• Joe Biden hails ‘historic progress’ and credits stimulus package• Number in or seeking work still 3m below pre-pandemic peakThe US added 850,000 jobs in June, a sign that the country’s post-vaccine rebound is continuing to accelerate.The national unemployment rate remained relatively stable, rising 0.1% to 5.9% in June, probably because more people came off the sidelines to join the labor force.Related: US adds 559,000 jobs in May as fears of hiring slowdown fade Continue reading...

UK GDP has fallen – yet house prices have soared. Even a small rise in interest rates could hurt the economyUK house prices appear to have defied economic gravity over the past year. The lockdowns triggered by the pandemic led to a 10% fall in GDP, the largest fall in 300 years, since the Great Frost of 1709. Yet the latest data shows house prices have grown at the fastest annual rate – 13.4% – in 17 years. Are we in the midst of another housing bubble?An optimistic scenario is that the current boom is driven by the unusual circumstances of the pandemic rather than more systemic problems. Spending more time at home has led many homeowners to desire more space and a better environment. They have used the record buildup of household savings, amassed during the lockdowns and supported by the government’s furlough scheme, to buy larger homes or move out of cities (property prices outside cities have increased by 14% compared with 7% within them).Related: UK house prices rise at fastest rate since 2004 amid stamp duty rushRelated: House price inflation will continue for now, hitting the young and low-paid | Larry ElliottJosh Ryan-Collins is head of finance and macroeconomics at University College London’s Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose Continue reading...

Warning signs are there for global economy, and central banks will be left in impossible positionIn April, I warned that today’s extremely loose monetary and fiscal policies, when combined with a number of negative supply shocks, could result in 1970s-style stagflation (high inflation alongside a recession). In fact, the risk today is even bigger than it was then.After all, debt ratios in advanced economies and most emerging markets were much lower in the 1970s, which is why stagflation has not been associated with debt crises historically. If anything, unexpected inflation in the 1970s wiped out the real value of nominal debts at fixed rates, thus reducing many advanced economies’ public-debt burdens.The same loose policies that are feeding asset bubbles will continue to drive consumer price inflation Continue reading...

Chancellor tells Mansion House breakfast that talks on financial services equivalence have ‘not happened’

Landmark moment for world economy with OECD plan that also covers prevention of profit-shiftingEfforts to force multinational companies to pay a fairer share of tax have taken a decisive step forward after 130 countries and jurisdictions agreed to plans for a global minimum corporate tax rate.In a landmark moment for the world economy, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) issued a statement committing each of the countries to a two-pillar plan to radically reshape the global tax system. Continue reading...

Xi Jinping himself has warned China’s wealth gap is not only economic but political and could threaten party’s legitimacyWhen Wang Zhenyu moved out of his small village in central Henan province to the coastal city of Dalian at 18, he was astonished. “It was like a culture shock for me, even though it was just a big city in my country, not a foreign land.” A few years later when he was enrolled in Peking University as a graduate student, he found much fewer students in the country’s top university coming from a similar background to his.Growing up in a small village of 2,000 farmers, many of Wang’s childhood friends dropped out of school after finishing their nine years of compulsory education. Now with a decent academic job, Wang begins to experience “reverse culture shock” every time he goes back to his village for the annual lunar new year.Related: China has almost wiped out urban poverty. Now it must tackle inequalityRelated: China: 'ruthless' campaign to evict Beijing's migrant workers condemned Continue reading...

Ministers overrule Trade Remedies Authority to defend sector against cheap imports, notably from ChinaThe steel industry has welcomed the government’s extension of measures to defend the ailing sector from a flood of cheap imports.Liz Truss, the international trade minister, said the government had overruled the Trade Remedies Authority, a public body that had said protectionist tariffs and quotas on 10 types of steel product should be maintained for three years, but lifted on nine others. Continue reading...

Commonwealth research says UVI is better measure of small island states’ aid needs, especially on climateSmall island nations on the climate crisis frontlines have been overlooked in overseas aid, according to a new index.Urging a move away from the current benchmark of using gross domestic product (GDP) to measure aid allocation, researchers from the Commonwealth secretariat and the Foundation for Studies and Research on International Development (Ferdi), a French thinktank, have developed the universal vulnerability index (UVI) as an alternative. GDP, they claim, fails to reflect the realities nations face, particularly on climate.Related: UK to slash funding for overseas water and sanitation projects by 80% Continue reading...

The tech giant’s move to combat fraud and dodgy ads has taken too long. The online safety bill must change“We are committed to leading the necessary changes to help fight online scammers,” trumpeted Google’s UK managing director, Ronan Harris, this week, as if the tech giant were somehow a pioneer of a crackdown on online financial fraud and adverts offering “bonds” with implausibly high rates of interest.The reality is that Google’s harder approach has taken an age to appear. It was 18 months ago that the frustration of Andrew Bailey, then the chief executive of the FCA, boiled over. He called for “more assistance from the big internet service companies, particularly Google” on taking down obviously dodgy adverts quickly. If a bank or a regulated financial institution had received such a public shaming, immediate action would be expected.Related: Bank of England’s Andy Haldane warns of inflation rises Continue reading...

Departing chief economist says central bank could be forced to stop economy from overheatingThe Bank of England’s outgoing chief economist has warned that inflation could rise by more than expected and force the central bank into a dangerous “handbrake turn” to stop the economy from overheating.In a parting shot at his fellow rate-setters on his final day at Threadneedle Street on Wednesday, Andy Haldane said he expected that a surge in consumer prices would drive UK inflation close to 4% this year. Continue reading...

Job loss or need for universal credit add to vulnerability once firms required to pay more into plan, thinktank findsOlder workers are at most risk of being made unemployed in the second half of the year as the government’s furlough scheme is phased out, according to a leading welfare thinktank.The Resolution Foundation said the chancellor’s decision to wind down furlough support for employers from today would endanger the jobs of more than one in four workers aged 55 to 64 who have remained on the scheme since the recent lockdown.Related: Beware scaling back UK furlough scheme too soon, warns Resolution Foundation Continue reading...

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

Limited opportunities to spend could pave way for boom as restrictions relax, say economists

Our latest snapshot of key economic indicators finds business activity surging but stock markets slipping

Business leaders also warn of renewed threat to jobs and growth as Delta variant drives up infections

End of furlough, corporate sector debt and continuing crisis in other nations all mean it is too soon to get out the bunting

High political stakes in NI protocol shown in research released hours before unveiling of new UK-EU dealVoters in Northern Ireland are evenly split over the need for Brexit checks on goods coming in from Great Britain, a new survey has shown just hours before a new deal between the EU and the UK is revealed.The EU will on Wednesday say it is retreating from the threat of a trade war and confirm a “package” of arrangements to take the heat out of the bitter dispute over the sales of British sausages, secondhand cars and potted plants in Northern Ireland. Continue reading...

Bank for International Settlements says inflation spike could raise the cost of borrowing to post war highsInflation could spike this year, putting pressure on central banks to raise the cost of government borrowing to post war highs, according to the Bank of International Settlements, which warned of “daunting” issues confronting policymakers during the post-pandemic recovery.With UK government debt spiralling to £2.2tn due to the costs of the pandemic, a jump in interest rates to levels last seen in the 1990s could more than double the cost of national borrowing. Continue reading...

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

Car finance deals and personal loans increase as interest rates fallHouseholds increased their borrowing in May for the first time in eight months as the easing of lockdown rules coincided with a fall in loan interest rates.Figures from the Bank of England showed the first significant credit spending surge since last August, as a run of net repayments by households came to an end in May when £280m more was borrowed on consumer credit than was repaid. Continue reading...

Business lobby group warns failure to act will put UK’s economic recovery from Covid crisis at risk

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

Dozens of Nobel laureates sign open letter condemning treatment of economist Andreu Mas-ColellThreats of massive fines against the economist and former Catalan finance minister Andreu Mas-Colell for his alleged role in Catalonia’s failed independence bid in 2017 have prompted international condemnation.Mas-Colell, 76, who served as finance minister from 2010-16, is among 40 officials, including the former Catalan presidents Artur Mas and Carles Puigdemont, accused by a tribunal of illegally using €4.8m of public money between 2011 and 2017 to further the cause of independence.Related: Freed Catalan leader calls on Spain to ‘think about future generations’ Continue reading...

Thinktank warns of ‘dangerous complacency’ with strength of jobs market and pay growth both weaker than thoughtThe strength of the UK jobs market and rates of pay has been overstated, according to new research, just as the government prepares to cut back its wage support scheme for furloughed workers this week.There is a risk of “dangerous complacency”, the Resolution Foundation warned, as people are still working fewer hours than they were before the pandemic and headline pay growth is overstated.Related: The UK economy is barely out of first gear, so now is no time to hit the brakes Continue reading...

Renewable energy will rely heavily on an industry already berated for human rights violationsInterest in Dogger Bank was once restricted to insomniac enthusiasts for the BBC’s Shipping Forecast. Not any more. Today, the shallow sandbank, located 120 miles off the UK’s north-eastern shoreline, is home to the world’s largest windpower project. When fully operational, giant turbines will transmit 3.6 gigawatts (GW) of electricity, enough to power 5m homes, into the National Grid at prices well below current levels.Welcome to the beginning of the end of the fossil fuel era. Around the world, solar and wind now represent the cheapest source of new electricity generation – and prices are tumbling. Electric vehicle (EV) batteries are driving oil towards obsolescence. Stripped of government subsidies and corporate lobbying carbon-based fuels are a busted flush. The future of energy is green – and the future can’t come soon enough to tackle the climate crisis.Related: The rush to ‘go electric’ comes with a hidden cost: destructive lithium mining | Thea RiofrancosRelated: Record metals boom may threaten transition to green energyKevin Watkins is chief executive of Save the Children UK Continue reading...

Hurrahs for inflation reaching 2% as the economy grew gave way to panic over rising prices – and it’s all, of course, made much worse by BrexitIt is difficult not to laugh: as the economy has been recovering, in certain sectors, from the biggest contraction in output for several centuries, the Bank of England has been desperate to “achieve” the official inflation target. Finally we learn that it has indeed been achieved – that the index of consumer prices has risen by 2.1% in the past 12 months, marginally over the target of 2% – and, hey presto, there is panic in the ranks.Sorry, I should say some ranks. There is one hell of a debate going on in economic and financial circles about whether recent price rises in certain sectors warrant early counter-inflationary action – higher interest rates – or whether the “green shoots of recovery” could thus be nipped in the bud.Demands for finance reach Sunak from all sides, but he's hoist with his own petard: the impact of the Brexit he espoused Continue reading...

Combine the pandemic with rising raw material costs, stir in a labour shortage, a twist of Brexit, add a pinch of poor weather and voila …Tinned tomatoes are a taken-for-granted store cupboard staple, relied upon by Britons to whip up home cooked favourites such as spaghetti bolognese. But the price could soon make you take notice, amid warnings of higher shopping bills, set against a backdrop of soaring global food prices.From the packaging to the transportation and the energy used in manufacturing, nearly all aspects of the production of this popular ingredient now cost more. The crushed tomatoes alone are 30% dearer than a year ago, at €0.48 per kilo. The same pressures are driving the prices of many foods higher, meaning Britons will probably face bigger bills for groceries or meals out this autumn.Related: Bank of England’s Andy Haldane warns over UK inflation riskRelated: The fear that haunts markets – is inflation coming back? Continue reading...

Chief economist says Britain could face ‘nasty surprise’ in wake of US riseInflation could rise well beyond the Bank of England’s expectations, according to its chief economist, Andy Haldane, raising the chances of a “nasty surprise” in the form of a sharp interest rate hike.Speaking as US inflation reached 4.2%, its highest level since 2008, Haldane said the UK’s own rate of price rises was increasingly likely to catch up.Related: Recovery likely to push inflation above 3% by end of year, says Bank Continue reading...

Fifteen years of tax information on thousands of plutocrats is one of the biggest stories of the decade. And yet … cricketsAmerican billionaires don’t pay taxes, and American politicians are all but ready to send Seal Team Six to assassinate the nameless bureaucrat who let ProPublica in on this fact. Welcome to our political hellscape.This month, ProPublica revealed that American billionaires essentially do not pay taxes, and within hours the White House had awkwardly promised no fewer than four federal investigations into the identity of the individual who had alerted the news organization to this fact.Related: Petition urges Jeff Bezos to blast into space – and stay thereEvery billionaire is an inherently public figure, whose fortunes are inextricable from the fabric of our daily livesMaureen Tkacik is a senior fellow at the American Economic Liberties Project Continue reading...

With inflationary pressures all too visible, Threadneedle Street could perhaps be slightly more worriedInflation is “likely to exceed 3% for a temporary period”, says the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, which would prefer the emphasis to be put on the word “temporary”. The rate-setters, or most of them, are sticking to their script: once the inevitable strong period for growth and inflation is out of the way, both readings will fall back, so there’s no need to be alarmed.The benign view has a lot going for it, of course. Inflation plunged last year during lockdowns and the reopening phase was bound to produce a spike of some size. May’s inflation reading was 2.1%, a relative surge from just 0.7% in March. But if the peak proves to be 3%-ish, the “transitory” narrative – central bankers’ favourite word these days – would still be intact. Continue reading...

UK interest rates put on hold with post-Covid boom expected to have impact on prices in coming monthsThe Bank of England expects the strength of Britain’s economic recovery to push inflation above 3% by the end of the year before falling back in 2022 as the post-Covid boom slows down.Policymakers on Threadneedle Street’s monetary policy committee (MPC), who have come under pressure to signal when interest rates will rise in response to higher levels of inflation, said the Bank’s base rate should remain at 0.1% until the economic outlook was more certain. Continue reading...

Arts programme Who We Are Now will take place in both countries and aims to revise old assumptionsForget Tim Tams, Vegemite and moderately cheaper Jacob’s Creek wine, the UK and Australia are to collaborate on the biggest cultural exchange programme there has ever been between the two countries.Early details of an ambitious UK-Australia season were announced on Thursday, with events taking place in both countries from September and encompassing visual arts, theatre, film, dance, design and literature.Related: Scott Morrison has agreed in-principle to a UK free trade deal. What’s in it for Australia? Continue reading...

For the hardline conservatives ruling Poland and Hungary, the transition from communism to liberal democracy was a mirage. They fervently believe a more decisive break with the past is needed to achieve national liberationIn the summer of 1992, a 29-year-old Hungarian with political ambitions made his first visit to the US. For six weeks he toured the country with a coterie of young Europeans, all expenses paid by the German Marshall Fund, a thinktank devoted to transatlantic cooperation.America had long fascinated Viktor Orbán, but he seemed disengaged and unaffected as the group walked around downtown Los Angeles, which was still reeling from the Rodney King riots two months earlier. One Dutch journalist on the trip recalled that the eastern Europeans in the group preferred to spend their daily stipends on “a Walkman and other electronics” rather than on food or fancy hotels. The free market and cutting-edge technologies certainly appealed more to Orbán than American debates and struggles over equality, justice or the rights of people of colour.Related: The conspiracy theorists who have taken over Poland | Christian DaviesRelated: How liberalism became ‘the god that failed’ in eastern Europe Continue reading...

Thousands of leaseholders should benefit from leasehold changes, says CMA

Manufacturing and services grew at near-record rates in June but face staff shortages and delays to supplyBritain’s economy surged ahead in June as private-sector businesses secured extra work and created thousands of new jobs, but analysts warned the boom could be short-lived if shortages of skilled staff and hold-ups to vital supplies continue into the autumn.The manufacturing and services industries, which account for more than 80% of business activity, expanded at near-record rates in June, according to a survey by IHS Markit, building on the unprecedented burst in output growth in May. Continue reading...

The imbalance is more extreme than it’s been in over a century. We need to fix this structural problem before it’s too latePolicymakers and the media are paying too much attention to how quickly the US economy will emerge from the pandemic-induced recession, and not nearly enough to the nation’s deeper structural problem – the huge imbalance of wealth that could enfeeble the economy for years.Related: ‘When is this going to end?’: US factory town devastated by jobs moving overseasA giant suction pump had by 1929-30 drawn into a few hands an increasing portion of currently produced wealth. As in a poker game where the chips were concentrated in fewer and fewer hands, the other fellows could stay in the game only by borrowing. When their credit ran out, the game stopped.There’s so much wealth at the top that the prices of luxury items of all kinds are soaringRobert Reich, a former US secretary of labor, is professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and the author of Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few and The Common Good. His new book, The System: Who Rigged It, How We Fix It, is out now. He is a columnist for Guardian US Continue reading...

Labour shortages are causing widespread disarray. Perhaps employers might consider something radical: paying people more and exploiting them lessGot an advanced degree? Twenty years of experience in your field? The ability to drop everything to respond to work emails? Great! Then you meet the qualifications for an entry-level job paying miserable wages. But you’ll need to have a gazillion interviews and write a thank-you letter after each one to have any chance of getting it, of course.That’s an (only slightly exaggerated) reflection of what the job market has looked like for a long time. Wages have been stagnant for decades. Companies have been demanding more, and offering less: the power has been very much in employers’ hands. Now, in the US at least, the power balance may be shifting; people are quitting their jobs in record numbers. Almost 4 million Americans quit their jobs in April: the highest numbers since government record-keeping for labour turnover began in December 2000. Meanwhile, in the UK, a lot of people are seriously thinking about quitting – one study found 38% of employees are looking to change roles in the next year. Continue reading...

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

Scott Morrison’s free trade agreement with the UK is a win for the Nationals, but the return of coal-loving Barnaby presents a new challenge for the PMOn Monday morning we saw one of those organic redirections that sometimes happen in politics. If the Nationals hadn’t lunged to take out their leader Michael McCormack, another story about Scott Morrison and an undeclared pilgrimage in Cornwall to engage with his convict ancestry would have dominated the day.If you missed this story in the melee, a quick recap. On Monday the London correspondent for Nine newspapers, Bevan Shields, reported that Morrison had last week embarked on an undeclared pilgrimage to St Keverne, a small village 45 minutes south of the G7 summit site in Cornwall, to explore his family’s convict past. This ancestry dot com sortie was undertaken minus the travelling press.Related: The double standard Scott Morrison walks past (on his way to the pub in Cornwall) is the double standard he accepts | First Dog on the MoonRelated: Barnaby Joyce’s Nationals threatens to blow up any climate ambition, and it’s making life hard | Gabrielle ChanRelated: Net zero by 2050? Over our dead body, bolshie Nationals tell Scott Morrison | Katharine Murphy Continue reading...

Reopened economy brings warning of prices rising at fastest pace in almost 40 yearsBritish factories enjoyed the strongest growth in output on record in June but warned they expected to raise their prices at the fastest pace in nearly 40 years in response to a shortage of key components and materials.The Confederation of British Industry said its quarterly survey of manufacturing showed that the rebound across the sector was gaining momentum going into the autumn.Related: UK government borrowing eases as recovery helps tax take Continue reading...

Former Citigroup and OECD chief economist has warned of economic harms from austerity and BrexitThe chancellor has appointed former White House adviser and Citigroup chief economist Catherine Mann to the Bank of England’s monetary policy committee, in a move that ensures two of the nine individuals responsible for setting the country’s interest rates will now be women.The Treasury announced on Tuesday that Mann, who has previously warned about the economic harms that could be caused by austerity and Brexit, has been appointed for a three-year term as an external committee member beginning on 1 September. Continue reading...

Move is key part of Liz Truss’s plan to pivot trade away from Europe after Brexit

Reopening of economy in May causes rush to shops and increases VAT and fuel duty receipts

Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news

The economic damage from Covid will make Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak’s decisions even harder

Poor families cannot afford healthcare and schooling but good harvests offer some hope, World Bank findsThe number of Zimbabweans in extreme poverty has reached 7.9 million as the pandemic has delivered another economic shock to the country.According to the World Bank’s economic and social update report, almost half of Zimbabwe’s population fell into extreme poverty between 2011 and last year, with children bearing the brunt of the misery.Related: 'My parents sold me': poverty drives trade in child brides in Zimbabwe | Nyasha Chingono Continue reading...

Output picked up in May as sectors reopened but lockdown extension may hit some hospitality firms

The idea that the country could spend less on key frontline services than what was planned before the pandemic needs to be discardedLast week the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, claimed in a TV interview that the government cash being spent to keep the economy running during the pandemic was not his money to spend but the viewers’ money. The subtext was that Covid-19 bills would have to be paid for. Mr Sunak was channelling his inner Margaret Thatcher, who in 1983 told her party conference that there is “no such thing as public money; there is only taxpayers’ money”. It is rhetoric frequently used by those who wish to suggest that the government faces the same budget constraints as a household. It is also economically illiterate.The UK is not going to run out of money. The Bank of England is financing Covid spending by buying up huge amounts of Treasury debt under quantitative easing. Lord Turner of Ecchinswell, a former City regulator, told peers earlier this year that QE “is lubricating a fiscal expansion and making it easy for the government to run large fiscal deficits without the danger of setting a rise in interest rates”. We are living in an era of cheap money. Boris Johnson’s apparent repudiation of his own party’s austerity policies cannot be squared with real-terms cuts to some department budgets. The Treasury remains committed to balancing the books in mean-spirited ways: whether it is paying nurses a miserly 1% extra or cutting aid to the poverty-stricken parts of the globe. However demotic the slogans used by Mr Johnson, his words all too often betray the party’s real instincts. While Mr Sunak won’t find the cash to pay for catch-up lessons, his boss praises rich parents who buy private tuition because they “work hard”. Continue reading...

Rishi Sunak should think again as scheme will be badly missed by businesses in hardest-hit sectorsThe complaints from employers are getting louder. Far from the headlines a year ago warning of a rerun of 1980s-style unemployment, businesses are worried there aren’t enough workers to go around.And yet Britain’s economy faces a paradox: after the government delayed the final easing of Covid-19 restrictions in England, employers are also turning up the volume about the growing risk of job losses. Is this simply Janus-faced corporate lobbying or can both somehow be right at once?Related: Furloughed workers reluctant to return, says Andrea LeadsomDelaying the easing of lockdown is unlikely to be severely damaging for the economy at large Continue reading...