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In 1930, Keynes opined that by 2030, people would work only 15 hours per week. As such, this prediction will not be realized. However, expected lifetime hours of leisure and home production in the UK rose by 58% between 1931 and 2011, rather more than Keynes would have expected. This reflects increases in life expectancy at older ages and much longer expected periods of retirement. Leisure in retirement contributes to high life satisfaction for the elderly, but building up savings to pay for it is a barrier to working only 15 hours per week. Byline: Nicholas Crafts

Byline: James Cloyne, Nicholas Crafts Keywords: government failure; industrial policy; productivity; L52; O47 Abstract This paper reviews UK industrial policy in the context of Brexit and weak productivity performance. It considers proposals made in a recent White Paper as well as more general arguments for reform now that the 'post-Thatcher consensus' has ended. The desirability of improving horizontal policies in the areas of innovation, infrastructure and skills is noted. In the event of a hard Brexit, there would be an opportunity to return to 1970s-style selective industrial policies and public-interest-based competition policy. An advantage of a soft Brexit is that it would preclude interventionism of this kind. Article Note: Submitted May 2018. The author is grateful to the editor, James Cloyne, and three anonymous referees for excellent suggestions which improved an earlier version of this paper. The usual disclaimer applies.