The need for central planning
In one of his many walks around his neighbourhood Phil has been listening to a book, The People's Republic of Walmart, by Leigh Phillips & Michal Rozworski. Basically, a contrarian economist and a jou...
6 Aug 202539min
Lessons from Lesotho on trade and alliances
Lesotho (pronounced ,li-su-tu0 is a small African nature that President Trump threatened with 50% tariffs, describing as a country nobody had ever heard of. Maybe that’s enough for his disciples to d...
30 Jul 202536min
Getting the numbers we need
There is a huge reliance on data to aid decision making – whether it’s Investors wanting to know where to move money, central banks pretending to understand the economy, governments making policy deci...
23 Jul 202541min
The self-induced healthcare trap
In real terms the amount the UK spends on healthcare has risen from £500 in 1970 to £3,000 per person today. That’s a massive increase, but the payback has been that we are living 10 years longer. Ask...
16 Jul 202539min
Blowing the budget?
Financial markets don’t like it when governments announce plans to spend more money. That’s why there’s concern over Donald Trump’s Big Beautiful Bill, which will add, by some accounts, $4 trillion to...
9 Jul 202544min
Ditching the dollar
There’s been a lot of talk lately about de-dollarisation. In other words, global investors are parking less of their money in US dollars (in the form of US treasuries/bonds). What was once considered ...
2 Jul 202541min
Is manufacturing fetishism a problem?
There was an article in The Economist last week, shared widely in press around the globe, about the apparent fixation with manufacturing. Aussie economist Saul Eslake calls it Manufacturing Fetishism,...
25 Jun 202540min
Selling the farm
There’s an irony that the UK Chancellor Rachel Reeves has imposed an inheritance tax on farmers, whilst a trade agreement with the US could see Britain selling-the-farm on a farm grander scale.Phil ar...
18 Jun 202543min
