Business and investment

We often think of exports and imports as things made in one country and consumed in another – I export cars to you and import socks you’ve made. In fact the majority of UK exports and imports are now made up of goods or services which are themselves inputs into production. I export engines to your car factory and import cotton to make into socks. This sort of trade is particularly important for understanding the UK’s trade with the EU. In this observation we look at the implications this has for the UK’s future trade policies.

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.

Today, the Labour party will announce that they would not implement planned corporation tax cuts and would reverse most of the cuts introduced since 2010. This would be the first time the main rate of the modern corporation tax in the UK had been increased. The policy could raise around £19 billion in the near term, but substantially less in the medium to long run because companies would respond by investing less in the UK.

Last month, researchers at the Institute for Fiscal Studies launched first paper the from a new programme on local government finance. This paper looked at a range of issues including, changes in councils’ spending and revenues over the last seven years, and issues related to the evolving English business rates retention scheme (BRRS). Today, we publish two spreadsheets with information for individual council areas: a spreadsheet showing changes to councils’ spending on services between 2009–10 and 2016–17; and a spreadsheet showing relative gains and losses from the BRRS since it was introduced in 2013–14.

The results of the latest business rates revaluation reveal a growing divergence in property prices between London and the rest of the country. Increases in the value of non-residential property in the capital are set to raise rates bills by 11%, on average, increasing the tax take by over £700 million. This will be offset by reductions in bills and revenues in most of the rest of England, and especially the North, as property values fall behind. Growing differences in property prices reflect broader evidence of a growing divergence in economic performance over the last few years. And it will contribute to the ongoing trend of the UK government becoming more and more dependent on revenue from London to fund services across the whole – which may pose difficulties if more revenue sources are devolved to the local level. This observation discusses this and other issues related to today’s revaluation figures.

This article was first published in Prospect Magazine and is published here with permission.

IFS Director Paul Johnson wries in The Times.

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.

While few can predict how Britain would fare long-term, if we go it alone the immediate impact could be seismic

IFS Director Paul Johnson writes in The Times.