Great piece: www.worksinprogress.news/p/why-the-de...

From an Economist leader in August 2000

As the shutdown grinds to an end, I took stock for @economist.com on how well private-sector data has done guiding America through the past few months' data drought. www.economist.com/finance-and...

A quick take from me ahead of tomorrow’s Supreme Court arguments on IEEPA tariffs — There are lots of non-IEEPA authorities Trump can use rebuild his tariff wall — But, losing IEEPA will make the tariff-setting process more lumbering and chaotic. That could be a problem economist.com/finance-and...

Farage's jettisoning of the 2024 manifesto in favour of what promises to be a much more fiscally-conservative approach is a significant moment. My colleague @archiehall.bsky.social ran the rule over the policybook as late as May. It wasn't pretty. www.economist.com/britain/2025...

Here's something I don't have a good explanation for— British households' long-run inflation expectations are pretty severely de-anchored, but markets are totally relaxed.

Have data centres raised power bills? Not really, our analysis @economist.com finds—at least so far. Adding data centres to a state-level model of electricity prices shows no significant effect But backlash is brewing. My latest, on the politics of the data centre: www.economist.com/united-state...

For the first time in about 70 years, net immigration to America could be zero. Beneath the noise of tariff and budget fights, migration may well be the biggest economic story of 2025. My latest for @economist.com: Welcome to Zero Migration America Link: www.economist.com/finance-and... 🧵 below

Pretty crazy how the economic weakness of H1 2025 has just been... revised away

I wonder who...

Goes nicely with a slice of @spignal.bsky.social 's column about Europe's increasingly pungent lack of urgency www.economist.com/europe/2025/...

A dose of everything-is-fine-ism from me in @economist.com. Amid worries about a slowdown in America —The latest data isn't awful (even payrolls), and seems to have stopped getting worse —That leaves America with more than enough growth to keep Europeans jealous www.economist.com/finance-and...

Charts with the same energy: longue duree Lib Dem polling and the VIX

One for the degens: pulled together a tracker of Fed betting markets w/ colleagues @economist.com. Odds of Lisa Cook being ousted by December are still just 27%, and Waller has a narrow lead in the Fedstakes at 32%. Link: www.economist.com/interactive...

Has Britain's workforce sickness problem topped out?

Bracing chart from Deutsche on just how messy a compromised Fed can be for the dollar

We’re looking for a writer to join us in London for 12 months

Petition to ban “unlocking” in British public policy, a term that obscures far more than it illuminates. A brief lexicon: — “Unlock investment” = backdoor subsidies — “Fiscal rules unlock” = borrowing — “Unlock money” = spending — “Unlock new homes” = could have built them years ago

The case not to worry, and then the case to worry about the attacks on the Fed, from me in @economist.com Reassuringly, the path to stacking the Fed is narrow. But norms are fragile, and Trump's obsessions (see tariffs) tend to linger in US politics Short 🧵 below www.economist.com/finance-and...

Quick overnight take on the Lisa Cook mess: — A big, and troubling escalation in Trump's war on the Fed — Market reaction you'd expect: broad selloff in US assets — But: scale of the moves is not huge (bond yields have actually come back down). Still pricing in TACO www.economist.com/finance-and...

New Substack post: on what I've been thinking and writing about over the summer, including: — Britain's worryingly not-cheapening wind turbines — The possible demise of the Sun Belt migration boom — America's growing fondness for Britshoring Link ➡️ notes.archie-hall.com/p/what-i-wr...

Had not expected Jeremy Hunt’s book to be so amusingly catty towards his successor

My latest for @economist.com: on America's data-centre boom. Vast short-run impact on GDP growth: — Accounts for ~1/6th of growth over the past year — And ~1/2 of growth over the past six months But: so far still much smaller than the 1990s dotcom buildout. And... www.economist.com/finance-and...

A vignette from me in @economist.com on NoMa: "The YIMBYest Neighbourhood in America"

I checked in on America's shaky-seeming housing market this week for @economist.com. (Quick 🧵) www.economist.com/finance-and...

Something of a worrying pattern to Britain's inflation upsurge—which has now repeatedly surpassed BoE forecasters' expectations

Notable how "Team Transitory" the BoE remains—inflation is not far off 4% (and expectations are v high), but we're almost certain to get a rate cut in an hour. Meanwhile, the Fed seems scarred into data-dependence and held off at last week, even with inflation well below 3%.

Some work news: I’m shifting focus at @economist.com from the British to American economy, and moving from London to Washington. DC suggestions—from places to eat to people to meet—eagerly requested.

Great @jburnmurdoch.ft.com article on crime and disorder—despite a long-term falling crime trend in Britain, there has been a sharp pickup in highly visible petty crime, and a collapse of enforcement. Lines up well with what I found looking into this a few months back. (Charts 2, 3)

Energy in Britain has gotten scarce—and thus expensive. Prices are high in absolute terms, and further above the European average than any point in at least 40 years (barring the 22/23 shock). What's behind this, and is it crimping growth? I took a look for @economist.com. (🧵)

Quick Fed take: for all the double dissent discourse, Powell gave a hawkish presser and the market lowered the odds of a September cut sharply. Clear, still, who’s in charge.

Donald Trump’s tariff announcements in April prompted investors to shed American assets, sending Treasury yields soaring and the dollar falling. The greenback is yet to claw back the ground it lost since then, suggesting a persistent dent to its valuation

Some unsolicited career advice from me in this week's @economist.com: "Want higher pay? Don't change jobs"—for nearly the first time in a decade, the job-switcher pay premium in America has vanished. www.economist.com/finance-and...

A short piece from me for @economist.com: "Has Trump damaged the dollar?" Three months on, the "Liberation Day" shock has now clearly subsidied... www.economist.com/finance-and...

For a dose of optimism, read Archie's excellent cover package on why Britain's bargain sales pitch might be one of its biggest strengths

Things are so bad, they’re good. Archie with the unpopular, optimistic news for a country prepared to embrace it

A cover story from me in this week's @economist.com—on the "Poundland" strategy for the British economy: as a a cheap-but-good-value exporter of workers and assets. That means slaying some sacred "world-beating" cows, but is truer to the advantages Britain actually has. (🧵)

A thread of my favourite (read: scariest) charts from the OBR's new fiscal risks report. Starting with: Britain borrows more than most rich countries.

There’s an odd tension in how the tariff chaos is hitting the American economy, which I tried to capture in my latest for @economist.com. On the one hand, things feel calm—prices in shops haven’t risen much, markets are back at highs. But… (🧵) www.economist.com/finance-and...

Nature is healing

One year in, how is Labour's growth "mission" going? Not excellently, it's safe to say. I walk through the cavalcade of missed opportunities in my latest for @economist.com. www.economist.com/britain/2025...

Weird jobs report: private payrolls actually missed expectations, aggregate bolstered by big rise in gov't jobs.

Totally wild chart. How much longer will markets tolerate this nonsense?

Emergency Substck post from me, on today's gilt market mess. notes.archie-hall.com/p/im-the-ca...

Spot the difference

In a wild twist, The Economist disapproves of state-run grocery stores, as Zohran Mamdani proposes. I walk through why: www.economist.com/united-stat...

We're hiring an intern to write about Britain—do apply! (We treat interns as regular writers, pretty much from day one.) www.economist.com/britain/202...

Afraid I'm a card-carrying UK Data Service hater: — Bafflingly convoluted interface — Foists a 7-page form on me to access any actual data — Demands a £450 fee for "commercial" (incl press) use Actively stymies attempts to do interesting data-led work. All I want is a nice csv!

My beach-read rec, in the @economist.com "Money Talks" newsletter www.economist.com/newsletters/...