It is vital that MPs consider the serious implications of our current public debt commitments and public debt projections. On current projections, the UK will default on its welfare state commitments, including those related to pensions. We must move our debt projections to a sustainable path. The reports that this briefing looks at highlight the need to take a long-term view of our public finances.
Tags: debt, economics, Liberty, Money, Welfare
It is often discussed how central banks saved the world economy following the 2008 Global Financial Crisis. In reality, monetary policy has created an even larger bubble than that which burst in 2008. But the trend has now been going on for a generation – from the 1980s onwards, every recession has been met by creating an even larger debt bubble. This has been done by cutting interest rates to “stimulate” the economy out of recession, but when they are […]
Tags: Austrian School, Bank of England, economics, Hayek, Monetary Policy, QE
Today, the Chancellor of the Exchequer announced his Comprehensive Spending Review. The review set out the Government departments’ resource budgets for the years 2021/22 to 2023/24. Here are some of the Chancellor’s main points: New funding that takes the budget for coronavirus vaccines over £6 billion, part of over £18 billion to fund preventative coronavirus measures An additional £254 million investment to help reduce rough sleeping and homelessness The new £2.9 billion restart scheme to help more than one million […]
Tags: economics, Economy, Money, Treasury
On 22 March, I took the opportunity to speak in the debate on the Budget Resolutions. The Hansard record is below (emphasis mine): Mr Steve Baker (Wycombe) (Con): I rise to support the Budget and, in particular, to welcome the Government’s supply-side reforms. This has been a dramatic Budget, and I would be failing the Government if I did not concentrate on the areas of drama. First, on the disability reforms, the challenge before the Government is clear: to deliver a policy […]
Tags: Budget, Disability, economics, Monetary Activism, Monetary Policy, Parliament, VAT
In my maiden speech in the Commons, I explained how central banks and easy money produce the economic dislocations which result in the business cycle. As the economics posts on this site attest, I have consistently defended the view that our economic difficulties are rooted in the chronically inflationary system of fiat money with which society has been saddled since the end of the Bretton Woods agreement in 1971. I’m glad employment, GDP growth and other indicators are positive but […]
Tags: Banking, economics, Jackson Hole Summit, Money
Co-operatives give people control over the products and services that matter to them. From fan-owned football clubs to farmer-controlled producers, there are nearly 7,000 independent co-operatives across UK. Since the Rochdale Pioneers opened their Toad Lane store in 1844, the co-operative movement has grown to a network of over 3 million individual members in the UK. Cooperatives boost innovation, productivity and entrepreneurship and contribute £37 billion to the British economy. In Wycombe, Cressex Community School became the first state-maintained Trust schools […]
Tags: Cooperatives, economics
The next in a series of videos which set out how Conservatives are securing a better future for our country: Sajid Javid talks about reducing the deficit.
Tags: Better Future, Conservatives, economics, General Election, Video
Via Share The Facts: Labour’s spending plans are in chaos – with Ed Miliband and Ed Balls spending the money from their proposed homes tax over and over again. Last week Balls said the tax will fund the NHS and nothing else: ‘All the money we raised from the mansion tax will go the National health Service’ (LBC, 21 Jan 2015). But now Miliband says the tax will pay for reducing the deficit: ‘A plan to pay down the deficit […]
Tags: economics, General Election, Ideas, Incompetence, Labour, Spending
The European Central Bank has announced a programme of bond-buying of €60 billion a month, to be carried out at least until end-Sept 2016. Monetary policy around the world remains in the midst of a remarkable experiment: money creation is expected sustainably to solve real economic problems. It is possible that there is something dangerously wrong with mainstream economic thought. Hayek’s conclusion to The Pure Theory of Capital is a spectacular rant against those economists who consider only the short-run, surface […]
Tags: Central Banking, ECB, economics, Ideas, Monetary Policy, Money, Quantitative Easing, Video
Via the Conservative Party, “Labour would increase borrowing by over £20 billion in the first year of the next Parliament”: Britain has a clear choice at the next General Election: competence or chaos. We can continue on the road to a stronger economy with a competent Conservative team that have a long term plan; or we can choose the chaos of Labour’s £20.7 billion unfunded spending promises, higher taxes and more borrowing which would take us back to square one. […]
Tags: Deficit spending, economics, Labour
Steve Baker is the Conservative MP for Wycombe.
Steve was first elected to Parliament in 2010. He was previously an RAF engineer officer then a consulting software engineer. Find out more...
Steve holds regular surgeries in High Wycombe. If you would like an appointment, please contact me.
