David Woodruff
@dmwoodruff.bsky.social
Associate Professor of Comparative Politics, LSE. CPE, central banks, monetary history, intellectual history of social science, Karl Polanyi, Soviet economic history, complaining about neoliberalism, etc. He/him.
Reposted by David Woodruff
Always an air of surreality around fiscal discussions when this stuff isn’t on the table.
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
November 14, 2025 at 9:42 AM
Always an air of surreality around fiscal discussions when this stuff isn’t on the table.
Reposted by David Woodruff
A little more progressivity would go a long way: If UK kept tax allowance for all, but raised top rate to 50p at >100K income, it would raise ~£13 bln/year. ALL of the cost would fall on the 5% of taxpayers with the highest incomes, and 90% on top 2% (b/c 100-125K would see marginal rates fall).
Table 2.5 Income Tax liabilities by income range
Income Tax liabilities by income range covering the period from tax year 2022 to 2023 to tax year 2025 to 2026.
www.gov.uk
November 14, 2025 at 9:47 PM
A little more progressivity would go a long way: If UK kept tax allowance for all, but raised top rate to 50p at >100K income, it would raise ~£13 bln/year. ALL of the cost would fall on the 5% of taxpayers with the highest incomes, and 90% on top 2% (b/c 100-125K would see marginal rates fall).
A little more progressivity would go a long way: If UK kept tax allowance for all, but raised top rate to 50p at >100K income, it would raise ~£13 bln/year. ALL of the cost would fall on the 5% of taxpayers with the highest incomes, and 90% on top 2% (b/c 100-125K would see marginal rates fall).
Table 2.5 Income Tax liabilities by income range
Income Tax liabilities by income range covering the period from tax year 2022 to 2023 to tax year 2025 to 2026.
www.gov.uk
November 14, 2025 at 9:47 PM
A little more progressivity would go a long way: If UK kept tax allowance for all, but raised top rate to 50p at >100K income, it would raise ~£13 bln/year. ALL of the cost would fall on the 5% of taxpayers with the highest incomes, and 90% on top 2% (b/c 100-125K would see marginal rates fall).
Weird UK tax thing: ann'l income £100K to ~£125K is taxed at 60% marginal rate due to phase-out of untaxed allowance; marginal rate 45% >~125K. Back-of-the-envelope calc: eliminating allowance phase-out & making top rate 46.13% is revenue neutral. Earning 100-200K save, 200-500K ~=, costs >500K.
November 14, 2025 at 9:12 PM
Weird UK tax thing: ann'l income £100K to ~£125K is taxed at 60% marginal rate due to phase-out of untaxed allowance; marginal rate 45% >~125K. Back-of-the-envelope calc: eliminating allowance phase-out & making top rate 46.13% is revenue neutral. Earning 100-200K save, 200-500K ~=, costs >500K.
Always an air of surreality around fiscal discussions when this stuff isn’t on the table.
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
November 14, 2025 at 9:42 AM
Always an air of surreality around fiscal discussions when this stuff isn’t on the table.
Reposted by David Woodruff
Which is why I think the current denigration of humanities and non-STEM fields is bonkers. From where do ideas like "causality" derive? They *do not* organically emerge from "the data."
November 13, 2025 at 11:09 PM
Which is why I think the current denigration of humanities and non-STEM fields is bonkers. From where do ideas like "causality" derive? They *do not* organically emerge from "the data."
Reposted by David Woodruff
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
November 12, 2025 at 9:30 AM
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
TIL that employee contributions to UK national insurance are ludicrously regressive: rate goes down from 8% to 2% on income > £50,270. And it's getting even worse: threshold is infrequently updated & would be nearly £10000 higher if adjusted for post-Covid inflation.
November 12, 2025 at 3:09 PM
TIL that employee contributions to UK national insurance are ludicrously regressive: rate goes down from 8% to 2% on income > £50,270. And it's getting even worse: threshold is infrequently updated & would be nearly £10000 higher if adjusted for post-Covid inflation.
BoE rolls out new defence of QE-QT, stressing low costs for long-maturity debt in QE decade. But it's drawing arbitrary boundaries: analysis (APF Q3 Rept) fails to note that BoE conditioned QE on HMT accepting gilt issue limits, part of causal chain to catastrophic austerity. on.ft.com/3JY23EM
Bank of England’s Andrew Bailey says QE will offset its costs in long term
Bank governor responds to investors and politicians after value of its holdings of UK government bonds fell
on.ft.com
November 12, 2025 at 2:31 PM
BoE rolls out new defence of QE-QT, stressing low costs for long-maturity debt in QE decade. But it's drawing arbitrary boundaries: analysis (APF Q3 Rept) fails to note that BoE conditioned QE on HMT accepting gilt issue limits, part of causal chain to catastrophic austerity. on.ft.com/3JY23EM
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
November 12, 2025 at 9:30 AM
Over the last 11 financial years, the UK Treasury has spent more on paying interest to the banking sector on their reserves than it has taken in from them in corporate and sector-specific taxes. In 2024-25, it paid over 3 times as much for interest on reserves as it received from taxes on banks.
Reposted by David Woodruff
Whole fucking thing makes me sick to my stomach. An abject fucking liar, a man who lies as easily as he fucking breathes, threatening an organisation which strives for truthfulness. And plastic patriots like the Mail and Farage urging him on. Jackels.
November 11, 2025 at 7:24 AM
Whole fucking thing makes me sick to my stomach. An abject fucking liar, a man who lies as easily as he fucking breathes, threatening an organisation which strives for truthfulness. And plastic patriots like the Mail and Farage urging him on. Jackels.
Not an easy thing to knit the social fabric.
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November 5, 2025 at 9:43 PM
Not an easy thing to knit the social fabric.
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Reposted by David Woodruff
1. On Tuesday Night, Democrats won elections nationwide in a stunning rebuke of anti-transgender politics.
From Virginia to New Jersey to New York and beyond, anti-trans candidates fell left and right after spending tons of time and money campaigning on hate.
Subscribe to support our journalism.
From Virginia to New Jersey to New York and beyond, anti-trans candidates fell left and right after spending tons of time and money campaigning on hate.
Subscribe to support our journalism.
"A Stunning Rebuke Of Anti-Trans Politics"—Dems Win Elections Nationwide Despite Anti-Trans Ads
As election results poured in on Tuesday night, it became clear that Democrats were winning nationwide against anti-trans opponents.
www.erininthemorning.com
November 5, 2025 at 5:10 AM
1. On Tuesday Night, Democrats won elections nationwide in a stunning rebuke of anti-transgender politics.
From Virginia to New Jersey to New York and beyond, anti-trans candidates fell left and right after spending tons of time and money campaigning on hate.
Subscribe to support our journalism.
From Virginia to New Jersey to New York and beyond, anti-trans candidates fell left and right after spending tons of time and money campaigning on hate.
Subscribe to support our journalism.
An outstanding policy analysis, but should be made more general: *any* business that has a return on equity < 10% automatically gets a tax adjustment so it reaches that level. Also, the magic of the market requires businesses have absolute freedom on salaries and bonuses.
November 4, 2025 at 1:07 PM
An outstanding policy analysis, but should be made more general: *any* business that has a return on equity < 10% automatically gets a tax adjustment so it reaches that level. Also, the magic of the market requires businesses have absolute freedom on salaries and bonuses.
Read this, seriously.
This is a must read.
If you want to understand the emotional end intellectual malaise of British politics, this piece by @mjrobbins.com is a pretty good place to start. It effectively describes a country that has gone mad. open.substack.com/pub/martinro...
November 3, 2025 at 11:27 AM
Read this, seriously.
Reposted by David Woodruff
This is a must read.
If you want to understand the emotional end intellectual malaise of British politics, this piece by @mjrobbins.com is a pretty good place to start. It effectively describes a country that has gone mad. open.substack.com/pub/martinro...
November 3, 2025 at 7:49 AM
This is a must read.
Some Threadneedle-ologists say BoE will hold rates this week and wait to see how budget looks. To act on this reasoning would contradict long-stated, albeit entirely arbitrary, policy, which implies implausibly assuming government makes no change.
November 3, 2025 at 10:13 AM
Some Threadneedle-ologists say BoE will hold rates this week and wait to see how budget looks. To act on this reasoning would contradict long-stated, albeit entirely arbitrary, policy, which implies implausibly assuming government makes no change.
OM, and with apologies for the language, FG.
It's ok, all holders of these securities need to do is buy an over-the-counter credit derivative to hedge their default risk, then securitize and tranche those derivative contracts and sell the resulting income streams. Assuming the top tranches get AAA credit ratings, what could possibly go wrong?
quite literally everything i hear about the economics of this feels insane, especially given the big issue of the tools not doing what boosters say they will do. so many details make me feel very not good!
October 31, 2025 at 6:29 AM
OM, and with apologies for the language, FG.
Excellent, excellent, excellent from @danielagabor.bsky.social on a podcast with Andy Haldane, ex-BoE. She doesn’t let him get away w/ saying stuff he knows not to be true, eg claiming the BoE could ‘go bust’. It’s mainstream central bank speak that’s bankrupt! podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/t...
On Politics: Do bond markets and the Bank of England run Britain?
Podcast Episode · The LRB Podcast · 29/10/2025 · 1h 6m
podcasts.apple.com
October 30, 2025 at 7:46 AM
Excellent, excellent, excellent from @danielagabor.bsky.social on a podcast with Andy Haldane, ex-BoE. She doesn’t let him get away w/ saying stuff he knows not to be true, eg claiming the BoE could ‘go bust’. It’s mainstream central bank speak that’s bankrupt! podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/t...
Reposted by David Woodruff
The 🇺🇸 has a floating exchange rate and issues the world’s dominant reserve currency & is absolutely nothing like 🇬🇷 or 🇮🇹, which are constrained by belonging to a modern day gold standard. We need to stop using fearmongering analogies & discuss actual tradeoffs when we talk about 🇺🇸 debt.
October 27, 2025 at 2:06 PM
The 🇺🇸 has a floating exchange rate and issues the world’s dominant reserve currency & is absolutely nothing like 🇬🇷 or 🇮🇹, which are constrained by belonging to a modern day gold standard. We need to stop using fearmongering analogies & discuss actual tradeoffs when we talk about 🇺🇸 debt.
Reposted by David Woodruff
A central fact about education, but one which almost disappears in discussions of education policy, is the enormous amount of effort and creativity and commitment teachers put into finding ways to help students actually learn. In every classroom people are struggling to find ways to do better.
Important update from two months into my “experiment” (lol) assigning college juniors and seniors to read whole physical books and then having a seminar where they use the physical book and physical notebooks and their ideas and questions to fill three hours of class time:
It rules
It rules
October 25, 2025 at 1:32 PM
A central fact about education, but one which almost disappears in discussions of education policy, is the enormous amount of effort and creativity and commitment teachers put into finding ways to help students actually learn. In every classroom people are struggling to find ways to do better.
Reposted by David Woodruff
Under 50 U.S.C. § 1701(a), it is an “unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States” that Canada is being mean to me on TV.
BREAKING: Trump says he's punishing Canada with 10% extra import tax for not pulling down an anti-tariff ad sooner.
Trump punishes Canada with 10% extra import tax for not pulling down anti-tariffs ad sooner
President Donald Trump says he plans to hike tariffs on imports of Canadian goods by an extra 10% because of an anti-tariff television ad aired by the province of Ontario.
bit.ly
October 25, 2025 at 10:16 PM
Under 50 U.S.C. § 1701(a), it is an “unusual and extraordinary threat, which has its source in whole or substantial part outside the United States, to the national security, foreign policy, or economy of the United States” that Canada is being mean to me on TV.
Reposted by David Woodruff
"normies do not care about this thing and so it is no use raising a stink" is imho just an excuse for not doing politics, which is the job of making normies care about something
October 24, 2025 at 2:47 AM
"normies do not care about this thing and so it is no use raising a stink" is imho just an excuse for not doing politics, which is the job of making normies care about something