If the Labour conference this week didn't make you feel a little nervous, you might want to look back at some of the speeches again. They spelled out, as David Smith put it in the Times, an "all-singing, all-dancing left-wing programme for government". Think the effective confiscation of large parts of listed firms for employee benefit trusts and tax grabs; the replacing of up to a third of corporate boards with workers; an awful lot of nationalisation; and a very sharp rise in the minimum wage.
But as well as looking at the policies on the table, you might also look at the reaction to them. Business may be a bit bothered by the whole thing, but overall the response has been, as John Stepek points out in our podcast this week (listen to it here), remarkably uncritical. Why? Smith suggests a couple of possibilities but the most convincing is time much of the population has no memory of a UK in which workers and corporations are in constant conflict, or one in which the state controls telecommunications, rail, water and energy. They therefore have very little idea of "how bad it often was".
The Tories may come up with an excellent defence of capitalism next week, something for which the nation's net tax payers would be hugely grateful let's not forget that the top 10% of UK income-tax payers now pay nearly 60% of all income tax, up from under 55% in 2007-2008. But on current form we rather doubt it. It seems then that, barring us developing a time machine and taking everyone under 50 back to the 1970s for a reminder of the miseries of this kind of thing, there is a strong possibility the UK is soon to have to relearn an awful lot of painful lessons about how incentives actually work.
Subscribe to MoneyWeek
Subscribe to MoneyWeek today and get your first six magazine issues absolutely FREE
Sign up to Money Morning
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
One group who do have some awareness of the possible troubles ahead are our property roundtable panelists. You will see on reading our roundtable that politics looms large: pretty much everyone is convinced that there is a land-value tax, or at least a wealth tax on the way something to think about if you are on the verge buying an expensive house (there are some very nice ones in this week's magazine for those interested in paying up for a private ice rink or golf simulator, by the way).
That risk aside, the roundtable covers everything you need to know about the residential housing market in the UK today. Will house prices rise from here? Is a slow and painless decline in real (that is, after-inflation) prices really possible? Does the end of the funding for lending scheme mean mortgage rates are going to rise? Just how bad for all of us (housebuilding company executives aside) has the bonkers Help to Buy policy really been? And finally, now that prices are down 20% or so in real terms from their bubble highs, is it time to start buying in London? The short answers to these questions are: probably not, hopefully, yes, very, and maybe.For the long answers, see our cover story.
-
Review: Trasierra – a yoga retreat in the Spanish hillsFlora Connell joins a yoga retreat at Trasierra, in the Sierra Morena mountains north of Seville
-
How much should I have in emergency savings?When your boiler breaks or your car won’t start, you can find yourself paying a hefty bill. How much should you have in emergency savings to cover unexpected costs?
-
How capitalism has been undermined by poor governanceEditor's letter Capitalism’s “ruthless efficiency” has been undermined by poor governance, a lack of competition and central banks’ over-enthusiastic money printing, says Andrew Van Sickle.
-
The biggest change in the last 17 years – the death of the “Greenspan put”Editor's letter Since I joined MoneyWeek 17 years ago, says John Stepek, we’ve seen a global financial crisis, a eurozone sovereign debt crisis , several Chinese growth scares, a global pandemic, and a land war in Europe. But the biggest change is the death of the “Greenspan put”.
-
Things won't just return to normal – that's not how inflation worksEditor's letter You might think that, if inflation is indeed “transitory”, we just need to wait and everything will return to “normal”. But this is a grave misunderstanding of how inflation works, says John Stepek.
-
Car hire and the strangeness of the post-pandemic economyEditor's letter A global shortage of hire cars and unusually high hotel occupancy rates sum up the post-pandemic global economy in a nutshell, says Merryn Somerset Webb, with enhanced demand meeting restricted supply.
-
Everything is getting more expensive – including moneyEditor's letter Investors are about to start feeling rather more pain, says Merryn Somerset Webb – from the rising price of money.
-
We may be heading for recession – and it will be no ordinary recessionEditor's letter Just as the downturn in 2020 was not a typical recession. the next downturn could be very different too, says Merryn Somerset Webb.
-
What companies should be prioritising this decadeEditor's letter In a world beset by uncertainty, companies should be prioritising slack over efficiency, says Merryn Somerset Webb.
-
Inflation could soon start to hurtEditor's letter Inflation is not going away. And with people's wages not keeping up, things are going to start to hurt, says Merryn Somerset Webb.
