EU referendum: A Brexit would consign George Osborne’s Budget plans to the bin and put in jeopardy hopes of future growth. March 18, 2016 George Osborne’s Budget this week was mostly welcomed by the business community. But, his Budget plans for this year and beyond will be blown out of the water by Brexit, which the Office for Budget Responsibility warns is the biggest risk to the UK’s future prosperity, shattering its growth forecasts. And Brexit is increasingly likely [...]
Regardless of changes to pensions and retirement ages, no country can duck its demographic destiny March 18, 2016 Facing up to demographic reality is never likely to be a vote winner, but over the course of the next four decades the UK will gradually increase the state pension age to 68 for both men and women. Governments all over the world are waking up to the necessity of such a move, driven as [...]
Break-up a bitter pill for Witty not GlaxoSmithKline, Sainsbury’s boss Mike Coupe’s dealmaking and Smith & Williamson’s owners consider a sale March 18, 2016 If Sir Andrew Witty is casting around for an epithet to sum up his tenure at GlaxoSmithKline, it would probably be: breaking up is hard to do. Yesterday’s announcement that he will retire in 2017 was the City’s worst-kept secret, but it affords GSK the opportunity to contemplate the sort of radical change that tends [...]
George Osborne’s tinkering has made the UK tax system more complicated than ever March 18, 2016 After eight Budgets and six Autumn Statements, we have a pretty good idea of what kind of chancellor George Osborne is. According to the Office for Budget Responsibility’s policy measures database, before Wednesday he had made 585 separate tax policy changes at these so-called “fiscal events”. There had been 165 income tax changes, 107 corporation [...]
Donald Trump can still be stopped – if Republican elites remember they’re conservatives March 18, 2016 Marco Rubio is gone; another campaign “suspended” after facing the full force of the Trump phenomenon. The senator must have known it wasn’t looking good in his home state of Florida. Appearing tired and dejected on camera just a few days before the primary this Tuesday, he then experienced a crushing, double-digit defeat (which not [...]
Why London’s technology sector is united against Brexit March 18, 2016 The upcoming EU referendum could redefine what it means to do business in Britain, and the City has emerged as a powerful campaigning voice in the debate. The chief executives of Numis Securities and CMC Markets have called for the UK to leave, opposing the views of Canada Corporation and 36 FTSE [...]
As the UK is said to be the twenty-third happiest nation on earth, is happiness economics a waste of time? March 18, 2016 Tim Worstall, senior fellow of the Adam Smith Institute, says Yes. All too many of its practitioners chafe at the restriction that economics is a positive subject (describing what is) rather than a normative one (what ought to be). This is the explanation for the World Happiness report, where two distinguished, elderly and shockingly right-on economists, [...]
Why equity crowdfunding is about more than just money March 17, 2016 The UK’s “alternative finance” market has doubled in the last 12 months and hundreds of British entrepreneurs have embraced crowdfunding to launch and grow their businesses. While the US has only just got round to legalising equity crowdfunding, the UK is leading the world. And from next month, hundreds of thousands of investors are expected to jump [...]
It’s not them, it’s you: It’s easier than you think to stop feeling like you are managing a bunch of kids March 17, 2016 “Why does everything end up on my desk?” “Nobody shows any initiative – it’s like managing a bunch of children.” Are these familiar thoughts? Do you find people don’t understand you? Are you frustrated that they don’t do what you want and what your business needs? What causes your organisation either to be a great one, [...]
Budget 2016 might have done no favours for house buyers – now it’s time to look again at property funds March 17, 2016 The British have a long-standing love affair with residential property. This extends beyond owning their own homes to a faith in bricks and mortar as a solid investment. However, while investing in residential has meant owning one or more buy-to-let properties, the impending crackdown on buy to let by the chancellor means they should consider an alternative [...]