ASI Bulletin: You're NIC-ed
New ASI Patron, Rory Sutherland Lecture and a Bumper Crop of Research Reports
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NEW ASI PATRON
THE 2024 ADAM SMITH LECTURE with 'Bohemian adman' Rory Sutherland
BUMPER CROP of research reports, on tax, the brain drain, and why Capital Gains Tax should go
But first...
It’s like being at a terrible party where the host is trying to reassure us that people aren’t already leaving. Well, people with capital certainly are, as our new Millionaire Tracker reveals. We calculate that by 2028, our millionaire population will shrink by a whopping 20%. What could have brought that on?
Unrelated to the above I’m sure, the Budget was published. Apparently, tax rises are needed to ‘save us from austerity’ (which means keeping the civil service out of austerity by driving the rest of us into it). The PM said the public finances need 'tough love’ (when really they should be sent to bed with no supper) . There is more cash for ‘our’ ‘precious’ NHS—which the Health Secretary says is ‘broken’. (So a bit like pouring more fuel into a broken engine, then? Shouldn’t you get under the bonnet and fix it, first?) You can read our own response to the Budget here.
At least America is putting the ‘party’ back into ‘party politics’ with a very jolly election. Kamala Harris has won the support of celebs like Beyonce, Taylor Swift, and Leonardo DiCaprio. (How thrilling it must be for the Vice President to meet the world’s most powerful people—Ed.) Kamala complains that Donald Trump has refused to release his medical records (but then, does anyone really want to see an X-Ray of Donald Trump?).
And with the theft of £300k worth of mature cheddar, police say they are looking for the Big Cheese responsible. (That man must be a muenster—Ed.)
IN THE TANK
We’re delighted to welcome Cameron de Silva Clamp to the team as our Gap Year intern. Plus the brilliant Sebastian Charleton has joined us full-time as our Digital and Communications Manager.
And in other ASI team news, Lord Mendelsohn, a Labour peer with decades of experience in business and politics, has joined the Institute as Patron. A former Shadow minister for business and for trade, he is currently Chairman of Evoke plc and a Senior Adviser to Value Retail plc.
Our co-founder Madsen Pirie has written two excellent blogs on the myth of the employers’ contribution, and on the three ways you can measure wealth- the third might surprise you!
The Annual Ayn Rand Lecture- with Charles White-Thomson as our star speaker this year- was a roaring success. The whole speech is now available to watch on YouTube. Plus you can read Charles’ reflections on his lecture in CityAm and CapX.
NEW RESEARCH
Tracking the outflow of millionaires
Hard to keep up with it, in fact. We predict that the UK will lose the greatest proportion of millionaires in the world, dropping by 20% by 2028.
Non-doms and, er, non-doms
You wait for one report about how we’re messing up non-doms, then two come along at once. The first estimates that abolishing non-dom status would cost £6.5 billion by 2035 and the loss of 23,000 jobs by 2030. It also called for an Italian-style tax cap of £150,000 a year (Well, who could use £150k worth of roads and refuse collection anyway—Ed.) to attract more highly mobile wealthy individuals.
The second report looks at the legal implications of scrapping non-dom status, revealing unfair and undesirable results, and suggests six alternatives for reform.
Abolish Capital Gains Tax!
Yeah, why not? It doesn’t do any good. Indeed, our expert Peter Young found that scrapping CGT could raise UK national income by 0.9% every year, amounting to £25.08 billion in 2024/25 (that’s £1000 for every family in Britain). CGT also smothers start-ups and small businesses, limiting competition, innovation, entrepreneurship and job creation. And multiple evidence shows that CGT rate rises reduce revenue, while cuts increase revenue. We call for the phased elimination of the tax.
Class Action Lawfare
The expansion in class action cases is damaging trust in UK's legal and business environment, says our Sam Bidwell. It has been driven by a growing industry of third-party litigation funding (TPLF), with these funders making considerable sums from it. It’s leaving businesses exposed to large-scale litigation from large but ill-defined groups, harming business confidence, forcing firms to switch cash into legal costs and defences, and driving investment abroad.
UPCOMING EVENTS
The Next Generation
On Tuesday, 5th November, we have another Next Generation drinks and networking, our forum exclusively for young people interested or involved in policy work. This time, we welcome our new Labour patron Lord Mendelson, who wants to revive the Labour Party's free-market thinking and argues that 'capitalism' shouldn't be a dirty word amongst progressives of any tribe.
Enlightenment Evening: Can Free Markets be Feminist?
Why are so many feminists socialists? We’ve invited Dr Victoria Bateman to give us the case for neoliberal feminism on Thursday November 14th. Dr Bateman is known for her feminist activism in defence of women’s bodily freedom, is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and has twenty years experience in teaching economics and economic history at the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. (Knows a bit, then—Ed.)
Enlightenment Evening: Bye-bye, non-doms
The non-dom regime is outdated and complicated, and needs reform (not abolition). How can we modernise it while remaining competitive in the global challenge to attract the world’s largest wealth creators? On Tuesday 19th November, our experts will enlighten you.
This year’s Adam Smith Lecture, on Wednesday, 27th November, will be given by Rory Sutherland, Vice-Chairman of the advertising company Ogilvy UK and 'Britain's most Bohemian adman’. His theme is Young people, creativity and capitalism.
Join us at Woburn House to hear how young creatives flourish in free markets, meet some like-minded visionaries and find a new way of thinking about economics and culture!
MEDIA
This month, we’ve had 2.5x our normal average of monthly media hits. Here are some of the highlights…
Our Millionaire Tracker findings were on the front pages of the Telegraph and CityAM. And they were also spotted in the Times, the Financial Times, the Guardian, the Independent, the I, the Mail, the Sun, the Express, the Standard, CapX and on the BBC, LBC, the Daily T podcast, Times Radio and GB News.
Our Non-Dom research featured in the Spectator, on Bloomberg News, the Express, the FT, the I and the Telegraph.
Our report on Class Action Lawfare appeared in CityAm, with an accompanying op-ed from Sam Bidwell, the Law Gazette, the Times and the Telegraph.
Post-Budget, Sam Bidwell wrote a blistering piece for the Critic, whilst Maxwell Marlow appeared on the TPA’s new podcast.
Plus, we’ve been commenting on a whole host of other topics, including- but certainly not limited to- this year’s Nobel Prize winners, VAT on private school fees, and London’s Nightlife scene.
And I quote…
This one from former US President Ronald Reagan seems appropriate to the times:
"A taxpayer is someone who works for the government but doesn’t have to take the civil service examination."
Bye,
e
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