Government spending

As lockdowns are lifted and more economic activity is resumed, the extent, speed and nature of the UK’s economic recovery from the pandemic will be a crucial determinant of the Chancellor’s options at the upcoming Spending Review, expected this autumn.

Official statistics released by DWP today show that by February this year there were 5 million Universal Credit (UC) claimants – double the number seen pre-pandemic.

The unwinding of the furlough scheme represents a step towards ‘normality’ in the labour market, but it also will mean big income losses for many of those who end up unemployed unless they are swiftly able to find alternative employment. In this observation we discuss the kind of support available for such workers via other programmes, and what sort of hit to their income they might see if they do lose their jobs.

In this observation we look at the arguments to consider when assessing the merits of the large injection of education spending.

This briefing note describes the range and level of COVID-related spending on education in England.

Are there any common themes in how the current Scottish Government has used these powers? Who are the winners and losers from the reforms it has under

How is Scotland's higher spending allocated across different services? How have these allocations changed over time? And how do a range of headline in

Presented "The Liquidity Sensitivity of Healthcare Consumption: Evidence from Social Security Payments" at Johannes Kepler University Linz.

The COVID-19 crisis has both created billions of pounds of new costs for and demands on councils’ budgets and has hit many of their sources of income. We find that across the sector as a whole, the government has largely addressed forecast pressures in 2020-21. However, financial pressures have been, and will continue to be, uneven across councils. As a result, underlying the aggregate picture, many councils still face at least some shortfall this year – particularly among shire districts.

IFS researchers presented their initial analysis of the Chancellor's announcements on the public finances, spending on public services, and the tax and the benefit system on Thursday 4 March at an online briefing.