Obama’s an accomplished individual. Smart, cool, in control. But his standout quality is probably his ability to create euphoria. Create it, sustain it, ride it. Watch the people celebrating with him at his victory rally in Chicago and you could easily believe that the USA had just won a war or beaten a recession. Unfortunately for [...]

A hundred years ago, a generation of men – many of them volunteers – fought an unprecedently bloody war for almost invisible gains. The men were heroes, but the generals commanding them were too often blunderers, too little conscious of the ever-mounting casualties. David Cameron is right to demand that our schoolchildren are reminded of [...]

Accountable: A letter in the Sunday Times called for Osborne to begin spending cuts a year earlier than planned In February 2010, twenty economists published a letter in the Sunday Times calling on George Osborne to begin spending cuts a year earlier than planned. The key sentence of that letter stated that, ‘In order to be credible, [...]

Another day, another banking scandal. Barclays’ LIBOR cheats exploited an arcane and out-dated rate-setting mechanism to fix rates in their favour – which means to your detriment. But just ripping off ordinary people and ordinary investors doesn’t win many points in the Bankster’s Cheat Olympics. If you really want to shoot for those medal places, [...]

Barclays bankers fiddle the LIBOR markets – a multi-trillion market – on a heroic scale. Other banks and bankers are being investigated too. Barclays will not be alone in its wrong-doing, and other banks may even have exceeded Barclays’ brazen contempt for truth and right-dealing. So what happens? So far, we’ve seen all the standard [...]

It’s a strange world we’re living in. This newspaper reported yesterday that, ‘Britain and the US joined forces to urge Germany to create a central Brussels body that could assume sovereignty over individual countries’ budgets and fiscal policies.’ Under pressure: German Chancellor Angela Merkel doesn’t want a Euro superstate – and can’t afford to finance one anyway [...]

  ‘Inflation falls.’ That’s the headline countless British consumers have been longing to see. And inflation isn’t just falling: the Bank of England predicts that prices rises will be down as low as 1.7% some time later this year. If that’s true, it’ll be a blessed relief for countless consumers. Personally, though, I’m just about [...]

Must be nice being Swervyn Mervyn. Nice to be so secure in your job that you can reject any idea of checks and balances on your all-but-supreme power. Nice that ex-Chancellors of the Exchequer view you as some Sun King beyond any check. Nice to have a £400,000 salary and plenty of time to enjoy [...]

Mervyn King of the Bank of England has one main job: to keep inflation at or close to 2%. This week – Tuesday – we’re going to see a new set of consumer price inflation figures and they’re not going to be anything like 2%. My bet is that we’re going to see inflation race [...]