The world's central banks turned hawkish in unison this spring, just as the shock that frightened them was already reversing. My mid-year report card, honestly marked, and where I think the second half goes.
The ONS now says its own labour survey has been understating how productive Britain is. On the better data, output per hour has grown twice as fast since 2019 as the number used to set tax and interest rates.
Slowing private sector pay, mythical price gouging and a cost of living crisis that isn't – what yesterday's labour market data actually reveals.
A year after its £51bn black hole quietly evaporated, the NIESR is back with a £24bn sequel and an inflation forecast to match. I think it will be just as wrong – and just as damaging.
A new Prime Minister, the same script. If Mr Burnham asked me how to get the UK growing again, here is what I would tell him – keeping everything simple.
The Bank of England spent the week being wrong – on wages, on prices, on growth, and all in the same direction. Follow the data instead and you arrive somewhere the MPC won't go: inflation below 2%, rates below 3%. A cat amongst the pigeons, in other words.
With oil prices back at pre-conflict levels, our arithmetic shows CPI inflation peaking at a little over 3% in September and falling below the 2% target in the second half of 2027.
Oil hit $144 a barrel in April, the highest price ever paid for physical crude, and underlying inflation barely moved. This week, Neil Woodford explains why the oil price doesn't work the way most people think, and why three central banks tightened into a shock that was already reversing.
Neil Woodford’s 2026 economic outlook: insights on global growth, market trends, and challenges across the US, China, Europe, and the UK.
