Research and analysis

All our IFS analysis to date of Chancellor John Healey's Autumn Budget 2026.

This piece sets out a set of ‘fiscal traffic lights’ for evaluating overall fiscal sustainability. 
 

Five principles for business energy support: set clear aims, keep price signals, target support, account for differences, and evaluate in real time.

Funding further increases in defence spending would require hard choices, both at this Budget and in the years ahead. 

Across LMICs more children are entering pre-primary school than ever before, but fewer than half are developmentally on track. 

What should we expect from the October Budget? IFS economists discuss the choices facing the Chancellor on energy bills, taxes and public spending.

Postponing council tax revaluation yet again is unjustifiable and risks entrenching an out-of-date system in Wales and beyond.

Data underlying the paper.

This chapter provides a review of the literature on the distributional, poverty, and inequality impacts of taxation and public spending in Africa.

Higher inflation, rising borrowing and potential spending cuts: what will the Chancellor’s first Budget mean for the economy and households today?

Departmental spending growth is slowing amid pressures on budgets and new spending ambitions. We assess the Chancellor’s choices at this Budget.

At his first Budget, the Chancellor faces an uncertain outlook for the economy, and added pressures on public spending from higher inflation.

Conflict in the Middle East and the subsequent energy price shock will squeeze households and make the economic backdrop to the Budget more difficult.

UK government borrowing costs are high, but recent rises reflect global factors and the attention of the bond markets is currently elsewhere.

HM Treasury is covering losses as the Bank of England unwinds QE. Recent economic and policy changes affect the scale of losses in the near term. 

At the Budget there may be temptation to reach for more efficiency savings, but the priority should be the ambitious plans departments already have.

Higher inflation, higher government borrowing costs and pressures on public services will be the key challenges faced by the Chancellor at the Budget.

All the analysis and more from our IFS Green Budget 2026 to date, funded by the Nuffield Foundation and Barclays.