BIG jump in UK CPI inflation.
Up from annual rate of 2% in July to 3.2% in Aug.
Not just the highest level of inflation since 2012, it’s also the biggest month-on-month change in the level in the history of this inflation measure (going back to 1997)
Here’s one reason to believe the inflation rise may be temporary: the main contributing factor was a BIG jump in prices, this year vs last, in restaurants.
And what was happening last year? Eat Out to Help Out.
Once that washes out, some of the upward pressure should go away…
Here’s a reason to believe the rise in inflation may NOT be temporary. Lots of pricing pressure in the pipeline, inc THIS: energy prices are going up v v fast, which will feed into household bills in the coming months. And that’s before you consider costs of raw goods…
You don’t have to look far to find other prices rising very FAST. These are factory gate prices - in other words the wholesale prices companies (as opposed to consumers) pay for materials. And just look: from metals to chemicals to wood, they’re all rising at record rates…
On top of everything else, here’s another inflationary side-effect of the semiconductor shortage.
Not enough chips to go into new cars means not enough new cars which means used car prices are going through the roof (dotted line compares price growth this yr with previous years)
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👗Billions of pounds of imports...
↗️Rising by more than 50% a year...
🛬Planes stuffed with cheap clothes...
🇨🇳And a loophole saving Chinese companies from £billions of UK taxes.
Behind the scenes of one of the biggest stories in the modern economy: e-commerce
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We've spent months investigating this phenomenon.
- We've got the first official estimate of the scale of cheap untaxed imports into the UK.
- We've seen inside the planes carrying these goods here.
- A whole logistics industry is growing around it.
This is a v big deal!
The story begins with a MASSIVE rise in orders from Chinese e-commerce giants like SHEIN and Temu.
Now, most coverage of these brands focuses on labour standards. An important issue.
But there's something else going on here - something deeper.
A shift in how trade works...
🧵Some thoughts re inflation.
Not the data today, but two deep issues we should prob spend more time thinking about. 1. While economists and policymakers may have convinced themselves that the cost of living squeeze is over, for millions of households, it doesn't feel that way.
The key thing to remember here is that when economists talk about inflation what they're really talking about is the ANNUAL RATE at which a basket of goods and services changes price. And certainly, that rate is much lower than the 2022 peaks...
But, as I say, what that number is is simply looking at the difference in the LEVEL of prices over the past year. This chart is that level. (The actual consumer price index!).
And yes, look over the year to May and it's up 3.4%.
🧵Why, barely 24 hours after the Spending Review, is everyone already going on about tax rises?
Are they REALLY coming?
Or is this an "incoherent argument", as one leading minister calls it?
Well here's a thread explaining what's really going on here.
Bear with me...
First things first.
Key thing to remember is that the main job of HMT is to generate enough money, mostly via taxes (left hand bar here), to finance all its spending (right hand bar).
If that left hand bar isn't high enough, we have to borrow to fill the gap.
That's the deficit!
This week's Spending Review was about the right hand column, obvs. But not ALL of the column.
Actually more than half of govt spending is on stuff that WASN'T covered by the spending review - on benefits, debt interest, pensions etc. It's called "annually managed expenditure"
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You may recall a spate of stories a few years ago about appalling working conditions & abysmally low pay in Leicester's clothes factories.
The hope was those stories would shame businesses into improving working conditions.
But here's what ACTUALLY happened next...
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Instead of staying in Leicester, most brands abandoned it & shifted production to N Africa & S Asia.
Today Britain's biggest centre of textile & apparel manufacture is battling the threat of extinction.
It's a mostly untold economic story we've spent recent months documenting
Once upon a time Leicester was the beating heart of UK clothes manufacturing.
The city was dotted with factories making clothes for big name brands.
Now, according to one estimate, the number of clothes factories has dropped from 1500 in 2017 to under 100 this year. A 95% fall.
How big a deal is the new trade agreement unveiled between the US and the UK? Here are some initial thoughts.
Start with this: this is total UK exports to the US over the past 5yrs: £273bn. Right now most of this will face a 10% tariff. Some things (eg cars) face 25% extra
Let's break down that total. The biggest chunk is cars. Just under £30bn. That's covered under the agreement. So too are steel/aluminium exports. Much smaller at £2.7bn...
These sectors will benefit from special deals (though much of the detail still remains vague).
Rolls Royce will apparently get tariff free access for its jet engines. That mostly helps Boeing, but also Rolls Royce. Jet engines comprise a surprisingly large chunk of UK exports to the US, about £17.3bn. So let's shade that red too...
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The Chinese owners of British Steel say they are now considering shutting their blast furnaces and end steelmaking at Scunthorpe in early June - only a few months away.
It would mean an end of virgin steelmaking in the country that invented it during the industrial revolution
British Steel say the main question now is timing: whether the operations will close in June, in September or later.
It says tariffs are one of the reasons the blast furnaces are "no longer financially sustainable".
Press release 👇
The news means @jreynoldsMP faces two interlocking crises in the coming months: 1. The imposition of US tariffs on an ever growing segment of British exports 2. The end of virgin steelmaking (the UK would be the first G7 country to face this watershed moment).
This is big stuff