The journal

Essays

Long-form pieces on the UK economy. We date them, we source them, and we leave them up when the news cycle moves on. That is the difference between a journal and a feed.

Threadneedle Street on a wet London morning, stone facades and commuters

Monetary policy

The last mile has become a fork

The MPC held Bank Rate at 3.75 per cent. Energy is lifting CPI again. Underlying inflation is not. September’s meeting is a test of whether the Bank can tell the two apart.

Mira Calder · 2 September 2026 · 12 min

A North Sea energy platform at dusk on a grey sea

Energy and prices

Look through the flare, not through the kitchen

A terms-of-trade shock from the Middle East is pushing UK inflation back toward 3 per cent. Households will feel it. The question for Threadneedle Street is whether wages and services follow.

Mira Calder · 28 August 2026 · 11 min

A British metal fabrication workshop with a welder at work

Productivity

A rebound that still owes the country five per cent

Administrative data now show output per hour growing at 1.1 per cent a year. That is better than the late 2010s. It is not a return to the pre-crisis path, and the Labour Force Survey is still arguing with the tax records.

Nairn Voss · 24 August 2026 · 13 min

A quiet British GP waiting room in morning light

Labour market

Nine million people are not a residual

The inactivity rate is stuck near 21 per cent. Long-term sickness, not a sudden taste for leisure, is doing most of the work. Labour supply policy now runs through the NHS waiting list.

Mira Calder · 19 August 2026 · 12 min

A wet British street of Victorian red-brick terraced houses

Housing

The housing market is still the fiscal trap

Britain cannot grow its way out of a planning system that rations land, a tax system that sits on property, and a politics that treats house prices as a household balance sheet.

Callan Reeve · 12 August 2026 · 14 min

An empty dealing room in the City of London after hours

Public finances

Debt interest is now a first-order Budget line

The Autumn Budget of 2025 pushed the tax take to a post-war high. At a Bank Rate of 3.75 per cent, the gilt market is no longer a cheap backstop. Fiscal rules that ignore the refinancing calendar are theatre.

Callan Reeve · 5 August 2026 · 13 min

The Scottish Parliament at Holyrood under overcast light

Scotland

What Barnett cannot tell you from Ayrshire

Holyrood has income tax and a block grant that still behaves like a block grant. The volatility is in the adjustment, not the slogan. Living in Ayrshire makes the arithmetic less abstract.

Callan Reeve · 29 July 2026 · 12 min

Cranes and containers at a British port at dusk

Trade

Goods still pay the border; services still pay the rent

Britain’s external accounts remain a services surplus sat on a goods deficit. Non-tariff frictions have not faded with familiarity. Reset talk is cheaper than a veterinary agreement.

Nairn Voss · 22 July 2026 · 11 min