Frances 'Cassandra' Coppola Profile picture
Writer & speaker. Author of The Case for People's QE (Polity). Coming soon: The Absolute Essentials of Banking (Routledge). Sings a bit too.
otaria123 Profile picture HermanntheGerman Profile picture ☀️ Leon-Gerard Vandenberg 🇳🇱🇨🇦🇦🇺 Math+e/acc Profile picture CRE Profile picture @AlgoCompSynth@universeodon.com by znmeb Profile picture 14 subscribed
Mar 15 18 tweets 3 min read
Dear @JamesCleverly, "National Insurance is a non-hypothecated tax on work" is a massive oversimplification, to put it mildly.
You might find my piece for Radix thinktank about the relationship between National Insurance and the State Pension helpful.
radixuk.org/opinion/budget… @JamesCleverly National Insurance is not an ordinary tax. It is widely (though incorrectly) regarded as contributions to a personal state pension fund.

And it is designed to give this impression. There’s even a “National Insurance Fund”. Here are its latest accounts. gov.uk/government/pub…
Mar 1 6 tweets 1 min read
Has anyone clocked the obvious lie in Israeli statements claiming Israeli troops fired on a crowd of unarmed civilians because they felt they were "under attack"? Israeli forces do not guard humanitarian aid convoys. So WHY WERE THEY THERE? Some of the statements even claimed they were guarding the convoy. No they weren't. They have never guarded humanitarian aid convoys. Recently, they've bombed and shelled them.
Feb 18 14 tweets 2 min read
I've just watched the BBC's Storyville documentary "Blue Box". It's the extraordinary story of Joseph Weitz, the man responsible for the forced "transfer" of Arabs out of Israel in 1948 and subsequent expropriation of their lands. bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episod… "Our mood has improved significantly. Our forces have conquered one Arab village after another, and the terrified inhabitants are fleeing like mice."

Dehumanisation of Palestinians started in 1948.
Dec 29, 2023 10 tweets 3 min read
When a small company that has been loss-making for years writes down a deferred tax asset of some £250,000 to zero, the end is usually nigh.
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This is from the full year 2022 accounts of Southbank Investment Research Ltd, whose newsletter The Fleet Street Letter is fronted by Nigel Farage.
Oct 29, 2023 7 tweets 2 min read
Can I just say why I am calling for an immediate ceasefire and complete change of plan.
It is not only because the loss of life in Gaza is horrific and the humanitarian conditions appalling. /1 It is not because there is no exit plan that does not involve genocide and/or ethnic cleansing.

It is not because of grave breaches of the UN Convention and the likelihood that some are war crimes. 2/
Sep 27, 2023 6 tweets 2 min read
What is really going on here is a full-frontal attack on the right of vulnerable adults to self-determination. Over-16s are regarded as adults for healthcare purposes. thesun.co.uk/news/24097207/… And waiting lists for NHS gender treatment are so long that both these teenagers will be over 18 by the time they get to discuss surgery with gender specialists.
Sep 12, 2023 8 tweets 1 min read
So what did I learn from reviewing that Sex Matters document?

Firstly, that muddle in a document that purports to interpret the law is intentional. If a section appears muddled and confusing, it is setting up some kind of chicanery. Secondly, that ignoring something doesn't mean the authors haven't read it. It means it doesn't suit their purposes.
Sep 12, 2023 34 tweets 8 min read
I don't know which "experts" Forstater consulted, but she doesn't seem to understand schools' legal safeguarding responsibilities. I've now found the Sex Matters report. Haven't read it yet. If anyone would like to critique it (esp teachers, please), the link is here.
I shall read it with KCSIE
and govt guidance on EA2010 for schools sex-matters.org/posts/updates/…
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl…
assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/upl…
Sep 1, 2023 10 tweets 2 min read
Ok, so I am doing the analysis that @FraserNelson has not bothered to do. Why exactly has the proportion of people economically inactive due to long-term sickness risen? The ONS identifies two reasons: baby boomers approaching retirement, and NHS waiting lists. Image It is not clear to me how forcing these people to seek work by means of harsher criteria for claiming no-work-requirement benefits would benefit either these people or the economy.
Sep 1, 2023 15 tweets 4 min read
Here's ONS's chart of the economic inactivity rate, from its August 2023 labour market overview. Yup, it's almost the lowest since 2008 and far lower than under IDS's tenure.

Fraser has ignored the growth in the UK population since 2008.
Source: ons.gov.uk/employmentandl…

Image If your population is growing numerically, then all else being equal, the numbers of economically inactive people will also grow. So here's ONS's 2020 chart of the growth in the UK population, past and projected. It grew particularly fast between 2008 and 2018. @FraserNelson Image
Aug 19, 2023 25 tweets 4 min read
By way of light relief from zombie politics and culture wars, I have been having a close look at this paper, which purports to prove that the major part of banks' comes from the "productivity of deposits". It appears to me to be very muddled. academic.oup.com/rfs/article/35… The notion that banks might derive quite a lot of value from efficiency in the creation and holding of deposits is not per se unreasonable. Deposits are a cost for banks, so anything that reduces this cost will, all else being equal, increase banks' value. But...
Aug 15, 2023 9 tweets 2 min read
If you are going to cite an academic paper, you really should understand what it says. The "productivity of deposit-taking" is not about a bank's ability to attract deposits, it is about the cost to the bank of doing so. #subtweet
(cc @bparsia this is about that NBER paper) @bparsia Attracting more deposits at the same or higher cost isn't an increase in deposit productivity. Attracting more deposits AT LOWER COST is. Deposit productivity rises if the unit cost of creating and servicing a deposit falls. This is basic stuff. Gah.
Jul 29, 2023 22 tweets 5 min read
Without wishing to stir the pot further... Nigel Farage's personal finances are not in the public domain unless he chooses to put them there, but his company finances very much are. I have been doing some digging... 1/ Companies House records show that he is director of three limited companies: Farage Media Ltd, Reform UK Party Ltd, and Thorn In The Side Ltd. …te.company-information.service.gov.uk/officers/tW56b…
Jul 24, 2023 12 tweets 2 min read
What is being reported on MSM:

- Nigel Farage's account was closed because of his political views
- The CEO apologised for closing his account

Neither of these is true. What is not being reported on MSM:

- Nigel Farage's Coutts account was closed because he's very high maintenance and not rich enough
- The CEO stuck the middle finger up at him by offering a NatWest account instead

This is the truth.
Jul 20, 2023 10 tweets 2 min read
It is a Coutts dossier, not a Nat West one. The distinction is important. Coutts provides premier banking services to very rich people. Nat West is a high street bank. Coutts has stringent financial criteria limiting who can bank with it. Nat West does not. High street banks like Nat West are obliged to provide basic banking services, except to people who fail basic risk management tests such as identity, financial crime or immigration status. Coutts private bank has no such obligation. It is free to choose its customers.
Jun 21, 2023 11 tweets 2 min read
Ok, so I have now listened to that recording of the teacher arguing with pupils about gender identity. Some thoughts: 1/ The pupils said anyone who identifies as something other than their birth sex is mentally ill. Hence the "should be in an asylum" comment. This is wholly unacceptable and the children should have been firmly disciplined at this point. 2/
Jun 19, 2023 4 tweets 1 min read
It is also not remotely consistent with statutory safeguarding guidance. I suspect heads will ignore it on the reasonable grounds that child safeguarding is the highest priority. Yep, it specifically violates the "safe space" requirement in KCSIE 2022. It means that trans children facing opposition at home would no longer be able to speak openly about their concerns with members of staff. 204: Risks can be compounde...
May 21, 2023 6 tweets 2 min read
"The second consensus layer is a sequencing protocol that receives encrypted transactions and determines a timestamp for each transaction. This sequencing layer can be run on a central CSP..."

If a new protocol claims to be decentralised, always read the whitepaper. that quote is from @CantonNetwork's whitepaper.
May 19, 2023 6 tweets 2 min read
Indeed, it is overwhelmingly skilled migration. Which is exactly what the points-based system was supposed to do. coppolacomment.substack.com/p/the-uks-net-… Home Office figures show that in the year ending June 2022, it granted 267,670 work visas, of which over half (54%) were for skilled people. The vast majority of these had long-term employer sponsorships, many in health & care. ImageImage
May 16, 2023 4 tweets 2 min read
Interesting. ONS figures show the rise in economic inactivity due to long-term sickness started BEFORE the pandemic. A whole year before, in fact. Image Biggest rise among over-50s. Image
May 16, 2023 11 tweets 3 min read
Fact checking the claims of Ben Bradley and Ann Widdecombe on #PoliticsLive.
1/ Most of the unemployed have been unemployed for less than 6 months. Longer-term unemployment is much lower. ons.gov.uk/employmentandl… Image The data underlying the chart above show that in Jan-Mar 2023 about 300,000 people had been unemployed for longer than 12 months, and just under 170,000 people had been unemployed for 6-12 months.