{"id":62664,"date":"2022-04-25T10:25:20","date_gmt":"2022-04-25T09:25:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/?p=62664"},"modified":"2022-04-25T10:26:53","modified_gmt":"2022-04-25T09:26:53","slug":"we-are-descending-into-economic-crisis-and-the-government-is-not-talking-about-it","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2022\/04\/25\/we-are-descending-into-economic-crisis-and-the-government-is-not-talking-about-it\/","title":{"rendered":"We are descending into economic crisis and the government is not talking about it"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ons.gov.uk\/peoplepopulationandcommunity\/personalandhouseholdfinances\/expenditure\/articles\/therisingcostoflivinganditsimpactonindividualsingreatbritain\/november2021tomarch2022\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">ONS has published a report<\/a> on the cost of living crisis this morning. They say:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Around 9 in 10 (87%) adults reported an increase in their cost of living over the previous month in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022), an increase of 25 percentage points compared with around 6 in 10 (62%) adults in November 2021 (3 to 14 November 2021).<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Nearly a quarter (23%) of adults reported that it was very difficult or difficult to pay their usual household bills in the last month, compared with a year ago, in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022); an increase from 17% in November 2021 (3 to 14 November 2021).<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Focusing on the latest period, among those who pay energy bills, around 4 in 10 (43%) reported that it was very or somewhat difficult to afford their energy bills in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022).<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Of adults currently paying off a mortgage and\/or loan, or rent, or shared ownership, 30% reported that it was very or somewhat difficult to afford housing costs, and 3% claimed to be behind on rent or mortgage payments, in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022).<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Among all adults, 17% reported borrowing more money or using more credit than they did a year ago, in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022).<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Among all adults, 43% reported that they would not be able to save money in the next 12 months, in March 2022 (16 to 27 March 2022); this is the highest this percentage has been since this question was first asked in March 2020 (27 March to 6 April 2020).<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>This finding was unsurprising:<\/p>\n<article class=\"col col--md-36 col--lg-39 page-content__main-content padding-bottom\">\n<div id=\"main-points\" class=\"section__content--markdown\">\n<section><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-62666\" src=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23-550x417.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"417\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23-550x417.png 550w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23-396x300.png 396w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23-768x582.png 768w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23-528x400.png 528w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.15.23.png 1428w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>As was this:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-62667\" src=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11-550x523.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"523\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11-550x523.png 550w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11-315x300.png 315w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11-768x730.png 768w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11-421x400.png 421w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.11.png 1388w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The stress of this crisis is already beginning to tell, and quite unevenly.<\/p>\n<p>It impacts other costs as well:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-62668\" src=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28-550x401.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"401\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28-550x401.png 550w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28-411x300.png 411w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28-768x560.png 768w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28-548x400.png 548w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.28.png 1434w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/> <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-62669\" src=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44-550x523.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"523\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44-550x523.png 550w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44-315x300.png 315w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44-768x731.png 768w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44-420x400.png 420w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.16.44.png 1408w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>The risk of people losing their homes is, as I have kept saying, high.<\/p>\n<p>So too is the chance that we will have a debt crisis growing:<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-62670\" src=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30-550x432.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"550\" height=\"432\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30-550x432.png 550w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30-382x300.png 382w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30-768x603.png 768w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30-509x400.png 509w, https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2022\/04\/Screenshot-2022-04-25-at-10.17.30.png 1426w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 550px) 100vw, 550px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>People are borrowing more. But will they be able to repay?<\/p>\n<p>This is a profoundly worrying review. And remember two things.<\/p>\n<p>First, the Treasury made this worse by increasing taxes.<\/p>\n<p>Second, the Bank of England is making this worse by increasing interest rates.<\/p>\n<p>You cannot make up callousness like that in the face of a crisis of this magnitude.<\/p>\n<p>We <a href=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2022\/04\/23\/its-time-for-a-new-path-on-the-economic-crisis-that-we-face\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">urgently need an alternative economic policy<\/a>. Danny Blanchflower and I have offered on.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The ONS has published a report on the cost of living crisis this morning. They say: Around 9 in 10 (87%) adults reported an increase<br \/><a class=\"moretag\" href=\"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/2022\/04\/25\/we-are-descending-into-economic-crisis-and-the-government-is-not-talking-about-it\/\"><em> Read the full article&#8230;<\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[96,14,190,35,106],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62664","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-conservatives","category-corruption","category-economic-data","category-economics","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62664","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62664"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62664\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62664"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62664"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.taxresearch.org.uk\/Blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62664"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}