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In this ASI e-bulletin from Eamonn Butler and our team of freedom fighters:
OUR AGENDA FOR GROWTH: It might put an extra £6,800 in your family’s pocket!
ADAM SMITH - THE GRAPHIC NOVEL: Coming soon - with your help.
£10,000 ESSAY COMPETITION: Get your entry in soon!
But first...
Might the count of Tory MPs joining Reform soon exceed that of Labour U-turns? Both numbers are rising as fast as the PM’s ratings are falling: Marmite’s more popular than that guy. And now Labour’s in open revolt. It’s like Fawlty Towers (except Fawlty Towers was meant to be a comedy).
But I digress...
RESEARCH
The Growth Agenda
We have ranked 14 different barriers to growth by their potential contribution to GDP, and suggest positive policy changes to reduce them. Reforms to planning laws and the energy sector, for example, need cuts in taxes and regulations to reduce costs and fuel recovery. If all our reforms were implemented, it could boost GDP by 10-20% over the long term. That’s another £6,800 per household. Imagine what we could all do with that!
THE WEALTH OF NATIONS
Adam Smith’s Wealth of Nations - The Graphic Novel
Ahead of the 250th anniversary of The Wealth of Nations, I’ve collaborated with artists to create a graphic novel that brings Adam Smith’s insights to life for a modern audience. It’s perfect for economics students and policy wonks looking for some light reading. But we’re still seeking funding towards its production. But you can support it so it comes out in this anniversary year.
Contact [email protected].
AND ANOTHER THING...
I see that US officials scoffed that “Germany only sent 13 soldiers to defend Greenland. (They obviously know nothing about German efficiency.)
IN THE MEDIA
Viggo Terling was in The Critic explaining why plans to tighten the rules on drink driving are wrong. Jasper Ostle was in CapX setting out our Growth Agenda - which also appeared in a number of major outlets. Foreboding Fiscals was back in the news, popping up in Guido Fawkes, and our Gen Z polling was featured in Fortune. On the events front, our Laila Cunningham TNG was mentioned in The Times and our exclusive Back To School Party was mentioned in Politico.
The 250th Anniversary of The Wealth of Nations is this year! If you'd like to help us celebrate, please consider donating by clicking the link below.
UPCOMING EVENTS
The Next Generation with Lord Elliott
In February we’re delighted to be joined by Conservative peer Lord (Matthew) Elliott of Mickle Fell, who founded the TaxPayers’ Alliance and Big Brother Watch, and played pivotal roles in the NOtoAV and Vote Leave referendum campaigns of the 2010s. In 2025 he wrote “Prosperity Through Growth: Boosting Living Standards in an Age of Autocracy and AI“ with Professor Arthur Laffer and others. Guaranteed to be interesting!
The Next Generation with Will Lloyd
In March, we’re thrilled to be joined by the Deputy Editor of the New Statesman, Will Lloyd. Will has carved out a reputation as one of the most distinctive voices in British journalism. Whether he’s dissecting the ego of a Cabinet Minister or mapping the social decay of a party conference, he has become the preeminent field reporter of Britain’s political zoo.
Crude Calculations Book Launch
Join us for a Book Launch assessing, economic liberalisation and low-carbon energy sources with Dr McPherson-Smith on Wednesday, 11th March. Why do some autocrats embrace the free market while others retreat into protectionism? Do regimes liberalise only when they are desperate for cash? In his new book, Crude Calculations, ASI Senior Fellow Dr Oliver McPherson-Smith challenges that idea.
EDUCATION
Essay Competition
It’s 250 years since 1776, a key date for freedom. Not just the Declaration of Independence, but Adam Smith publishing his Inquiry into the Wealth of Nations. (To mark the latter, we’re planning a big festschrift on Smith, and I’ll be publishing my Wealth of Nations—The Graphic Novel.)
And right now we’re inviting students under 24 years of age to submit an essay appraising the intellectual history of Adam Smith and America’s democracy with an eye to their application to the Middle East and the Islamic world, a realm underrepresented in the scholarship and popular thought about the Enlightenment. The top prize is £5,000 with £3,000 and £2,000 going to the second and third winners.
The deadline for submissions has been moved forward from the 31st March to the 1st March!
Spend your Gap Year at the Adam Smith Institute!
Each year, we take one or two students to come and spend their Gap Year working with us. To qualify, you should: be on a gap year between A-levels and university, be 18-20 at the start of the internship, be open-minded, inquisitive and friendly, be intellectually curious, eager to learn and interested in policy, understand the ASI’s perspective and what it does and have a broadly free-market perspective on the world.
It’s an amazing experience!
Intern at the Adam Smith Institute!
The Adam Smith Institute offers short, two-week unpaid internships to university students and recent graduates who are interested in politics, economics and policy work. These are an excellent opportunity to learn more about the policy making process and the wider free-market movement in the UK.
ASI ONLINE
Read our super-blogs
SOME FOOD FOR THOUGHT …
So, the Chinese want to build a super-embassy capable of stealing the UK’s most valuable secrets. (That should take them about ten minutes on a quiet Sunday.) If I was them, I wouldn’t admit to building 208 “secret” underground rooms. I’d just say I was running a laundry business on the side.
New Video: Is the UK’s decline inevitable, or is it a policy choice?
In this video, we break down The Growth Agenda: a radical blueprint to unlock British abundance. We identify 14 specific barriers - from the “Planning Cage” of 1947 to the world’s highest industrial energy prices - that are strangling wealth creation.
NEW MERCH
In celebration of the upcoming 250th Anniversary of The Wealth of Nations, we’ve launched a smart new collection of Adam Smith 100% silk ties in navy, pink and red, produced by the swank firm Colour Wovens.
We’ve also launched our exclusive new Adam Smith bust, showcased here by our Chairman, James Lawson. This hand-finished resin likeness of Adam Smith is beautifully presented with a bronze patina, capturing the timeless elegance of traditional sculpture. Each piece is carefully crafted to highlight intricate details and finished by hand for a unique, high-quality look. Ideal for offices, libraries, or collections, and a refined tribute to one of history’s greatest thinkers.
IN OTHER NEWS …
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood is to scrap “Non-Crime Hate Incidents”. No doubt the government will soon be hailing how it has “slashed the non-crime statistics”. (The police won’t like it: you can solve 100% of your cases when there’s no crimes but everyone’s guilty. Still, at least they can get on with their main work of not investigating burglaries.)
AND I QUOTE
“There was never a democracy that did not commit suicide,” wrote the US founder and statesman John Adams.
The way things are going in the UK, I’m beginning to think that there was never a political party that didn’t commit suicide either!
Bye,
E
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