There's a great deal of controversy and bitterness over whether the parasitical Scots steal money from the hard-working English to spend on whisky and deep-fried Mars bars, or whether in fact the evil colonial masters are stealing the Scots' money to fritter away on Pimms and linen suits. The problem is, despite the statistical data … Continue reading On that ‘who subsidises whom’ thing
Category: Financial arcana
Local press exclusives on specialist topics are seldom the most reliable or accurate commentaries you'll ever find on anything ever. Nonetheless, I'm concerned by the East London Advertiser's current alleged scoop on Crossrail. The ELA claims that: Crossrail chiefs fear the deteriorating economic climate, spiralling Olympic costs and the election of Tory Boris Johnson as … Continue reading Don’t axe Crossrail – double it!
If you think that Gordon Brown carried out a tax raid on pensions in 1997, which was the main cause of the end of final-salary pension schemes in the UK private sector, then you are wrong. In 1997, the government did indeed abolish the tax relief on dividends paid by firms into pension funds. But … Continue reading More clarifications of the obvious
Here is a table showing projected growth in real GDP per capita [*] for 2007-08, according to IMF data released this month: 2007-082008-092009-10 Canada0.0%0.6%2.0% France0.8%0.7%2.0% Germany1.5%1.1%1.9% Italy-0.1%-0.1%0.4% Japan1.4%1.6%1.8% United Kingdom1.3%1.4%2.1% United States-0.5%-0.4%1.9% In other words, credible independent people who understand economic forecasting (note: not people who couldn't tell GDP from a CDR but who think … Continue reading Sky in ‘not falling’ shock
In the UK, all debt for which the government is ultimately liable appears as government debt on the national accounts. If the debt of a PFI company is guaranteed by the taxpayer (as for Metronet, for example, unwisely) then it appears as government debt on the national accounts. If it does not appear as government … Continue reading Point of order
Tax Research has an article criticising the TaxPayers' Alliance for being a bunch of rentaquote extreme-right-wingers who distort the facts to bash Labour, socialism and anyone who thinks taxes should be higher than 1%, and also criticising the media for taking the TaxPayers' Alliance seriously. This is entirely true: the TPA is a lobby group … Continue reading Two bald men in ‘fight over comb’ shock
I don't know the detailed substance of the Tesco/British Land sale and leasebank transaction that the Guardian is exposing with glee as a sign of Great Evilness. But I do know some basic things about UK company and tax law, which suggest that the claim that Tesco will be able to avoid paying non-trivial amounts … Continue reading On tax and Tesco
[Sorry, it's a forward so I can't link the original...] "Munich Re has launched a bond programme under which $1.5bn in extreme mortality risk will be transferred to the capital markets.... Munich Re said that the programme would protect it against an exceptional rise in mortality after a major pandemic or similar event in the … Continue reading SPV of the week
If the Northern Rock debacle has done nothing else, it's certainly given a lot of people a great opportunity to rant about things they don't understand. The latest example is Granite, the name used for a collection of Special Purpose Vehicles [*] and associated companies [**] used by Northern Rock. According to hard-left MP John … Continue reading Northern Rock again: why Granite isn’t that hard
A surprisingly large number of commentators seem to believe that Northern Rock's shareholders should be eligible for some kind of compensation, following the bank's nationalisation. To me, this seems utterly bizarre. According to the Merril/Citi/Blackstone plan to sell Northern Rock in October 2007 (which was leaked by Bad People, and which certainly can't be found … Continue reading Am I missing something here?