Simon Wren-Lewis
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sjwrenlewis.bsky.social
Simon Wren-Lewis
@sjwrenlewis.bsky.social

Emeritus Professor of Economics, Oxford University.

Simon Wren-Lewis is a British economist. He is a professor of economic policy at the Blavatnik School of Government at Oxford University and a Fellow of Merton College.

Source: Wikipedia
Economics 95%
Political science 5%

I discussed the review here
mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2023/02/fisc...
However it seems to have little impact on BBC reporting and commentary.
Fiscal reporting at the BBC
The BBC intends to commission reviews on impartiality in various subject areas, and last week it published its first on fiscal policy (ta...
mainlymacro.blogspot.com
It's such a bizarre framing. Labour MPs think taking 450k kids out of poverty is putting the country first! That's why they wanted it to happen! It's not because they personally benefit.
Headline on The World at One just now:

"Sir Keir Starmer has denied putting the Labour Party before the country by ending the two-child benefit cap".

Can we please go back to reporting the actual news, not someone's partisan take on it?
Headline on The World at One just now:

"Sir Keir Starmer has denied putting the Labour Party before the country by ending the two-child benefit cap".

Can we please go back to reporting the actual news, not someone's partisan take on it?
"If the OBR cannot organise its document handling, how can we trust it to get the judgment on productivity or the tax richness of GDP forecasts right?" Well, because they're different things, for one. www.ft.com/content/b1af...
The OBR’s careless leak has damaged us all
The fiscal watchdog’s error is worse than other Budget leaks because it exists solely to improve the process
www.ft.com

Today's migration stats illustrate the migration doom loop in action...

(from my presentation at the IMF last week)

This week's post: Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2025/11/expe...
Why did the media hold Johnson to account for allowing lockdown parties in No.10, but did not hold him to account for allowing tens of thousands of preventable deaths from Covid?
Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid
It is now generally (although not universally) accepted that those of us who campaigned vigorously against the government’s auster...
mainlymacro.blogspot.com

Proud to see the Chancellor directly referencing my research (with @ruthpatrick0.bsky.social & Mary Reader) on the two-child limit.

As we wrote then "The two-child limit hasn’t discouraged poorer families from having children; it has simply made families poorer"

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Reposted by Simon Wren‐Lewis

Distributional analysis published alongside the Budget shows that the poorest will benefit most from the measures - particularly due to welfare and public service improvements.

Source: www.gov.uk/government/p...

Y'days post: Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2025/11/expe...
Why did the media hold Johnson to account for allowing lockdown parties in No.10, but did not hold him to account for allowing tens of thousands of preventable deaths from Covid?
Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid
It is now generally (although not universally) accepted that those of us who campaigned vigorously against the government’s auster...
mainlymacro.blogspot.com

This is very good. We need to tax wealth and raise taxes on middle earners.
My pre-budget take for the LSE Politics blog is up:

Labour are unable to articulate any vision or sense of purpose.

Much of the left has convinced itself that government spending can be maintained without broad-based tax increases.

Not a great budget backdrop.

blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...
Wealth tax and looser fiscal rules won’t save the Budget | British Politics and Policy at LSE
The narrative on the left that a wealth tax and looser fiscal rules would solve the Chancellor's 2025 Budget headaches has got out of hand.
blogs.lse.ac.uk

Reposted by Simon Wren‐Lewis

"Much of the left appears to have convinced itself that wealth tax is all that is needed. This is incorrect — and an incessant focus on wealth taxation is obscuring the need for broader tax increases." Clear and interesting piece by @jomichell.bsky.social:
blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...
Wealth tax and looser fiscal rules won’t save the Budget | British Politics and Policy at LSE
The narrative on the left that a wealth tax and looser fiscal rules would solve the Chancellor's 2025 Budget headaches has got out of hand.
blogs.lse.ac.uk

Reposted by Simon Wren‐Lewis

When can you declare an emergency over?

The 5p “emergency” petrol tax cut was introduced in March 2022, to offset a spike in prices

They are now about 30p down on that month, & about 50p down on the absolute peak
My pre-budget take for the LSE Politics blog is up:

Labour are unable to articulate any vision or sense of purpose.

Much of the left has convinced itself that government spending can be maintained without broad-based tax increases.

Not a great budget backdrop.

blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...
Wealth tax and looser fiscal rules won’t save the Budget | British Politics and Policy at LSE
The narrative on the left that a wealth tax and looser fiscal rules would solve the Chancellor's 2025 Budget headaches has got out of hand.
blogs.lse.ac.uk

I wish I didn’t have to share this. But the BBC has decided to censor my first Reith Lecture.

They deleted the line in which I describe Donald Trump as “the most openly corrupt president in American history.” /1

New post: Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid
mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2025/11/expe...
The Covid inquiry shows not just political failure on a deadly scale, but of media failure to transmit expertise and to hold to account politicians that let tens of thousands die unnecessarily.
Expertise, Government, the Media and Covid
It is now generally (although not universally) accepted that those of us who campaigned vigorously against the government’s auster...
mainlymacro.blogspot.com

Robbie Gibb describes the BBC's Political Editor Chris Mason as the "unsung hero of covering politics" and "absolutely first rate"

Reposted by Simon Wren‐Lewis

I have taken an hour out to have a look at the CPS's attack on our current fiscal rules.

I am mostly confused about what they want.

freethinkecon.wordpress.com/2025/11/24/w...
what, the fiscal rules, again?
The conventional wisdom, at least of the sort of crowd I hang out with, is that there is nothing wrong with the fiscal rules, nor with the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) that measures polic…
freethinkecon.wordpress.com