Thread by @faisalislam

Levelling Up thoughts from earlier

v interesting thing here acknowledgement of one of worst records of major economies on regional inequality, and in fact become worse in recent years

But can entrenched economic geography change without lots of spend?

bbc.co.uk/news/business-…

This is from the White Paper - UK worst of G7 nations for regional inequality as measured by ratio of richest fifth of council areas to poorest fifth - and thats got worse over past decade in the UK, but in Germany, Belgium, Japan, Spain, Portugal, gap has closed…

This is a related chart from @NIESRorg
… UK inter regional inequality declining last century before going into reverse since 1990s… whereas Germany closes the east-west gap in same time spectacularly…

researchgate.net/profile/Andre-…

poor productivity record of UK “core cities” when compared to average…

in UK 10 biggest cities materially less productive than average, compared to France, Spain, NL, Italy etc.

But also in Germany Japan, Korea, those cities are actually more productive than average…

In fact Germany’s core cities are as far above the national average of economic output per worker, as the UK’s are below it… interesting though that UK political geography focusses on towns…

Chicken or egg?

Only 7 of the UK’s 41 subregions reach OECD average of spend on research and development of 2.4%…

The first three bars below have more than half total R&D spend, though this might be partially a tax credit HQ effect

Mobility of workers between regions, esp with maximum GCSE qualifications fell over past two decade from just under 25% to 15%
And for those with degrees from 17% to 10%…
Theories? A8 effect?

Also surprised that in the Levelling Up paper there is no mention I can see of the post Covid change to office use/ home working as a unique opportunity to help change economic geography, spread high paid jobs around the country… etc. would seem to be a golden opportunity.