Tim Worstall

Mr Cable says that, behind the scenes, the Tories and Liberal Democrats are fighting a “constant battle”, including over tax proposals. Likening the conflict to a war, he says he can always use the “nuclear option” of resignation. His departure from the Government would spell the end of the Coalition, he claims. Vince is about [...]

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Sir Philip Green (born 15 March 1952) is a Monacan[1][2], British-born businessman with executive positions in Tina Green‘s companies, including the Arcadia Group. What’s even better is that it’s actually true, too.

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There are other flags. For example, artificial income shifting between family members. And turning income into capital gains. Using companies to avoid national insurance is also tax avoidance. So, does Richard Murphy now agree that Richard Murphy partook in tax avoidance?

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Anyone know what HSBC is alleged to have done to get the Teenage Trots at UK Uncut all upset? I can see references to “avoiding £2 billion in tax” but no details of exactly what is being alleged. Anyone?

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Bankers carve up £7 billion… while we count our pennies By Janet Street Porter The “why do untalented banksers get so much money” whine grates from this particular woman. I don’t know what her specific deal at The Mail is but I do know what one other similar columnist was getting: £1,750 per piece. Being [...]

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Britain’s future, economists have decided, lies in making things: What is this stupidity? Economists are unanimous in their insistence that the future of Britain’s economy, as with that of any and every advanced economy, is in the production of services.

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You do rather have to decide you know: The European court of human rights last week settled the case of three Irish residents who argued that their wellbeing had been jeopardised by their need to travel abroad in order to secure an abortion. Ireland’s theocratic strictures on terminations are nothing new. The abortionist Mamie Cadden [...]

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What a strange thing for a Keynesian to say: How, after the experiences of the Clinton and Bush administrations — the first raised taxes and presided over spectacular job growth; the second cut taxes and presided over anemic growth even before the crisis — did we end up with bipartisan agreement on even more tax [...]

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A piece at the Guardian blaming all the austerity in Latvia on the neo-liberals. As I commented there: The method by which the EU’s creditor nations and banks would like to resolve this crisis is “internal devaluation”: lower wages, public spending and living standards to make the debtors pay. This is the old IMF austerity [...]

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Well, actually, no, he’s not. Firstly of course he’s trying to raise £300,000 and the fees to get listed will be £250,000 or so (and a goodly chunk per year thereafter as well). So it’s an insane decision to start with. More than that though: “I emailed the CEO of the LSE, but no official [...]

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Especially since she’s at the alma mater: Catherine Hakim, a sociologist at the London School of Economics, said women have the freedom to make lifestyle choices about their work and private lives, and that tougher equality laws will not open any more doors for female workers. She said the pay gap has fallen to just [...]

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This is fascinating (for a certain level of fascination). You know those constant cries about how we’ve got to have international regulation of the banks to put them back in their boxes? Hmm. Walter Wriston’s 1970s dictum that “sovereigns can’t default” was disproved in the Third World Debt Crisis of the 1980s, but somehow the [...]

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but if he was on the original Heathrow Express in 1994 that makes it very interesting, particularly given what the Heathrow Express collapse did to London Underground’s approach to risk (I really must write the Jubilee Line Extension post one day). Without knowing which I’d be guessing, and if I’m going to do that I [...]

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that I can recall no company has ever gone into liquidation because it paid more tax than was necessary. Yukos.

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“Hello moosefuckers! I tell you why I hate Canada, half of you speak French, and the other half let them.” For this line led to Jerry Sadowitz being knocked unconscious by an angry member of the audience. Not that many readers of this blog are likely to be asked to open a comedy gig in [...]

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THE JOURNEY TO OUR HIGH STREETS Prelo Book 8.5 on 10 dummy text that is being employed in order to ascertain an approximate length because the actual copy has not yet been received. This is copgth because the actual copy has not yet been received. This is appropriate being employed in order to ascertain an [...]

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At the ASI. Yes, we really do want competition and markets in the NHS.

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This is being marketed as a blunder. It’s not though: Boles replied that he, Cameron and Clegg did not believe in central planning and that it would be a good thing to have different communities offering differing types of services, even if the appearance was chaotic. “I mean, bluntly, there comes a question in life,” [...]

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Now maybe legalisation of all drugs isn’t the right step to take: regular readers will know that my view is that it is but perhaps I’m wrong. But similarly, maybe legalisation is the answer. And what we;d really like to do, if anyone or any country is brave enough, is for someone to actually legalise [...]

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Another was a broader lesson about the nature of do-gooder ventures. “One of the things I realized . . . is how few success stories there are in websites or products or businesses that exist primarily for an altruistic purpose. Most of the time, the things that really change the world exist for something fundamentally [...]

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