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The article reconstructs the opinions expressed by academic economists in front of the Radcliffe Committee, whose Report was a document of considerable importance for the post-war theory of monetary policy. The Committee provided one of the first official occasions to discuss the nexus between inflation and unemployment in Britain and the role of monetary policy in achieving price stability. Analyzing the Report, the Memoranda and the Minutes of evidence put forth in front of the Committee, the article documents the innovative aspects of the Radcliffe doctrine on monetary issues and its complex connections with Keynesian and Post-Keynesian monetary theory. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a model of British monetary policy that includes the objectives, techniques, and trade-offs from 1951-1964. The author claims that the revival of the British monetary policy coincided with U.S. efforts to do the same, and attempts to negotiate the discomfort of a monetary policy faced with a differentiated set of financial institutions whose liabilities mirror those of commercial banks. The article reviews the policy objectives in terms of interest rates, price stability, full employment, a satisfactory balance of payments, and a satisfactory rate of growth. The article refers to the significance of the 1959 Radcliffe Report on monetary policy in those years.

The article discusses how welfare cost effects the banking structure in Great Britain. It is the aim of the article to demonstrate that Great Britain's banking structure is not socially optimal. The article also attempts to quantify the resulting social loss created by the banking structure. An analysis of the welfare cost is presents, as well as an attempt to measure it. The article cites a 1966 report from Great Britain's Prices and Income Board, which recommended that certain restrictive practices in banking be abolished and a competitive banking system be established.

This article examines the impacts of British government 'stop-go' policy on domestic sales of consumer durables over the period 1952-65, via hire purchase restrictions and punitive Purchase Tax rates. Our analysis includes a general review of contemporary evidence regarding the impacts of these measures, a more detailed study of the television sector, and time-series econometric analysis for both televisions and a representative high-ticket labour-saving consumer durable: washing machines. We find that the restrictions had devastating impacts on Britain's consumer durables industries, preventing firms from fully exploiting economies of scale, reducing output growth and international competitiveness, and eroding industrial relations. Government officials were aware of these problems, but considered them a price worth paying to facilitate moves towards sterling convertibility and the re-establishment of the City as a leading financial and trading centre. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article uses a detailed examination on the 1948 and 1949 Bonfires of Controls to reassess Harold Wilson’s development as a politician and examine the broader relationship between popular politics and economic policy. Whilst acknowledging the continued importance of the latter within Wilson’s self-identification as a modernizing ‘specialist’, it contends that these events are best viewed as representing the birth of a professional politician. It will show that, although economically motivated, there was a marked disparity between each Bonfire’s illusion and reality. Far from being entirely rational, each announcement straddled the gap between politics and economics. Within a post-war political landscape that had seen debates about controls become increasingly emotive, Wilson used the Bonfires to seize advantage. As a result, they can be seen to signify the point of his development from a self-identified professional economist to an astute political actor. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The article focuses on the austerity program of the British government during 1945 to 1951. It discusses the definition of austerity in the 1940s which focused on controlled private consumption and the transfer of resources from the war efforts to civilian uses. It highlights the reasons behind the austerity strategy, namely to correct the balance of payments and to invest for economic expansion. An overview of the expanding welfare provision and education during the period is also included.

The impact that the 1947 fuel crisis and the subsequent drive to increase industrial output had on the standing of Clement Attlee's first Labour government has often been understood in primarily economic terms. This article demonstrates that for many Britons these events were not only the cause of daytime power cuts and short-term unemployment, but also the source of restrictions on a host of leisure pursuits that altered the established rhythms of everyday social and cultural life. Such restrictions, which affected, amongst other things, the cinema, theatre, radio and sporting events, helped to determine the experience of the fuel crisis and thereby shaped attitudes towards the government, not least because of the emotive way in which they were reported in the press. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 1957, the Labour Party published radical proposals for a state earnings-related pension scheme ('national superannuation') whose funds were to be invested in stock markets to generate high returns, and to help modernize and dynamize the British economy. This article explores a sophisticated campaign against the proposal by the insurance industry, and the resistance of the unions. In doing so, it considers the implications of this cross-class alliance, not least in terms of a possible missed opportunity to build a 'developmental state' in the UK, but also in terms of the country's increasingly inadequate and inequitable system of pension provision. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines labour market policy measures adopted to counteract the effects of the current economic crisis, comparing the UK policy response to reactions of governments in other developed countries. It shows that, despite having entered the crisis with one of the least developed packages of policies to support unemployed people of any country, the UK has done unusually little to bolster provision in this field, despite the social and economic benefits that increased investment would bring. In the light of this, the article critically revisits the UK's status since the late 1990s as a labour market policy 'success story'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Design of welfare benefits is a tricky business. In this regard, James Meade believed that it is important to avoid excessive distortions to the price of labour. He also recognised that means testing is a useful way of limiting the ‘hideously expensive’ cost of universal benefits provision; he conjectured that a 50% claw-back rate might be appropriate. We use a rational agent model to explore the welfare effects of alternative retirement benefits arrangements in the UK. Our analysis supports an extensive role for means testing, consistent with Meade's conjecture, and highlights the distortions associated with alternative methods of benefits financing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the post-World War II economic history of Great Britain, focusing on how the government publicly portrayed the issue of balance of payments during the period of the 1950s and 1960s. The author considers whether the period was actually a time of economic decline; the methods used to factor macroeconomic statistics; and diplomatic and economic relations between the U.S. and Great Britain as a result of wartime lend-lease policies and the Marshall Plan. The author considers government advertising encouraging the British to increase production and limit imports as a way of addressing problems deemed inherent in the country's trade imbalance between exports and imports.

This article attempts to show that there were three key elements to the changing policy mix as regards state economic intervention and ownership in post-war Britain. These have been relatively neglected by economic historians in favour of questions concerning 'objective' performance. They were: the uncertainty, confusion and competition of the two main political parties as to what the nationalised sector was for; attempts to escape an unpopular and bureaucratic policy model; and recommendations and techniques copied from other countries. It is posited that these three analytical categories provide an explanation for the shifting boundaries of the state in post-war Britain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The inflation targeting regime prevailing in the UK is not the result of a change in policy maker objectives. Analysis of UK policymakers¿ statements demonstrates that objectives have been essentially unchanged over five decades. Instead, the crucial underpinning of UK inflation targeting is an overhaul of doctrine. This overhaul involves changes in policymakers¿ views regarding key IS and Phillips curve parameters. They particularly have involved whether levels terms (of the real interest rate and the output gap) appear in the curves. Contrary to conventional wisdom, changing views on the expected-inflation term in the Phillips curve do not play a role. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the article "An Overhaul of Doctrine: The Underpinning of UK Inflation Targeting," by Edward Nelson, published in the same issue of the journal.

Office space in Britain is the most expensive in the world and regulatory constraints are the obvious explanation. We estimate the ‘regulatory tax’ for 14 British and 8 continental European office locations. The values for Britain are substantially greater than elsewhere. Exploiting panel data, we provide strong support for our hypothesis that the regulatory tax varies according to local prosperity and its responsiveness to this depends on whether an area is controlled by business interests or residents. Our results also imply that the cost to office occupiers of the 1990 conversion of commercial property taxes from a local to a national basis exceeded any plausible rise in property taxes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The British paper and board industry opposed plans to establish the Western European free trade area and the more modest EFTA, arguing that British producers would be unable to compete successfully against their Nordic rivals. The paper industry did support British entry to the EEC, but only because this was considered to be a less bad option than continued membership of EFTA. It is argued that while the British government could not fundamentally change its European policy solely because it harmed the interests of one particular industry, pressure from business and fears that increased competition would lead to increased unemployment gradually persuaded it to find ways to reduce competition. However, this policy probably encouraged many companies to delay efforts to modernise production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the evolution of British trade union policy relating to the European Union (EU). It focuses upon the 1975 UK referendum on continued membership of the Common Market (latterly the EU), and uses this key event to illuminate the range of the debate within the trade union movement, the rationale why it determined to oppose British membership of the EU and why its scampaigning proved largely ineffective, before considering the consequences arising from the referendum defeat. The paper identifies a number of issues resonant within the labour movement-including the decline in the strength of the left and the concomitant polarisation of opinion concerning the optimality of pursuing predominantly national or super-national economic and social policy-which have resulted in the periodic oscillation in trade union strategy, from opposition to (conditional) support for the European integration 'project'. It surmises that the inability of the trade union leadership to construct a viable strategy, able to combine full employment with social and labour market protection for vulnerable workers, implies that the questions last comprehensively aired during the 1975 referendum campaign have never been satisfactorily resolved. Consequently, an understanding of the factors pertaining to the 1975 referendum campaign has the potential to inform the contemporary debate. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Low and falling demand for housing has come to be recognised as a fairly widespread phenomenon in late 1990s Britain. Whilst research has tended to focus on the negative consequences of this for social rented housing, the weakness of the private housing market has led to increasingly grave problems in some inner cities and former coalfields, particularly in the North of England. The main purpose of the paper is to review and evaluate the actual and potential public policy responses to this complex of issues in relation to both private- and public-sector housing, in the light of new evidence on the extent, incidence and causes of low demand. Whilst central government has displayed a growing recognition of the need to develop counter-measures, particularly in England, the paper questions whether those so far proposed fully address the severity and intractability of the issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article reviews the recent developments in UK competitiveness policy, and explores its relationship with industrial policy, including regional industrial policy. It argues that competitiveness is virtually synonymous with productivity growth, but that while four Competitiveness White Papers of the 1990s potentially broadened the scope of UK industrial policy, the shift from 'sectoral' to 'horizontal' measures has in fact helped much reduce the content of this policy. The article reviews current industrial policy and expenditure, distinguishing between the areas of science and technology, small firms and regional policy. It argues that industrial policy is now a part of competitiveness policy,being closely aligned to the efficiency role of government. It finds that while policy has converged on a narrower set of measures, the traditional boundaries between the science and technology, small firm and regional policy components have become much less clear-cut. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Argues that the British Department of the Treasury opposition to Keynesianism is undeniable but was effectively marginalized for much of the 1950s by Keynesian economists working in the economic section in Great Britain. Importance of economic analysis in making economic policy; Advantages of internal professionals over internal generalist administrators.

Focuses on the British Conservative governments and their economic policies from the period 1979 to 1997. Aim of the macro-economic policy since 1979; Outline of the performance of the economy from 1979 through to 1996; What this performance has shown; Examination of the Conservative government's supply side policies.

The article focuses on the relationship between the trade unions and the Labour Party in Great Britain in the 20th century. The trade unions have made several efforts to cooperate with the ruling Labour Party during the 1940s and 1950s regarding the economic policy of the government. In the wake of current economic crisis, efforts are being made on both sides to maintain a sound relationship.

This paper begins with an examination of the period, during 1981, when the then Secretary of State for the Environment proposed a local referendum mechanism that would be triggered whenever a local authority attempted to increase its rates above a ceiling fixed by central government. This episode is then used as a basis for a broader examination of the possible applications of local referenda within the context of political systems that are dominantly based on notions of representative democracy. American experience is drawn upon to support the proposal that, in carefully defined circumstances, local referenda could constitute useful additions to the existing mechanisms of central-local relations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the annual expenditure on special regional assistance to industry in Great Britain between 1960-61 and 1972-73, based on a previously published study of the financial costs to the exchequer of regional policy in Great Britain undertaken by economists B. Moore and J. Rhodes. Itemization of "mainly recoverable" and "mainly non-recoverable" expenditure in the study; Information about the sources from where the data, presented here, are obtained; Discussion of the Local Employment Act of 1960; Information about the "Annual Reports," being presented by the Board of Trade under the Industrial Development Act of 1966; Figures of annual expenditure on Selective Employment Tax Additional Payments, presented in a memorandum submitted by the Department of Trade and Industry to the Trade and Industry Sub-Committee.

Examines the relationship between globalization and the development of the British and Norwegian welfare states. Welfare state policies of British and Norwegian labor parties; Western European globalization in the 1980s and the 1990s.

The article is the first in a series on the British welfare state. Specifically, the author explores the question of the effects of state social policy on the distribution of income and on social inequality, or what he terms "differential reward." An analysis concludes that the tax system does little to equalize income. Additionally, the welfare state's policy tends to amplify social inequality absent strong state intervention with positive income transfers.

Presents proposals for the conduct of British economic policy in the 1990s. Policy objectives; Central features of policy-making framework between 1976 and 1985; Targets for monetary growth; Methods to achieve money targets.

Se presentan noticias que tratan de la economía internacional. Arabia Saudita propuso la regulación de la producción petrolera de los países exportadores. Alemania Occidental sugirió que se retrasara la aceleración del Mercado Común Europeo. El gobierno británico restringió el crédito bancario. La U.R.S.S. revalorizó el rublo y abolió los impuestos personales. Japón intensificaba sus exportaciones.

Se presentan noticias que tratan de la economía internacional. Se informa que aumentaba la producción mundial de hierro. Se dan estadísticas sobre la inversión extranjera en Canadá. La situación económica en Europa Occidental era favorable. Surgían presiones para la iniciación de negociaciones entre los bloques económicos en Europa Occidental. El gobierno británico rechazó las recomendaciones del Comité Radcliffe en relación con la política monetaria.

Se presentan resúmenes de varios artículos publicados en revistas económicas. Entre los artículos incluidos están "La Politique Monetaire de la Grande Bretagne (1955-1956)" por M. Niveau, "Disguised Unemployment and Underemployment in Agriculture" por P. M. Rosenstein-Rodan y "The Problem of Monetary Liquidity".

An introduction is presented in which the author anticipates a 1964 political election in Great Britain while referring to articles contained in the issue on topics such as economic policy, governmental reform, and issues pertaining to the British Parliament.

The article discusses the Great Britain's Liberal Party's political philosophy as of July 1962, including in regard to British citizens' participation in government, the decentralization, or devolution, of government and the Party's perspective on public welfare. An overview of the Liberal Party's philosophy on international relations, pensions, defence policy, social security, social policy, relations between industrial management and employees, economic policy, national income and currency policy, is provided.

The article discusses the trend of trade union thought in Great Britain concerning the economic integration with Europe over the period 1956-1962. The discussion is based on the records of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) which is concerned in economic integration and social policy in a wider geographical context. It is stated that the TUC has not shown much interest in the prospects for political integration. The record indicates future policies to associate the region with the continent to meet with trade union approval or disapproval. It is emphasized that there is a diversity of views regarding the British trade union movement from adopting a strong position on common market policy.

A single change was to be observed between the two wars, a change to which the second war has given additional significance. One can collate that change with others and with anything in the position of Great Britain, if there is anything, which remains unchanged. There is a rough and ready index of the change in the fall between 1912 and 1938 in the proportion of British industrial production which was devoted to export. It fell from about two-fifths of the whole to about one-seventh. A seventh is not a small proportion, the multiplier effect on the rest of the economy of any variation in so large a fraction might be great, and its influence is enhanced by the concentration of a large part of this export production on a few industries and a few areas. But the decline is a significant change. Some such change was overdue before the first World War. The concentration on the one hand of so much of the world's export trade in textiles, coal, ships, and hardware in British hands, and on the other of so much of British resources in these exports was a survival of 19th century conditions which were passing and likely to be altered as knowledge of modern technology spread from old industrialized countries to new countries.

Discusses the human and economic costs of the coal miners' strike in Great Britain in 1984. Miners' reaction against the government's plan to close unprofitable mines and to cut government subsidies and costs in many areas; Number of jobs that will be affected by Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's policy; Government's offer to scrap the pit closure plans in favor of an independent closure-review procedure.