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Sep 23 • 12 tweets • 7 min read
Really staggering 🇬🇧mini-budget just announced here in London. Ain’t nothing mini about it.

Record-setting borrowing *and* tax cuts. £100 billion price tag. No-tax & spend. Trickle down economics on steroids. Throws fiscal sustainability out the window.

A huge political gamble
The £45 billion in tax cuts just announced, mostly given to the wealthy & businesses, is biggest tax cut since 1972, when Chancellor Barber had his "dash for growth". It's 2% of GDP.

That ended in disaster. It's generally regarded as the most damaging UK budget in modern history
The #Truss & #Kwarteng trickle-down economics policy changes include:

🧐Highest income tax rate (45% for ⬆️150K) abolished
🍾Scrapping cap on bankers bonuses
🏨Scrapping planned increase in corporation tax
🏘️Cutting stamp duty
"It's all based on an outdated ideology that says if we simply reward those who are already wealthy, the whole of society will benefit. They have decided to replace levelling up with trickle down," says Labour Shadow Chancellor Rachel Reeves.

Biden agrees
The pound is plummeting in reaction to this morning's UK budget announcement.

Just hit $1.11 - a 37-year low.
What today's #TrickleDownTruss budget means in practice:
A graph is worth a thousand words.
Bloomberg says UK markets still in "meltdown" following the #Truss budget announcement. Guardian reports a "fire sale of UK assets".
theguardian.com/business/live/…
It isn't just the #dollar that the #pound is rapidly losing value against today - it's the whole basket of currencies including the #euro.
exchangerates.org.uk/news/36584/23-…
It's even worse than first thought.

The Resolution Foundation says 🇬🇧 will have to borrow an extra £411 billion over the next 5 years to pay for this #Trussonomics budget.
Former US Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers just had a brutal assessment of #Trussonomics on Bloomberg, predicts pound may fall below USD parity shortly.

"I think the UK is behaving a bit like an emerging market turning itself into a submerging market."
bloomberg.com/news/articles/…
"Between #Brexit, how far #BankOfEngland got behind the curve and now these fiscal policies, I think 🇬🇧 will be remembered for having pursued the worst macroeconomic policies of any major country in a long time" says former 🇺🇸 Treasury Secretary Summers.

"Naïve wishful thinking"

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More from @DaveKeating

Dave Keating Profile picture
Sep 23
I’m in London this morning as we await the announcement of the UK budget, which will unveil the details of a cap on household energy bills.
New Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng says the government’s plan he is unveiling now will reduce inflation by 5%.

Energy bills could reach as high as £6,500 next year, he tells MPs. But the government will prevent this, he says, by today taking 3 steps:
The three elements of the 🇬🇧 plan being introduced right now are:

🧾Energy bill cap of £2,500 for households
💷Energy bill relief scheme for businesses
🕴️Emergency liquidity injection into energy markets (mirroring 🇪🇺)
Read 6 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
Aug 31
BREAKING: EU foreign ministers have just agreed to fully suspend the union's 2007 visa facilitation agreement with 🇷🇺#Russia, announces 🇪🇺foreign affairs chief @JosepBorrellF in Prague.

He says Russians entering neighboring EU states present a "security risk" Image
Borrell says this common EU approach ending visa facilitation will prevent #Russians from engaging in Schengen "visa shopping".

"We have seen many Russians travelling to 🇪🇺 for leisure and shopping as if no war was raging in #Ukraine. This cannot be business as usual." Image
Borrell: "This [compromise] will allow visas to be granted on an individual basis after a thorough assessment of each individual case and especially specific groups of people."

"We don't want to cut ourselves off from those Russians who are against the war in #Ukraine"
Read 4 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
Aug 29
Presentation of @jonworth’s #CrossBorderRail project in Berlin.

Jon crossed every EU internal border that’s possible to cross by train this summer, and found free movement by rail isn’t a reality for most. Watch here: crossborderrail.trainsforeurope.eu/top20/ Image
Many (not all) European countries have excellent rail systems - comprehensive and widely used. But these systems have been built nationally. They stop at the border.

The result is that today there are less cross-border rail connections than there were 50 years ago. Image
National state-owned rail operators have had little incentive to maintain train routes that crossed into other countries.

Jon found many old disused cross-border rail tracks that used to carry passengers across routinely decades ago - now abandoned by the rail operators. ImageImage
Read 5 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
Jul 20
BREAKING: In response to threat of 🇷🇺 shutting off gas taps, 🇪🇺President @VonDerLeyen announcing now a proposal to:

🙏Ask all EU countries to reduce gas demand by 15% from August to April
👇Give Brussels ability to trigger emergency alert require mandatory gas demand reduction
EU countries asking to benefit from the solidarity gas supply cross-border flows already agreed will be required to demonstrate that they have taken measures to meet the 15% gas demand reduction target.
ec.europa.eu/commission/pre…
"#Russia is blackmailing us," says @VonDerLeyen. "Russia is using energy as a weapon"

12 EU countries have been hit by a partial or total cut-off of Russian gas. "Overall the flow of Russian gas is now less than one-third of what it used to be at this time last year"
Read 14 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
Jun 23
BREAKING: #Ukraine has just been given EU candidate status
President #Zelensky’s reaction to #Ukraine being given 🇪🇺 candidate status:
Following the approval of candidacy status, President Zelensky has just dialed in to speak to the 27 EU leaders by video at #EUCO.

He is speaking to them now.
Read 12 tweets
Dave Keating Profile picture
Jun 23
It appears leaders weren't able to convince 🇧🇬#Bulgaria's PM Kiril Petkov (whose government just collapsed) to end his veto on starting 🇲🇰#NorthMacedonia's 🇪🇺 accession talks this morning

The Western Balkan applicants almost boycotted this morning's meeting over lack of progress
The rumour going around is that the Western Balkan leaders are very unhappy with how this morning’s mini-summit went. Several EU leaders didn’t even bother to show up.

The press conference by VDL, Michel & Macron has been cancelled, Weatern Balkan leaders about to hold their own
This would be a pretty bad result considering the main point of this morning’s Western Balkans leaders meeting was to smooth over anger about Ukraine & Moldova being given fast-track candidate status while W Balkans have had every conceivable roadblock thrown in front of them
Read 15 tweets

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