Sovereign Money
Economics shapes everything — what you earn, what you pay, what your government can afford. This site brings together reports, papers, and articles from the OBR, IMF, OECD, United Nations, The Lancet, and others, covering monetary policy, public finance, food systems, corruption, and the cost of living. Longer resources come with AI-generated summaries and skeptical analyses designed to separate genuine economic constraints from political choices. There are interactive dashboards and downloadable data series built from official sources, and an AI research assistant trained on the full library to help you find what you need.
Articles
When democracy requires a physics degree
A fusion researcher stood up at a talk I gave last week with a question about government spending. "I still find our monetary system confusing," he said. This struck me as more than an educational failure on my part. It pointed to a deeper problem with how we govern ourselves.
If We "Paid Off" the National Debt, There Would Be No Money Left
Politicians of all parties have spent decades telling the British public that the national debt is a burden on future generations, a reckless legacy we are imposing on our children and grandchildren. The argument has the surface plausibility of a household analogy: spend more than you earn, rack up debt, and eventually the bill comes due.
The Deficit Obsession is Costing Us a Clear View of the Economy
Every time the government runs a deficit, the media and most politicians reach for the same tired metaphors. We are "maxing out the national credit card." We are "burdening our grandchildren." We are "living beyond our means." What almost nobody mentions is the other side of the ledger.
Shadows on the wall: The monetary myths that shape British politics
The Treasury tells us there is no money. The Bank of England tells us it operates independently. The OBR tells us the deficit must be closed. They have been projecting these shadows on the wall for so long that most of us, MPs included, have mistaken them for reality.
The vexed question of whether the UK can afford Modern Monetary Theory doesn’t even make sense
Modern Monetary Theory isn’t a potentially risky radical fiscal plan but simply a description of how the British state already spends