NEW: Access to Sure Start greatly improved disadvantaged children’s GCSE results, by as much as three GCSE grades.

THREAD on @nridpathecon, @Sarah_Cattan and @carneiro_econ’s new report, funded by @NuffieldFound, on Sure Start’s impact on educational outcomes: [1/10] Between 1999 and 2010, Sure Start expanded as a network of ‘one-stop shops’ integrating services for families with children under 5 under one roof. These ranged from ante- and post-natal health services, parenting support, early learning, childcare and employment support.

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NEW: The Scottish Government has boosted support for students’ living costs from September, but funding for undergraduate teaching faces further cuts at the 2024-25 Scottish Budget.

THREAD on @KateOgdenEcon & Madeline Thomas’ report on Scottish higher education spending: [1/11] Scottish students' living cost support had been eroded over time, with real-terms support for the poorest students cut by 16% (£1.6k a year) between 2013-14 and 2022-23.

The £900 increase in loan entitlements in 2023-24 was the first real-terms increase in over a decade.

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NEW: The next government will face some of the toughest choices in generations.

Our new report, funded by @NuffieldFound and @finan_fairness, identifies the key economic and fiscal choices ahead of the upcoming General Election:

[THREAD: 1/14]ifs.org.uk/publications/c… A combination of high debt interest payments and low growth is forecast for the next parliament.

This will make it harder to reduce debt as a fraction of national income than in any parliament since the 1950s.

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NEW: Housing costs take up three-and-a-half times as much of the budgets of the poor as of the rich.

We need to take housing costs into account to understand income poverty.

THREAD on @JCribbEcon, Tom Wernham & @xiaoweixu_’s new report on housing costs and incomes: [1/5] Whether we deduct housing costs from incomes makes a big difference to poverty measurement – the poverty rate is around 17% ignoring housing costs, but 22% if we deduct them.

Trends over time also look very different when housing costs are deducted from incomes.

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NEW: Scottish pupils' performance in international PISA tests has declined over time in maths & science, while reading test performance has been more stable.

James Lester, @awmckendrick & @lukesibieta investigate socio-economic inequality in Scottish education:

[THREAD: 1/6] Scotland has gone from best performing UK nation in PISA tests to being an average performer.

It remains above Wales, but is much closer to the OECD average than it was in 2006 to 2012.

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NEW: It may be harder now than at any point in over half a century to move up the distribution if you are born in a position of disadvantage.

THREAD on our IFS Deaton Review of Inequalities commentary on social mobility in the UK, funded @NuffieldFound: [1/9] Inheritances will be twice as big on average for those born in the 1980s as for those born in the 1960s.

Your parents’ earnings are a much stronger predictor of your earnings for those born from the 1970s onwards than they were for previous generations.

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Differences in disability rates between education groups are larger than differences by age, our new commentary for the Inequality: IFS Deaton Review finds.

30-year-olds without qualifications are more likely to be disabled than university grads in their 60s.

[THREAD: 1/7] The economic effects of disability are also felt unequally between educational groups.

Those with low levels of education are not only more likely to have a disability, but that disability is much more likely to result in them being out of work.

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Isaac Delestre presents our analysis on the #Budget2023 changes to the tax system.

Watch live here: The biggest change to personal tax coming next month wasn't announced yesterday, but is the income and NICs threshold freezes announced last year.

The additional tax burden for most basic-rate taxpayers will be about £500, while for most higher-rate taxpayers it will be £1000.

Carl Emmerson presents on the public finance risks and the public spending in our #Budget2023 analysis event.

Watch live here: The @OBR_UK are now among the most optimistic of forecasters on growth, and expect the economy to be 0.6% bigger in 2027 than under its previous forecast.

This would be stronger growth than under @bankofengland's forecast, but still poor compared to the long-run average.

STARTING NOW: Spring Budget 2023 IFS analysis

Watch our overnight analysis of yesterday's #Budget2023 here: .@PJTheEconomist opens our event with his opening remarks, followed by four presentations on the public finances and public spending, tax changes, the changes to Universal Credit and disability benefits and childcare changes.

Watch live here:

The expansion of free childcare entitlements is to exacerbate one of the largest distortions you are likely to see in a tax and benefit system, meaning some parents could be worse off overall even after a pay rise of tens of thousands of pounds.

#Budget2023 THREAD: Free 30hr entitlements will remain unavailable when earnings cross £100k. That huge “cliff-edge” will now be extended to high-earning parents of under-3s, and increased sharply for many high earners with 2+ preschool children. This can lead to extraordinarily perverse incentives.

After a shallower recession in the short term, the @OBR_uk now expects the economy to be 0.6% bigger in 2027 than under its previous forecast.

This would still be a poor growth performance compared to the long-run average.

#Budget2023 Borrowing in the later forecast years was revised down, by £17 billion or 0.6% of national income.

However, this still leaves borrowing higher than in the forecast produced before Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine.

The government has announced that Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates, which determine the maximum amount of housing support available to private renters in the benefit system, will remain frozen at their Sep 2019 level for 2023–24.

THREAD 1/7 on the consequences for recipients: Back in 2012–13, Local Housing Allowance (LHA) rates were set to the 30th percentile of rent in the area.

This meant a family on benefits could rent one of the cheapest 30% of homes in their area and have their rent fully covered if their income & assets were low enough.

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NEW: Successive changes to the UK benefits system have pushed more people into work, but usually into part-time, low-paid work with limited career progression.

THREAD on our @NuffieldFound-funded IFS Deaton Review chapter on benefits and inequality [1/8]
ifs.org.uk/publications/b… Working-age benefit spending steadily increased between the late 1970s and 2010, both in real terms per capita and as a share of GDP.

Policy choices since 2010 have reduced working-age benefit spending. About half of all benefits spending now goes to families in work.

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Keeping savings in a pension can be a highly effective way of avoiding inheritance tax.

@David_Sturrock, @StuartAdam_IFS, Isaac Delestre and Carl Emmerson set out proposals that would make the tax treatment of pensions at death fairer and more efficient [THREAD: 1/8]: We identify 2 problems with how pension pots are taxed at death.

First, any funds that remain in a pension at death are not subject to inheritance tax. This incentivises using pensions to pass on wealth while avoiding inheritance tax.

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NEW: The NHS has more funding and staff than it had in 2019.

But it is treating fewer patients than pre-pandemic as the impacts of COVID linger.

THREAD on @BenZaranko & Max Warner’s report on NHS funding, resources and treatment volumes [1/9]
ifs.org.uk/publications/n… For many types of care, the NHS is treating fewer patients than it did in 2019.

In the latest month of data, the NHS carried out 14% fewer emergency admissions and 14% fewer outpatient appointments than it did in the same month in 2019.

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NEW: Though school spending per pupil is now set to return to 2010 levels by 2024, colleges, nurseries and universities face severe financial challenges from higher-than-expected inflation and no extra funding from the Autumn Statement.

[Education spending report THREAD: 1/11] Total education spending was about 2% lower in real-terms in 2021 than in 2010.

From 2010 to 2019, school spending per pupil fell by 9% in real-terms, and by 14% in colleges. Higher education spend per student saw a temporary boost from higher tuition fees in 2012.

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Chancellor @KwasiKwarteng has promised a 'fully costed plan to get debt falling in the medium-term’.

But stabilising debt as a fraction of national income in 2026–27 would require a fiscal tightening of around £60bn on @Citibank’s central forecast.

[#IFSGreenBudget THREAD: 1/8] Debt in our central forecast with @Citibank continues to rise throughout the forecast horizon, even once the big packages of support for rising energy prices are assumed to have expired.

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NEW: For every £1 given to households through the high-profile cuts to taxes, £2 is being taken away in the stealthy freezes to tax and benefit thresholds.

Read @TomWatersEcon and Tom Wernham’s @NuffieldFound-funded #IFSGreenBudget chapter> ifs.org.uk/publications/r…

THREAD: [1/8] Alongside the headline tax cuts (to the basic rate of income tax & NICs) various thresholds and amounts in the tax-benefit system are being frozen.

This is raising the tax burden and reducing the size of the benefit system in real terms – especially when inflation is high [2/8]

NEW: In the absence of official scrutiny from @OBR_UK alongside Friday's announcement, we've provided our own #IFSGreenBudget fiscal forecasts with @citibank.

We find that planned tax cuts with stalling economic growth would leave debt on an unsustainable path.

THREAD: 1/13 It is disappointing that Friday’s statement won't be accompanied by new official forecasts from @OBR_uk.

These would have shown that a combination of a weaker outlook for the economy and substantial tax cuts will lead to more borrowing and more debt.

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NEW: Inequalities by family background emerge early and persist as children progress through the education system.

@ckfarquharson, @Sandra_McNally & Imran Tahir’s findings from our IFS Deaton Review chapter on education inequalities, funded by @NuffieldFound, in a thread:
[1/12] The disadvantage gap at GCSE between children eligible for free schools meals and other children has barely changed over the past 20 years, despite decades of policy attention.

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