Government finances and spending

How does the taxation of housing fit into how we analyse other taxes and the tax system as a whole, and what can we conclude about how it should be reformed? This was a Keynote Presentation given at the Tax Research Network Annual Conference, at Aston University and online, on 9 September 2021.

If history repeats itself, the ‘temporary’ increases in NHS funding announced this week could end up permanently swallowing up the money raised by the tax rise, leaving little available for social care.

IFS immediate reaction to the Prime Minister's announcement about social care.

Presented "The Impact of Payroll Tax Subsidies: Theory and Evidence" at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

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.

At this IFS event, Olivier Blanchard, Professor Emeritus at MIT and former Chief Economist at the IMF, and Jean Tirole, Nobel Prize-winner and Honorary President of the Toulouse School of Economics, presented their report on the major future economic challenges.

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit sub-Saharan African economies hard, exacerbating debt and debt servicing cost issues that a range of countries in the re

The ‘gig economy’ has grown and risen up the policy agenda in recent years. The associated growth in people working through their own businesses and in work happening through platforms highlights difficult questions about when to have boundaries in the tax system and where to put them.

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