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Britain is also eerily emulating a pattern of democratic backsliding; from India to Mexico, authoritarian governments “test-drive” what they can get away with at local level first. By conveniently delaying elections at a time when council tax is set to rise, Labour risks setting a wicked precedent for “taxation without representation”. – Sherelle Jacobs, Daily Telegraph (£). January 18th, 2026 | 19 comments
Away from the perma-misery of politics, wars, regulatory nonsense and so on, I came across this article on the Substack of the Rational Optimist Society (with a name like that, it is not a place to go for the doom-scrollers): “Housing is arguably the most broken industry in the world, with tough competition from healthcare and education. It’s a gigantic market that affects us all,” writes Stephen McBride. He argues that firms such as Cuby Technologies are doing for housing what shipping containers did for transportation and global trade, with massively positive effects. Cuby’s product is the Mobile Micro-Factory (MMFTM). It’s a standardized, portable factory that turns homebuilding into a predictable manufacturing process. I can see that acronym MMF, in this context, getting the same visibility as SMR for “small modular reactors”, and tapping into the same idea of using economies of scale, mass customisation and fiendishly clever computer tech to produce lots of useful, not eye-wateringly expensive things for our homes, power generators, whatever. And I can see, in time, how this fits with still-developing tech such as 3-D printing (which has been around a while). It will of course give some folk the vapours, such as those in the construction trades, much as happened with other disruptive changes. But if, for example, ageing and other forces squeeze labour market supply of people in such trades, then business models such as the MMF one, able to churn out homes, will have a lot of appeal. Plus new jobs can be created around design and all the associated, value-add opportunities that can arise. One aspect of all this is that if it lives up to the billing, the precision with which homes are built will be very high. Also, there is an appeal, is there not, for the likes of Elon Musk in figuring out how to efficiently produce things for spacefaring and the settlement of Mars. I can bet he is following all this closely. Final thought – for places that have suffered a devastating loss of housing (such as Southern California exactly a year ago because of the fires), being able to produce attractive homes at scale for people seems to have a lot of appeal. And, er, that’s where the horrible politics comes in. To date, only a fraction of the number of houses lost have been replaced. That is a shameful state of affairs, and one for which the local politicians deserve to pay a high price.
January 18th, 2026 | 24 comments
“So, where are the chants of ‘From The Gulf to the Caspian Sea, Iran will be free'”? – Allister Heath, asking a question that sort of gets a natural, logical answer: because Iran’s regime is against Israel and Jews, and against the West more generally. And in the minds of those who used to protest about Israel’s attacks on Hamas/Hezbollah and others, that is what counts. A few thousand people dead in Iran is all about the smashing eggs/omelette equation according to this anti-West calculus. In a way, this plays to the whole “two-tier” issue of the thinking about much of today’s Left (and the barmier forms of it on the Right): If you are on the “right” side of a particular argument (say that you are against Israel’s existence, or at least ambivalent about it), then it creates moral “space” to be indulgent towards regimes that are against Israel, etc. We see this over and over. (Daily Telegraph link behind paywall.) January 16th, 2026 | 19 comments
Minnesota is not a happy place at the moment, what with the multi-billion-dollar welfare fraud story and now this:
Several Samizdata commenters are, if I recall correctly, those with law enforcement experience, so I’d be interested to know what the rights and wrongs are here. January 11th, 2026 | 113 comments
Some thoughts about what might happen if the brutes ruling Iran are toppled: Funding for various Islamist terror networks will decline and that is good for Israel, Lebanon and wider world. Israel might try and carve out relations with Iran, leading over time to trade and capital flows, development, etc. There are lots of young, smart Iranian people who want something better. Some expat Iranians might return and bring money and investment. This will hit the Islamists who are allying with the Western hard Left. This is going to badly undermine morale and the sense that their ideology is winning. That is important. Iran’s relations with Moscow will change, and become more difficult. This might further tilt the scales against Putin, although that is not something I predict with much confidence. On balance, this is also a negative for China, assuming that Iran moves in a slightly more liberal direction (I use that word with due care and attention). The Gulf states might benefit in some ways but not in others. Saudi Arabia, UAE etc have benefited in recent years from expanded links with the West, in part because they were seen as the relatively sane folk in the room (particularly, the UAE). If Iran were to turn more friendly, more pro-capitalist, etc, it creates more competition for the Gulf states. Competition is generally a good thing. Can we call it “Persia” again? January 9th, 2026 | 14 comments
I saw this on Fraser Nelson’s Substack (it seems everyone has a Substack these days). The British journalist has been to Thailand with his wife, and noted this positive healthcare outcome in Thailand:
I had the same frustrating experience in dealing with my own ankle/knee pain issues about six years ago, but unlike Nelson, I did not fly thousands of miles to get treated (which clearly has to be factored in for the health tourist equation to work. But then Fraser Nelson was in the country anyway on holiday.) I have private medical cover, but did not use it on this occasion, and got sorted with specially made insoles, and did physio and various exercises – including barbell lifts such as the deadlift – to strengthen my knees, and so forth. I am a lot better and feel fitter than when I was a decade younger. Whatever the specifics, the example given from Thailand shows that the UK’s free-at-the-point-of-use system has major faults, because there’s less of a price incentive to focus on what people are looking for, and therefore fresh sources of supply aren’t drawn in. Prices are information carriers, and like a clogged artery, a healthcare system run on socialist lines can produce the national equivalent of a stroke. (This in some ways describes the economy of the UK.) Healthcare needs a sharp dose of capitalism along with green veggies and a daily walk. Think of how under free market healthcare, technologies such as 3-D printing/processing scale up production, in a customised way, of items such as hip replacement parts, knee replacement parts, insoles, and other things. This tech already is being used, but under a more market-based UK system, this will accelerate. The toolkit that is promised by AI could really drive change in a positive way (and I am not as starry eyed about AI as some might be). Healthcare needs its Jobs, Dyson and Rockefeller. Anyway , thoughts about health and wellbeing often crop up in the cold, post-Christmas days of January, so it is time for me to hit the weights. Wishing everyone here a happy 2026. January 4th, 2026 | 11 comments
I left this comment on another place and thought I’d share it here. I was responding to an American pal – whom I normally agree with – who said the the UK’s vote for independence outside the EU was a disaster. I have jazzed it up a bit and added links. Well, it is Christmas! The EU has become an increasingly regulated, bureaucratic entity, and while the UK tried to pull it in a different direction, the sclerosis of the continent got worse. The Single Market and “freedom of movement” aspect had their positives – up to a point. The Customs Union (external tariff wall, in other words) was a clear negative, however. The structure of the EU is hostile to classical liberal economics in the medium term, not a plus. The bureaucratic mission creep of the European Commission, unhampered by a largely toothless E. Parliament (it cannot initiate or repeal directives), meant the EU economy decelerated, imperceptibly at first. Its share of global GDP has shrunk and not just because other, non-European countries such as China and India have grown over the past few decades. While some of the reasons for Brexit were grounded in nationalism, which I dislike, some reasons were more classically liberal. Those reasons should not be discounted. Another point: for far too many, the ideas of free enterprise and freedom of trade became entwined, in a poisonous way, with the creation of transnational, bureaucratic structures distant from ordinary people. To that extent, the EU is part of the problem for those making the case for capitalism and open markets. When you say those words, far too many think of men and women in suits in Brussels regulating this and that, not entrepreneurship, trade and human interaction. That’s a problem. For Americans reading this, remember that when the original 13 colonies broke free from the UK in the 1770s, they did so in part for reasons around representative government and the powers to tax with legitimate power. The EU increasingly came to the point where member states were reduced to regions of a centralising state. Ross Clark’s Far From EUtopia is a marvellous read about Brexit, what went wrong, and more. December 15th, 2025 | 14 comments
“I fear that today’s way of life is not our strength but has become our weakness. It has become debilitating and corrupting. The two world wars spawned an enlarged public sector that has, in the past 30 years, become the insatiable cuckoo in the next, pushing out other activities by absorbing resources, increasing debt, raising taxes, creating unproductive employments, encouraging people not to work, over-regulating while under-performing, promoting mass immigration to feed its preference for cheap labour, and destroying vital industries in the pursuit of a green fantasy. It has created dependency and encouraged irresponsibility – all the more damaging in a society that has jettisoned much of its identity and pride. I have never felt more pessimistic about our ability to change. “Our `progressives’ still inhabit a dream-world: globalisation, `rules-based order’, open borders and the EU. They depend on perpetual public sector expansion for their existence,. This is, say Labour MPs, `in the party’s DNA’. It cannot face reality, as the recent Budget shows. The only part of the public sector not in their DNA is defence. The Liberal Democrats and Greens are even worse. A coalition of the three would be a nightmare. “We cannot defend ourselves while the present system prevails. Hence the contempt of Trump and Putin. People have of course been saying this for years and like the boy who cried wolf, they have been ignored. Now, however, the wolf is at the door.” – Robert Toombs, Daily Telegraph (£) I called the author “richard” – apologies for the goof. December 3rd, 2025 | 21 comments
“The great heroes of capitalism are the entrepreneurs who can feel the future in their bones and will do anything to bring it into being — fanatics who are compelled to build castles in the air, as Joseph Schumpeter put it. The biggest beneficiaries of these innovations are consumers who are showered with products and services beyond the dreams of previous generations. Capitalism may have made accommodations with some horrible regimes and vile practices in the past, as Beckert shows in detail. But as a system it thrives best in conditions of freedom, where government power is limited, property rights secure and businesspeople left alone to pursue their dreams and subject them to the stern test of the market.” – Adrian Wooldridge, Bloomberg ($), in one of his best recent columns IMHO, gently taking apart a new book by Sven Beckert that purports to show how we have become rich primarily through violence and enslavement, not mutual exchange. The book is apparently more than 1,300 pages long, and the largest ever published by Penguin. To write a book that long, and miss the key elements of why free enterprise is as great as it is, seems a lot of work for scant reward. Alas, I suspect Beckert’s book will be treated as reverently on parts of the Left as Thomas Piketty’s blockbuster, which turned out to be built on proverbial sand. A recent Nobel prizewinner in economics, Joel Mokyr, has written a book that I think rather more accurately identifies why, for instance, the UK became as wealthy as it did during the Industrial Revolution, and plays far more attention to the role of ideas. The Wealth and Poverty of Nations by David Landes is also a good study, in my view. Anything by Deidre McCloskey is also good. November 29th, 2025 | 26 comments
I wrote these thoughts on my Facebook page yesterday, and I have taken a few elements out and added others. Anyway, let me know what you think: The State’s share of the total economy continues to rise, putting even more pressure on those who are still here, working, building business, etc. There are one or two decent elements in it (stamp duty suspended on new share listings in London) but the general direction is bad. Unfortunately, given the reluctance of backbench Labour MPs to accept any meaningful welfare reforms, the total public spending bill will continue to rise. So next year we could have more of the same. That means more emigration of young, ambitious people to lower-tax places such as Dubai, Australia (relatively), etc. The tax base will contract. One element in particular – the so-called “mansion tax” levy on high-value properties – bothers me not just because of the specifics (it will gum up the real estate market, and thresholds are bound to be frozen, drawing in more over time), but because of a principle. If I own something that is valuable, why should I pay tax on it purely for that reason? Does the imposition of such a levy equate to the State acting as a landlord, demanding a rent? I can understand the point that a property that is valuable partly because of state action should therefore bear some tax (this is the argument for land value taxes or even council taxes, although LVT is problematic); there is also some sense in taxing property owners to pay for local services (back in the 19th C, only freeholders could vote in elections, which meant they had a vested interest in frugal government). But taxing something that is worth X, and purely for that reason, is punitive. It also means that the asset-rich/cash-poor issue arises. Some people will need to sell, or at least downsize earlier than they perhaps wanted. Some folk might rent out a room to a tenant, or take out a second mortgage to find the cash. That could have a cascade impact on property prices, perhaps undermining the point of the tax. But maybe that is the point of this tax: it is designed to push property values down. And ironically, that will mean that on death of the owner (s), the haul in inheritance tax will be lower than otherwise. If you own your home – you have paid for it fair and square, then it is yours. Period. A tax puts the State in the position of a sort of supreme landlord. I realise that some people will say that there is a generational wealth injustice issue here, because lots of younger adults cannot afford to buy or even rent a decent place. That’s a genuine issue. The solution, broadly, is to free up the planning system, and control net immigration. Another factor is that we must stop artificially holding down interest rates, which has enriched some people with large homes, particularly if they are leveraged. In some ways, the situation today is the long-drawn out consequence of the 2008 financial bust and a decade-plus of very low interest rates. I saw a few people on other social media forums saying that objectors should stop bellyaching and pay up. Apart from the oafishness of this sort of response (“do what you are told!”), it ignores the principle of absolute property ownership. Another objection I’ve seen is that lots of people have to downsize, so those affected can do so. However, this is not that easy. Who’s going to buy, particularly when stamp duties are high and taxes in general are crimping growth? Underlying liquidity in the UK housing market is weak and unlikely to improve fast, although it might pick up a bit. Some owners might rent out part of their home to make a bit of cash to cover the tax, but not all such homes are easily changeable for that purpose, and rental income is now taxed anyway. Even so, I would expect some of this to happen in the years before the measure is hopefully repealed. The new tax will not come in immediately – and might get snarled up as the general election nears (it must be held by July 2029). Of course, people downsize their property for various reasons: their children flee the nest; people want a smaller place to look after, unlock value and buy a holiday home, travel, invest in a business or hobby, etc. it’s natural and normal. But it’s not the State’s role to force the pace on this, to create a sense of duress. The levy on high-value homes is a form of wealth tax. Even someone who is generally favourable towards the UK government, Dan Neidle, says they are a really bad idea. Of course, I don’t need to spell it out to the sensible Samizdata regulars that what is wanted are taxes that are as low, flat and simple as possible. Final random thought: property taxes could be defended in the past when only freeholders could vote in elections, and they tended to have an incentive to vote for stuff that would protect the value of what they had, such as sewage, water supply, electrification, parks, amenities, law enforcement of various kinds, and so on. I sometimes hope, however, naively, that we could bring such an approach back. Voting ought to involve some beneficial ownership “buy-in” to one’s neighbourhood. November 28th, 2025 | 16 comments
“It [taxes on property values] is tantamount to a quasi-authoritarian reopening of settled property rights and fundamentally reorders the relationship between the individual and the state. Her scheme begins to abolish freehold property, turning yeoman-owners into leaseholders, with politicians as the ultimate landlords. Her `high value council tax surcharge’ is best understood as a rent, to be paid to [Rachel] Reeves for the right to stay in one’s home. Labour hates ordinary landlords, but is desperate to turn the state into the most exploitative of rent collectors. It’s sub-Marxist nonsense, a form of legalised theft.” – Allister Heath, Daily Telegraph, 27 November, on yesterday’s Autumn Budget from Rachel Reeves, UK finance minister. He’s right that things such as “mansion taxes” – which in reality raise relatively paltry sums – are about forcing owners of properties deemed to be above £X or whatever into a situation where they own them at the sufferance of the State, rather than outright. And the temptation to lower the threshold on such a tax, along with everything else, will be irresistable. On a related point, now seems a good time to introduce readers again to an essay in defence of absolute property right ownership – rather than the idea of owning it at the sufferance of the State. The essay, “Your Dog Owns Your House”, by the late French writer and classical liberal, Anthony de Jasay, is a masterpiece. November 27th, 2025 | 42 comments
On paper, he is the kind of Democrat that might have been invented in a laboratory of perverted social science by a MAGA Dr. Frankenstein: a socialist, an immigrant, a Muslim, son of a movie director and a professor of postcolonialism, holder of a degree in “Africana studies,” a 34-year-old whose experience runs the gamut from co-founder of the Bowdoin College chapter of Students for Justice in Palestine to membership of the New York state Assembly for the last five years, with stints as a rap producer and tenant organizer. Have I missed anything? Well, his employment experience does include a gig as “third assistant director” on the 2016 Disney movie “Queen of Katwe,” whose director, Mira Nair, is Zohran’s mom. – Gerard Baker, writing in the Wall Street Journal about Zohran Mamdani, who won by a clear vote yesterday night. That old line from H L Mencken of people getting the government they want “good and hard” is getting a lot of use these days. November 5th, 2025 | 45 comments - (Comments are closed)
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