Tim Worstall

Paul Krugman: Or if you prefer more British precedents, it echoes the Snowden budget of 1931, which tried to restore confidence but ended up deepening the economic crisis. Hmm, not all that sure of that: was it 1930 or 31? Anyway, we do in fact know what reversed the economic decline in the UK in [...]

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Far from being the deepest cuts in modern times, the Institute for Fiscal Studies calculates the proposed 3.6% real-terms cuts in public spending over fives years are only the deepest since 1976. Hardly the slaughter of the innocents, is it?

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Talking about a Tobin Tax, the Robin Hood Tax idea. Mr. Murphy says this: I also believe in the two tier version – with rate hikes when volatility increases Which is interesting really. Derivatives, one of those things to be taxed, lower volatility. So taxing them in order to reduce the trading of them, which [...]

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It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to graph out the unemployment rate and see that it takes about 3 times as long for it to fall as it does to rise every single time no matter who is in charge.

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I don’t believe I’ve ever seen crime data that’s given in thousands per hundred thousand population before.

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When was the last time Britain’s public spending was slashed by more than 20 per cent? Not in my mother’s lifetime. Not even in my grandmother’s lifetime. No, it was in 1918, when a Conservative-Liberal coalition said the best response to a global economic crisis was to rapidly pay off this country’s debts. Well, as [...]

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What is billed as Spain’s first national siesta championship is under way in Madrid to find the best napper and help revive the tradition of taking a nap after lunch.

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A couple of them for you: 47. So I met this gangster who pulls up the back of people’s pants, it was Wedgie Kray. 33. I was having dinner with Garry Kasporov (world chess champion) and there was a check tablecloth. It took him two hours to pass me the salt.

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How to properly deal with Frogs, Spics, Dagoes and assorted other swarthy foreigners. Here. “Rule Britannia”, “Britons never shall be slaves” etc, etc. So, when do we sail upon The Berlaymont m’ hearties?

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Yes, you know, these cuts, the very day they’re announced there’s a massive surge in attmepted suicide. No, really: It’s 2am, and I’m sitting under a strip light in the emergency unit of my local hospital, waiting for the doctors to finish attending to a young friend of mine who attempted to end her life [...]

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Project Prevention puts the price of a vasectomy – and for forfeiting a future – at £200 Erm, no. John from Leicester, the addict who accepted £200 to undergo a vasectomy-and therefore forfeiting a future with children in it- has made that the price of doing so. I can offer £200 as the price of [...]

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Retail sales in Britain unexpectedly fell last month as consumers started tightening their belts ahead of the government’s austerity measures, Fascinating. So, people do react now to future changes in income. Ricardian equivalence holds. But, just at the time that we so obviously needed an economic stimulus Therefore economic stimulus won’t work because people do [...]

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Merchants are the knights who will save this region from famine and must avoid investing in worthless projects.

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This is just over the hill from here: Four Britons were arrested in Portugal after a man was apparently kidnapped and tortured in the Algarve, it emerged today. James Ross, from Wick in Caithness, disappeared after travelling to Portugal on October 5. According to reports the 26-year-old had an ear, two fingers and three toes [...]

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it was not that important to me Ouch, that’s gotta hurt.

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The Bullingdon boys want to finish what Thatcher began Let’s accept that you are correct. Fine, I’m signed up for that. Let’s move the UK from the current semi-socialism with redistribution on top to classical liberalism with redistribution on top. You know, move it to the Nordic version of social democracy, the version of social [...]

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Sick people queueing for admission on A&E trolleys will suddenly show that NHS ring-fencing was bogus, its inflation needs far higher than the tiny extra it was given. Having a “higher inflation rate” is a synonym for saying that productivity isn’t increasing there as fast as it is elsewhere in hte economy. This is Baumol’s [...]

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Employers could face a £2.5bn bill after the European Parliament voted to force companies to pay maternity leave at full pay for 20 weeks. Well done, well done. As Adam Smith pointed out all those years ago, the total wages of any employment will be equal. So, if you raise the amount that must be [...]

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Starting in April 2012, the Treasury plans to collect money from all businesses forced to enter its Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC) scheme. The green measure was due to be introduced in April 2011 to force companies to buy “allowances” at £12 for every tonne of carbon dioxide they emit. Now, wearing one’s Greenie hat, this [...]

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Radio carbon analysis at the former Leper Hospital at St Mary Magdalen in Winchester, Hampshire, has provided a date range of AD 960-1030 for a series of burials, many exhibiting evidence of leprosy, on the site. Oh.

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