Steve Nolan
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ohstevenolan.bsky.social
Steve Nolan
@ohstevenolan.bsky.social
Economist, Senior Lecturer in Economics at Liverpool Business School
Good Budget Eve reading from @jomichell.bsky.social
My pre-budget take for the LSE Politics blog is up:

Labour are unable to articulate any vision or sense of purpose.

Much of the left has convinced itself that government spending can be maintained without broad-based tax increases.

Not a great budget backdrop.

blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandp...
Wealth tax and looser fiscal rules won’t save the Budget | British Politics and Policy at LSE
The narrative on the left that a wealth tax and looser fiscal rules would solve the Chancellor's 2025 Budget headaches has got out of hand.
blogs.lse.ac.uk
November 25, 2025 at 6:48 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
Please clap
November 24, 2025 at 9:16 PM
Continue to be confused by this strand of Labour MPs that appear not to want to raise any taxes at all.
November 24, 2025 at 8:20 PM
Had my first "hey, where did the sound go?" moment on live tv today. Thankfully, I think I styled it out and definitely didn't end up looking like a giant head in a tank babbling silently to themselves.
November 24, 2025 at 7:25 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
Anyway the basic gist is that this government have decided businesses, universities and immigrants should pay the taxes that the median voter doesn’t want to pay. I’m sure that will have no worrying incidence effects or counteract ‘the singleminded focus on growth’.
November 23, 2025 at 11:15 PM
Very good adaptation of Train Dreams on Netflix. Captures the mood of the book perfectly. Pretty much perfectly cast including having Will Patton narrate. His audiobook reading is one of the all time greats.
November 22, 2025 at 8:29 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
And autism was never something to be so terrified of that you avoid vaccines for preventable childhood diseases that could disable or kill you and others

The inherent ableism of this strain of anti-vaccinationism has always been acute
FYI, vaccines do not cause autism.
November 20, 2025 at 12:24 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
FYI, vaccines do not cause autism.
November 20, 2025 at 12:03 PM
November 18, 2025 at 12:45 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
lol every other year since 2019, a prominent male economist has been revealed as the absolute worst person ever. Like clockwork.
November 16, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
Very senior economist speaks out against Summers and against the discipline continuing to bestow privileges and honors on him; calls out sexism in economics.

You'd think this site should be flooded with similar threads...
1/ Egalitarianism should begin at home. I link to this article by @bencasselman.bsky.social in light of the communications between Larry Summers and Jeffrey Epstein that have just been released. The released emails and the fact of friendship are vile.

www.nytimes.com/2021/02/23/b...
For Women in Economics, the Hostility Is Out in the Open (Published 2021)
www.nytimes.com
November 15, 2025 at 10:49 PM
Scumbag
The emails have Summers reporting to Epstein about his attempts to date a Harvard economics student & to hit on her during a seminar she was giving.
November 15, 2025 at 11:09 PM
Pretty hard not to despair most days.
"The era of permanent protection is over"

Is this Labour government really saying it was wrong in principle to let these refugees of the last 75 years to stay, settle and become British - and they believe that should NEVER happen again in principle or practice?

www.youtube.com/watch?v=TiuR...
Refugees from 7 decades gather to commemorate 70 years of refugee in protection in the UK
YouTube video by Refugee Council
www.youtube.com
November 15, 2025 at 8:49 AM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
Yes, I think this is what the “it’s smart not to do income tax” stuff is missing. If you remove salary sacrifice on someone’s pension contributions you are increasing their income tax! If you freeze thresholds you are increasing their income tax!
Issue for Labour now isn't whether they break their manifesto pledge on tax. It is whether they do so in a way which is blatant, honest but sustainable - or whether they do so by a myriad of complex and likely insufficient means whilst arguing they are not.

Imho, one seems more toxic than the other
November 14, 2025 at 10:16 AM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
To be honest I think “I’m going to give a press conference to tell the whole nation over their breakfasts about the absolute need for something big on tax, then just drop the idea 10 days later” may actually be more stupid than anything Truss and Kwarteng did.
November 14, 2025 at 8:32 AM
Oh boy.
Massive move in gilts on open. Looks like giving up almost half the gains from the last month. Terrible
I am excited to see the gilt market reaction to this news. Think it could be quite bad. A big chunk of the recent gilt rally was predicated on Labour showing they could hike the big taxes if needed and….well I guess that idea is dead.
November 14, 2025 at 8:09 AM
Genuinely a bit flabbergasted.
November 13, 2025 at 11:29 PM
Did the weird Tuesday morning speech that I forced my kids to listen to on the school run mean nothing to them?
November 13, 2025 at 11:18 PM
The first rule of Monthly GDP Figures Club is “You don’t talk about Monthly GDP figures.”

Unless…

Popped onto BBC News Channel to discuss some of the broader implications for the budget and beyond.

youtu.be/iDigvkUqcXI?...

@ljmuofficial.bsky.social @ljmuimpact.bsky.social @ljmu-ris.bsky.social
Talking about the lack of UK growth on the BBC News Channel - 13th November 2025
YouTube video by Steve Nolan
youtu.be
November 13, 2025 at 5:30 PM
Telling everyone I work in AI now.
It's regression, isn't it? Regression in a trench coat, regression with a fake moustache, regression speaking ze french wiz a bit of ho-hee-hon, but still regression
With the caveat that it's impossible to know what is really happening from such a short story, this is clearly a terrible idea www.theguardian.com/education/20...
November 12, 2025 at 8:13 AM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
This is the most abysmal, pathetic thing. The BBC head resigning because the corporation is not supine *enough* to the far-right.
🔴 Breaking I Davie faced mounting criticism that a Panorama documentary misled viewers by editing a speech by Donald Trump

➡️ Read more: trib.al/I0iw7aP
November 9, 2025 at 6:16 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
November 2, 2025 at 8:47 PM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
Hot take: More sociologists and economists need to work together.
October 29, 2025 at 11:40 AM
Reposted by Steve Nolan
I think Peston should apologise for this outrageous framing. Not a serious show that any of us should be going on until this kind of nonsense stops.
Is the Reform MP who says she’s driven mad by TV adverts full of Black & Asian people a racist or realist? How many migrants would the Tories expel? & should the UK be selling fighter jets to Türkiye?

Join LIVE at 9PM on X & YouTube or on ITV1 at 1045PM 📺

#Peston
October 27, 2025 at 11:12 PM
Sweet Jesus
Is the Reform MP who says she’s driven mad by TV adverts full of Black & Asian people a racist or realist? How many migrants would the Tories expel? & should the UK be selling fighter jets to Türkiye?

Join LIVE at 9PM on X & YouTube or on ITV1 at 1045PM 📺

#Peston
October 27, 2025 at 11:18 PM