It’s always the economy, stupid – politicalbetting.com
It’s always the economy, stupid – politicalbetting.com
Americans ain't buying Trump's economic spin. The % saying we're on the wrong economic track has skyrocketed since Jan from 43% to 56%.This has caused a massive shift to the left on who's trusted more on inflation: it's now Dems +4 pts vs. GOP +14 going into the 2022 midterms. pic.twitter.com/nAnn2LCRZG
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So: imagine that there are currently two suppliers of widgets, each costing $5.00, and one is domestic and the other foreign.
Tariffs put $2 on the price of imported widgets, and so people might thing the domestic producer would now sell twice as many widgets for $5.
What actually happens is that the domestic producer raises their price to $6.99, and -price elasticity being what it is- sells 1.5x as many widgets, but at 40% more per widget.
That is profit maximizing behaviour for the widget manufacturer but shows up in higher prices for everyone.
*The article notes that the EU spoiled Amazon's chances to but them for $1.7bn last year. It's now worth $140mn which has saved Bezos a lot of cash.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/c1lr75lp239o
And sometimes words just fail me:
"Annual average earnings growth was 3.9% for the private sector and 7.6% for the public sector, across the three-month period."
https://allaboard.eu/interrail
Can't work out if we are going to travel down to Portugal or Southern Italy now but it should be a fun holiday..
Sure like Wylie Coyote can run in the air for a bit, the plummet is inevitable.
Economic analysis of the Trump 1.0 tariffs suggest they created additional jobs in manufacturing, at a cost to the consumer of $500k/job.
NHS medical staff got 4% this year and non-medical staff 3.6%. It was backdated to April but paid in August, so is that where the 7.6% comes from?
Pulitzer Prize Board members dump broad discovery demands on Trump for tax returns, psych records, and 'any' prescription meds history*
https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/pulitzer-prize-board-members-fight-back-with-wide-ranging-discovery-demands-including-about-trump-finances/
*He's also claiming "emotional damage"
.... However, the public sector annual growth rate is affected by some public sector pay rises being paid earlier in 2025 than in 2024. RTI pay data are also published and provide a provisional, timelier estimate of median pay. The two data sources generally trend well for mean total pay...
So something of a statistical artifact from annualising quarterly pay numbers, which shot up compared with the prior year's quarter, because the early pay awards this year simply weren't in the numbers last year.
There ought to be a corresponding drop in the next quarter, I think ?
(I know, it's astonishing that there still exist lawyers with principles.)
Poor economic news this morning but absolutely no surprise
Handing huge public sector pay rises whilst at the same time clobbering business with additional taxes and awarding massive increases in the minimum wage to young workers results in devastating employment and prospects especially for the young
Why would any business employ young workers when they can, for the same wage engage mature and experience staff
Labour often talk about Truss, but Starmer and Reeves have done far more long term damage to the economy and it will be very difficult to reverse
Add in the workers rights bill and the country can now see why ''Labour is not working'
https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employmentandemployeetypes/bulletins/uklabourmarket/december2025
"Annual average regular earnings growth was 3.9% for the private sector and 7.6% for the public sector. However, the public sector annual growth rate is affected by some public sector pay rises being paid earlier in 2025 than in 2024."
https://www.theglobalrecruiter.com/public-sector-pushes-median-pay-award-above-3-per-cent/
And tbf most of us were happy to jump to the same conclusion and start moralising over it, without asking any questions ourselves.
"Only European residents can travel with an Interrail Pass"
Er... I hesitate to ask but does that include Brits these days?
EDIT: I'm not sure ONS ought to be presenting those figures like that because journalists won't read the detail.
"What countries are included?
Austria, Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Estonia, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and Turkey."
The value of something like ONS is that they try to maintain a consistent approach, and they show their workings.
Even if you disagree with their analyses, you're at least fairly clear how they arrived at them, and political arguments can be conducted with some agreement on the facts.
https://www.politico.eu/article/french-and-germans-lean-toward-dialing-back-ukraine-support-new-international-politico-poll-shows/
As I forecast.
You need this place like an alcoholic needs booze. I said you’d be back.
Welcome back old chap.
Public sector pay rises were 4.75-6% not 7.6%. They happened earlier.
"In July 2024, the Labour government accepted the recommendations of the Pay Review Bodies (PRBs), meaning that public sector employees will receive a pay increase of between 4.75% and 6% in the 2024/25 financial year, depending on occupation.
In the Autumn Budget 2024 policy paper, the government said it had started the PRB process three months earlier in the year than for 2024/25"
My beef is with the general disconnect between what Labour says and what Labour does. This is not a pro-business pro-growth government.
(But it's better than the currently available alternatives, whether from Labour back benches or reform)
Pay is a part of it.
As a whole public sector get better pensions, holidays, increments and pay offs than the private sector.
That needs factorinf too.
That’s exactly what economic theory says should happen: you take advantage of the price differential to (a) maximise profits by increasing prices; (b) increase market share vs non-domestic competitors.
Please join the meeting 5 minutes before your allocated time of 11:15 by clicking on the link.
...
Join the meeting 10 minutes before your allocated time by clicking on the link. It is important that you are ready and join on time.
So in the course of a paragraph, they want me to join at 11.15, 11.10 and 11.05. This automatically generated nonsense must have been sent out for months if not decades with no civil servant bothering to read it.
Oh...
US and EU regulators also need to bear this in mind, when the Amazon buyout of Roomba was scuppered a couple of years ago.
I see Big Z has now given up on joining NATO so you can sort of see the hazy outlines of a deal that could emerge. Russia will need more though.
Day 1 would have just limited employment, especially for anyone with "interesting" backgrounds and led to a surge in agency work which I don't think would have been helpful for either business or worker, just the agency.
On the professional side, councils often employed younger staff, assisting them with obtaining qualifications and CPD credits (where applicable) in the knowledge, once qualified, the surveyor, solicitor or accountant would move on to a much better paying role in the private sector and the process would start anew.
The councils paid less but provided experience which looked good on the CV and, let’s be honest, worked them hard to help them achieve their professional goals.
They need to get back to selling Russian oil pipelined (at a commission) through Ukraine. Currently no-one can buy or reliably deliver the stuff owing to American secondary sanctions and Ukrainian explosives, so this is probably the economic win-win both sides need once the face-saving part has been agreed.
https://www.formula1.com/en/latest/article/formula-1-to-return-to-portugal-in-2027-and-2028.6kRRgAnvEoGiOkJMkzp1Cr
Managing meetings was a perennial struggle - I acquired a bit of a reputation for being a tyrannical Chair but I always wanted a 60 minute meeting to end after 50 minutes to allow those moving to the next meeting time to move, both physically and mentally, from the one issue to the next.
Part of what is perceived as the issue with decision making stems from this, I believe. Senior and especially middle management are overworked and become scared of taking decisions because they fear there has been inadequate discussion and the standard response is to arrange another meeting which rehashes all the old arguments wasting everyone’s time,
Whisper it quietly, but I suspect this happens in the private sector too.
Sorry: 25 Nov
* Unfortunately I can't make it so send my apologies in advance.
See the advisor quitting because not building fish discos that don’t save fish might upset the EU somehow.
Sir Humphrey Appleby: "We'd have to get clearances! Foreign powers, national interests. We have to consult our allies, top brass. NATO, SEATO, Moscow!"