Are ideas getting harder to find? Almost a decade ago, a banger of a study said YES. Over decades the US economy had been ploughing resources into R&D, with only slowing TFP growth to show for it. BUT newer evidence suggests more grounds for optimism 🧵 My latest column: as.ft.com/r/ee54d3c9-c...
What if ideas aren’t getting harder to find, after all?
Large companies may have just become better at hiding the fruits of their labour
as.ft.com
*** ANNOUNCEMENT *** How to Win a Trade War is finally on sale!! (UK pub day is Thursday, but I'm told people have already started receiving their copies...) Get yours here... US: www.simonandschuster.com/books/How-to... UK: www.panmacmillan.com/authors/soum...
How to Win a Trade War
An irreverent and invaluable guide to our new era of economic competition, written by Financial Times columnist and podcaster Soumaya Keynes and Ch...
simonandschuster.com
Equally I said that about Burnham so sometimes the 'not available option' really is available 🤷
Leaders of flag-raising group Raise the Colours Oxfordshire placed trackers on highway workers’ cars to find out their home addresses, the High Court has heard. RTC then attempted to intimidate the highway staff into no longer removing flags by repeating their addresses to them.
It's nice to see P&P promoting my article as we approach the anniversary of the 1976 IMF Crisis, when unilateral protectionism was furiously debated within the bowels of the British state. It's open access and free to read via the link below.
Past and Present@pastpresentsoc.bsky.social · yesterdayOn advance access "The Political Crisis of British Keynesianism, 1973–1983" by @colmpm.bsky.social (@qmpoliticsir.bsky.social) #OpenAccess doi.org/10.1093/past...
Zohran's magic is built into the fact that he has read Edward Said and David Harvey but understands that a CNN segment is not the time and place to give your book report.
Aaron Rupar@atrupar.com · yesterdayFrancesca Hong was asked last night by Kaitlin Collins if she still believes Thanksgiving should be canceled. Her answer was not 'no.'
The US military’s strikes on alleged drug boats have likely illegally killed “individuals who are not involved in narcotrafficking,” Sen. Tim Kaine told the White House, following “a careful review” of classified information he has seen so far.
‘They are murder victims’: Senator suggests US strikes have killed people who weren’t involved in drug trafficking | CNN Politics
The US military’s strikes on alleged drug boats have likely illegally killed “individuals who are not involved in narcotrafficking,” Sen. Tim Kaine told the White House on Monday, following “a careful...
cnn.com
It’s probably worth distinguishing between what explains the rise since the pandemic (clear role labour market change, building on weak performance in 2010s) with what drives UK’s higher level of neets internationally (education participation is absolutely part of it)
*Government: we need a sense of place and stronger regional policy to bring us together! *Also government: it's okay to shut this local uni campus in an area of high deprivation! *Thick-as-mince country. No joined-up thinking anywhere. 🇬🇧 www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
University of Essex's Southend campus shuts and staff say goodbye
The university says the closure is due to financial pressures, leading to 400 staff redundancies.
bbc.co.uk
My advice on how Burnham could pursue a substantive balancer agenda on immigration control + contribution + compassion - against remigration & racism bsky.app/profile/then...
The New World@thenewworldmag.bsky.social · last wk.The Labour party has been politically stuck on immigration. That has to change – here’s how the new PM can break out of the trap ✏️ @sundersays.bsky.social
Taking PM to Dover shows a No 10 responsiveness to the challenge he was talking about other issues, not this. On boats, on settlement & care workers, Burnham has "balancer" instincts about language + policy: he wants to talk about control of borders and protection, about rules and contribution.
The PM said he wanted to deal with the issue, more than the politics of language, tone. "The public don't like the idea that the border looks like it's not controlled. We need to bring back that control. But also we need to offer support for people who genuinely need it."
"People want to see this issue addressed," Prime Minister Andy Burnham said in Dover, adding: "We also need to build a system that offers safe routes for people as well, because that also takes away the selling point of the gangs." www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...
Burnham pledges to be 'relentless' in curbing small boat crossings
The prime minister says enforcement is increased but there also need to be more safe routes into the UK.
bbc.co.uk
This stolen money needs to be returned to blue states by the next administration with interest.
Murshed Zaheed@murshedz.bsky.social · 7d ago“Trump has rejected disaster aid for Democratic-run states at the highest rate in the 47-year history of the Federal Emergency Management Agency.” Right now people in blue states are basically paying federal taxes as if they’re colonized territories of red states. www.politico.com/news/2026/03...
I'm convinced by the stories people with visual impairments tell about how useful smart glasses are for them, but none of these users seem to depend on being able to record video, which is the main thing that makes them "pervert glasses". Why can't we just regulate that?
If you see someone online ignorantly claiming that entry into Ceuta entails entry into mainland Spain/the Schengen area, here's the text proving otherwise. (Plus almost everyone who entered Ceuta returned within a day)
Steve Peers@stevepeers.bsky.social · 5d agoHere are those special rules on Ceuta and Melilla as regards Schengen - dating back to Spain acceding to the Schengen Convention eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-conten...
Yusuf has gone to Ceuta, to find that those in Ceuta from Morocco can not enter mainland Spain, nor come to Britain. (So he is now praising Sanchez, for border control, within the ECHR!)
The highly confident Kisin believes it is "gaslighting" to point out the border controls + document requirements between Ceuta & mainland Spain, having confidently (but wrongly) asserted there were none, imagining (wrongly) that this gave those in Ceuta from Morocco unimpeded access across Europe
well done using the term social security; much needed in our discourse.
July set to be driest on record for England and Wales after relentless heatwaves
July set to be driest on record for England and Wales after relentless heatwaves
Climate scientist urges better planning as southern England had just 1% of long-term average rainfall last month
theguardian.com
No one would be harmed by this. Plenty would be protected. Type of thing govts used to do.
There is zero reason for the Govt not to ban pervert glasses except for cases where they have been prescribed for medical reasons (ie assistance for those with vision impairment).
No apologies, no freebies: the man who makes Andy Burnham’s jackets on how to weather a storm
No apologies, no freebies: the man who makes Andy Burnham’s jackets on how to weather a storm
Private White VC’s James Eden says PM should not be criticised for wearing a high-quality British-made brand
theguardian.com
Don't disagree with sentiment, but I think the 'demotic' model people have in their heads that the public are the primary mechanism of oversight is just wrong - public are a distant and very lagged backstop, the primary mechanism (&culpability) is the parliamentary party.
In China on holiday. It's wild. China in the American imagination: communist factory state full of worker drones destroying our industry and hostile to our civilisation China as I am seeing it: we have KFC, 7Eleven and McDonalds at the exit to all of our most important cultural heritage sites
Went to a wedding yesterday & talked to normal people about movies. Me: yeah but Disclosure Day is a sprawling mess created by Spielberg's desperate desire to unify his themes in a wholly artificial way Them: It was our first time in a cinema in a year & we just wanted to eat popcorn & zone out
Same. It may be that she is simply the politician of the future, in that it clearly shows as “knows her own mind” and “strong” for a lot of people. Rather than “busking every question”.
