"Fail to prepare, prepare to fail" has gone from being an irritating statement trotted out on a training course to a description of the UK government's modus operandi. And as well as on covid restrictions we're seeing it in EU negotiations - deal or no-deal. And here's why... 1/

Breathless accounts of brilliant negotiating are oddly unaccompanied by statements of UK wins.

Twice the PM has signed up to deals he previously said no PM could sign up for. The level of self-deception in turning these into triumphs is off the scale.

A wise man has suggested that Johnson's self delusions are good for the UK in the way he folds under EU pressure but denies it - that this actually delivers the best result.

But it doesn't do much for the country's politcal debate to have such delusions at the heart of the most important economic relationship. And they don't have such delusions in Belfast.

Perhaps it is the way of UK politics that no leader can be seen to be pro-EU, that the UK must be seen to be bigger than the EU, even though the UK is obviously smaller and needs the EU for trade.

Just bringing together my various bits and pieces on the UK-EU. The first reactions - a significant agreement...

Winners and losers of the UK-EU deal.

Why this was always going to be a problem - regulatory soverignty v free trade involves trade offs...

Going back to mid-2019, why the deal the UK wanted from the EU, the same benefits with none of the costs, couldn't be available.

More recently, why the Brexit dream is dying - because it wasn't designed to deal with a situation where we had to choose between trade with the EU and freedom.

Ten days in and it seems the government's post-Brexit economic policy is to ignore reality, priority and choice, and just claim with no evidence that everything is going to be great. This, needless to say, is dangerous territory. Exhibit 1... 1/

Here's a good example of what is currently passing for UK economic policy. The theory the UK can be 'nimble' in regulations has been present since 2016. In 5 years nobody has found the detail. We presume others might have a similar idea. And trade needs regulations to align 2/

There will of course always be someone to blame. Usually the EU. Because they do indeed want to compete with the UK. This is not exactly surprising. A vague UK idea versus the bigger next door market (or indeed a big one over the pond). Who's going to win? 3/

Next, 'Global Britain' and specifically the Liz Truss speech in the Commons yesterday. To summarise, we are going to do trade deals on everything with everyone while still protecting UK industry and poor countries. Yup, more warm words and no priorities.

Useful example here. The long running EU-US trade battle over food, one claiming to be about quality, the other science. The UK solution. We'll do both! Fabulous, why did nobody think of this before? Unless they did, and found they still had to choose. Note other warm words 5/

Small business in particular struggling with new Brexit red tape. Entirely predictable, and a function of a world trade system distorted against smaller traders. Stay with me a short while as Brexit threadmeister and story author @pmdfoster may say... 1/

The nub of the issue is the extra costs for most exports, whether this is paperwork or meeting different regulatory requirements. A fixed cost per exported load inevitably adds a higher percentage cost to small than larger business... and they may lack expertise. 2/

You'll note that in the EU, with virtually no paperwork or differing regulations, the costs of exports are similar for smaller and large companies - though even there there is a big company bias, because who can afford to lobby for friendly regulations? 3/

The same unfortunately typically applies to trade deals. If you are Nissan and threaten to leave the country without the right deal you have more clout than a small cheesemaker. As we see. But is it just the EU that is over-bureaucratic? Sadly not... 4/

One of the best UK business groups on trade policy @BritAmBusiness (and yes you can quote me @EmanueAdam) has a new report out on a UK-US trade deal and SMEs. It shows opportunities. But unfortunately problems unlikely to be solved. 5/

A few thoughts on tax policy. Thread:

So you are worth >$100M or perhaps even a few billion. There are only two ways to become this rich.

1. You start a business that becomes very successful.
2. You inherit wealth from your family. 1/

Whether you created a great company or inherited a lot of wealth, you are now sitting on a capital asset. You don’t really have any ordinary income (not meaningful to be relevant) and you never will. To the extent you ever pay taxes, it will be capital gains. 2/

The highest tax rate that the super rich will ever pay on their income (or wealth) is 20% capital gains tax. So, the super rich pay the equivalent effective tax rate of any American earning $75K (when you include FICA taxes). Same as a teacher or a cop. 3/

The question following from this obvious injustice in the tax system is the appropriate policy for taxing capital income. Economic policy would suggest that the best tax rate on capital is 0%. Why? ...4/

...Because in a capitalist society you want capital flowing efficiently without friction to its most productive use. Benefits of that are obvious. 5/

Ben Graham managed to compound money at 20%/year for 20 years at his partnership following a value investing strategy

In 1948 he acquired 50% stake in GEICO. It had to be distributed to his investors

They almost didn't make the investment due to some accounting questions 1/

Ben Graham paid $712,500 for 50% of GEICO in 1948. He put 25% of his investment assets in GEICO.

This investment did so well that the price of its shares advanced to two hundred times or more than the price of the half-interest by 1971/1972 2/

Ironically, the aggregate of profits accruing from this single investment decision far exceeded the sum of all the others realized through 20 years of operations in the partners specialized fields, involving much investigation, endless pondering&countless individual decisions 3/

Are there morals to this story of value to the intelligent investor?

An obvious one is that there are several different ways to make and keep money on Wall Street 4/

Another, not so obvious, is that one lucky break, or one supremely shrewd decision may count for more than a lifetime of journeyman efforts.

But behind the luck, or the crucial decision, there must usually exist a background of preparation and disciplines capacity. 5/

Inflation Is Coming!

Some say: Inflation didn’t rise after 2008-2015 Fed QE, so it won’t rise this time. Here are the problems with that argument.

1) From 2008-2015 regulators hammered the banks, so while the Fed’s balance sheet expanded, M2 did not accelerate.

2) In 2020, we used the banks to push out money, the opposite of the first round of QE. PPP loans were financed through banks and unemployment checks were direct-deposited.
3) The M2 measure of money is up more than 25% in the past 12 months.

4) That alone, 25%+ M2 growth, is enough, but we are compounding the problems.
5) Regulating fossil fuel production drives energy prices up.
6) Ag, industrial & transportation are energy intensive, and many claim they are bad for the environment. Result: higher prices.

7) Federal government borrowing and deficit spending encourages more Fed money printing, and artificially lifts demand.
8) Higher tax rates, rising minimum wage, and big government crowd out the private sector; reducing supply.
9) Demand up; Supply down! Inflation is coming.

Last month, Texas resident Royce Peirce paid $387.70 to heat his two-story house. This month, he owes $8,162.73 — and counting.

Amid freezing temperatures and another looming winter storm, Texans are facing a second crisis: astronomical power

Why are these energy bills so high? You can thank Texas’s power grid for that.

The U.S. is divided into three grids: one covers the eastern states, another the western states, and then there’s the Texas grid, ERCOT, which covers nearly the entire state.

Now you might be wondering: Why does Texas have its own power grid?

If you’re familiar with the state’s history and public policy, you probably already know the answer. In short, Texas has its own grid to avoid dealing with the federal

What we’re witnessing now is a collapse of the state’s power grid.

Amid freezing temperatures, the imbalance between Texas’s staggering electricity demand and its limited supply caused prices to skyrocket from $20 per megawatt hour to $9,000 per megawatt hour — a 450% increase.

One wholesale power supplier, Griddy, made a surprising decision.

CEO Michael Fallquist told Griddy’s 29,000 customers to abandon his service and switch providers: “We want what’s right by our consumers, so we are encouraging them to

For those who haven’t heard, we are witnessing a globally coordinated plan (conspiracy) to use fear and safety as cover for a #GreatReset of the world economy & society. This is a planned and internationally coordinated strategy by the most powerful global elites-the ruling class

The aim of the global ruling class is to refashion global capitalism into what we can call neo-feudalist technocratic bio-fascism-or ‘global fascism’ for short.

The aim is for remaining liberal democratic rights and freedoms that have been in place at least formally in the ‘west’ for the last few hundred years to be eroded and withdrawn.

There’s lots of different terminology and branding, for example: Great Reset, Fourth Industrial Revolution, Technocracy. The main aim of this plan is the concentration of power over capital, wealth, people and nature in the hands of a the very largest corporations and monopolies.

This plan for a new phase of global capitalism is enabled by national states and governments, international organisations & quangos (EU, UN, NATO, IMF, WTO, WHO, Gates, GAVI). With no clear lines between state and non-state actors, this is also a form of global corporatism.