The Bank of England has announced, just as the stock market takes a tumble, that interest rates might go up quite a bit, quite soon. If you know your movies, this is a financial ‘Sliding Doors’ moment: like catching your partner with a lover on the day you lose your job and have the cat put down. So it could either inspire a new start or compound a downward spiral. As you know, I try to keep my glass half-full…
“Cut interest rates to prevent recession, says Institute of Economic Affairs’ SMPC”
The ‘lag’, ‘trailing leg’ or ‘long wake’ of any economic measure means that its effects are often felt long after the problem it was supposed to solve has disappeared. 2010’s ‘balancing the books within the space of one parliament’ (that went well, didn’t it?), austerity to you and me, is one example.