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In today’s newsletter:
Our analysis of July’s growth figures
An interview with Rory Sutherland
Why are sick days at a record high?
The state of freedom in Nigeria
As a think tank with a clear philosophical outlook, we often talk about fighting the battle of ideas – or even waging the war of ideas. I sometimes regret the physicality of that language, because it suggests an all-or-nothing struggle against an enemy who must be vanquished. And perhaps we have had a stark reminder this week, from across the Atlantic, of what can happen when people conflate speech with violence, dehumanise the other side, and come to believe it’s ‘either us or them’.
The reality is very different. FA Hayek inspired both the mission and the style of the IEA in his 1945 advice to our founder, Sir Antony Fisher. We were to be a scholarly institute, dedicated to reaching “the intellectuals, the teachers and writers, with reasoned argument”. Why? Because it is the views of this group that shape the climate of ideas, and so largely determine the course of a free society and its politics. My predecessor once described our objective as “intelligent persuasion” – a pursuit far removed from the military metaphors above.
Hayek provides a fine model in more ways than one. We usually celebrate him for his extraordinary insights on spontaneous order, prices as information, and the impossibility of central planning. But he was also, by all accounts, polite to a fault, both in his writing and in person, and refused ever to attribute to his ideological opponents anything more nefarious than intellectual error. In a tribute to the Foundation for Economic Education’s Leonard E. Reed, he wrote:
When I stressed that it is genuine intellectual error that we have to fight, what I meant to bring out is that we ought to remain aware that our opponents are often high-minded idealists whose harmful teachings are inspired by very noble ideals. It seems to me that the worst mistake a fighter for our ideals can make is to ascribe to our opponents dishonest or immoral aims...
[I]f we have not yet convinced them, the reason must be that our arguments are not yet quite good enough, that we have not yet made explicit some of the foundations on which our conclusions rest. Our chief task therefore must still be to improve the argument on which our case for a free society rests.
That kind of civility and generosity in public debate seems to be rarer than it once was. Indeed, one of the changes I have witnessed in the (nearly) two decades I have been in and around Westminster has been the entrenchment of ‘tribal’ dividing lines, the coarsening of argument, and a more determined impulse to ‘play the man not the ball’. Perhaps this is just the result of rolling news and then social media, which require the most condensed forms of communication, and increase the returns to personalised outrage. But surely we can do better, at all points of the ideological compass.
In The Road to Serfdom, Hayek referred to “those little yet so important qualities which facilitate the intercourse between men in a free society: kindliness and a sense of humour, personal modesty, and respect for the privacy and belief in the good intentions of one’s neighbour”. That may not be quite so motivating as his famous cry for “intellectual adventure” in pursuit of “a liberal utopia”, but like so many Hayekian insights, it continues to resonate many decades after it was first put down on paper.
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We were very sad to learn this week of the death of Kevin Bell, who had been a trustee of the IEA for twenty-three years. Our chairman, Linda Edwards, has posted a full tribute to Kevin on our website. Let me just add that Kevin was a brilliant board member – being both generous in his support and forensic in his questioning – and a wonderful man, who was much-loved by the current and former IEA staff who had the chance to know him. Our thoughts are with Kevin’s family. He will be sorely missed.
Tom Clougherty
Executive Director
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IEA Podcast: Director of Communications Callum Price, Executive Director Tom Clougherty, and Editorial Director Kristian Niemietz discuss Kemi Badenoch’s offer to help cut the welfare bill, tensions between pro-growth and spending-focused factions in Labour, and the CMA’s plans to target tech — IEA YouTube
No growth is bad but not surprising
Responding to the July growth figures, Tom Clougherty, Executive Director of the Institute of Economic Affairs said:
Zero growth in July and a slowing over the three month period is bad but it isn't surprising. There remain fundamental problems with the foundations of the British economy that politicians of all stripes have so far failed to adequately address.
Debate each month about contractions or expansions of tenths of a percent obscure the wider problem – that anything below multiple percentage points a year mean we are going backwards as our population ages and welfare and healthcare bills balloon.
If this government really wants to prioritise growth as much as it says, it must think more radically. Sweeping changes to our tax, regulatory, and planning systems are a prerequisite to delivering the dynamic economy we need.
News and Views
When free debate dies, brutality is all that’s left, Mani Masharzad, CapX
My favorite line from Ludwig von Mises is not about economics, but about ideas. In ‘Liberalism’, he wrote: ‘Repression by brute force is always a confession of the inability to make use of the better weapons of the intellect’… This line has been on my mind in the aftermath of the tragic murder of Charlie Kirk, the conservative activist best known for debating opponents on university campuses.
Director of Communications Callum Price responds to LeftBrainUK, X
Stamp duty really exacerbates this problem by making the transactions between houses, buying and selling, moving houses, much more expensive, so people are less likely to do it.
Between The Waves — Britain’s post-empire problem with Europe, The Financial Times
Labour MPs on the left made common cause with English nationalists on the Tory right in defence of national sovereignty. Free-market think tanks such as the Institute of Economic Affairs found echoes among trade unions.
Rory Sutherland on Wealth Inequality, Housing Crisis & Economic Solutions, Director of Communications Callum Price interviews Rory Sutherland, IEA YouTube
The CBI should be championing growth, not calling for tax rises, Public Policy Fellow Matthew Lesh writes in the Telegraph
In what has been dubbed a “surprise” move, Rain Newton-Smith, the Confederation of British Industry chief, is calling for Labour to drop its pledge to not raise taxes on working people.
Her argument is self-serving yet understandable: British businesses have already shouldered enough of the additional tax burden since Labour came to power, damaging investment and growth.
Sick days hit record high, Head of Lifestyle Economics Dr Chris Snowdon appeared on GB News
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Firms urge Budget rethink amid warnings of more shop closures and job losses, Economics Fellow Julian Jessop quoted in This Is Money
Julian Jessop, economics fellow at the Institute of Economic Affairs, a free market think-tank, said: ‘The UK economy is indeed stuck in a “low growth, high tax” trap, but the Government's own failures to control public spending and restore investor confidence have played a key part.’
Sicknote crisis, Head of Media Reem Ibrahim appeared on TalkTV
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Bad medicine, Head of Lifestyle Economics Dr Chris Snowdon writes in The Critic
Reform UK have been ahead in the polls for months, but a general election is still a long way off. Their objective in the short term is to present themselves as a professional and serious outfit that is ready to govern. So why on earth did they allow Aseem Malhotra to get on the main stage at their conference on Saturday and allege that members of the Royal family have developed cancer as a result of taking Covid vaccines?
Reform vs the nanny state, Head of Lifestyle Economics Dr Chris Snowdon co-hosted Spike’s Last Orders
The Real Cost of China's Communist Economy | Mary Kissel, Managing Editor Daniel Freeman interviews Mary Kissel, former Senior Advisor to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, IEA YouTube
Labour warned gambling levy changes would be ‘irrational’, Head of Lifestyle Economics Dr Chris Snowdon quoted in CityAM
Christopher Snowdon, head of lifestyle economics at the IEA, said the government “seems intent” on directing gamblers towards offshore markets that limit government revenue in the UK.
Book review: "Build, Baby, Build" by Bryan Caplan | ||||||
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Build, Baby, Build: The Science and Ethics of Housing Regulation By Bryan Caplan | ||||||
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