Henry Smith

Economist, all views are my own and do not represent the views of my employer(s) and or clients

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

@hangsawoman Ask him how often he gets stuck in traffic on congested roads…

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

I asked Claude Opus 4.8 to rate the new cabinet based on their experience.

Top rating (5/5) - Previously studied and worked at the top of this field
4/5 - Studied or worked in this field
3/5 - Brief experience in the field
2/5 - Mentioned issues in the field Bottom rating
(1/5) - Never mentioned this field before

Healey → Chancellor: 3/5 (Financial Secretary to Treasury 2007-09)
Miliband → Foreign Sec: 1/5 (no foreign policy background) Streeting → Defence: 1/5 (no defence background)
Mahmood → Home Sec: 4/5 (qualified barrister)
Cooper → Health Sec: 1/5 (no health background)
Rayner → Housing Sec: 2/5 (grew up in social housing, care worker)
Reynolds → Business/Science: 2/5 (solicitor, no business/science career)
Powell → Education Sec: 2/5 (regeneration/charity roles, no teaching)
Phillipson → Equalities: 4/5 (ran a women’s refuge pre-politics) McFadden → Work & Pensions: 1/5 (career adviser, no welfare background)
Nandy → DCMS: 1/5 (homelessness charity roles, not culture/media)
Fahnbulleh → Energy/Net Zero: 5/5 (ex-CEO New Economics Foundation)
Norris → Justice Sec: 1/5 (union organiser, no legal background) Eagle → DEFRA: 1/5 (union researcher, no agriculture/environment)
Haigh → First Sec/Duchy of Lancaster: 2/5 (special constable, youth worker) Midgley → Chief Whip: 3/5 (Unite political director, Corbyn/Starmer aide)

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

@DanielPriestley @CeeMacBee Exactly my point. This graph represents your effective tax rate depending on your return and which policy is in place

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

@PolitlcsUK Has anybody thought how britain would hold up when it’s so energy reliant

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

It's not all terrible, there was some growth agenda. Planning reform, pension megafunds, GB Energy, trade deals.

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

In light of his resignation, here is a quick summary of everything Starmer and Reeves have done economically. Feel free to add more 🧵(1/n)

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

Business hammered. Hospitality shed 124,376 payrolled jobs (5.6%) in the year leading up to May 2025.

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

This is terrible for America

How does the US expect to compete in open source if they plan on regulating models like this? David himself acknowledges the importance of the US having open source

It is not possible to ban or limit open source over night like this

[David Sacks @DavidSacks]

I’ve had a number of conversations with folks inside and outside government about the current situation with Anthropic, and here is what I believe to be true:

— As we know, Anthropic publicly released its Mythos class models earlier this week under the commercial name Fable.

— Fable is Mythos with guardrails. But if those guardrails fail, then you’ve exposed Mythos and its advanced cyber capabilities to people who shouldn’t have them. (Keep in mind that Anthropic itself widely promoted the idea that Mythos was a cyberweapon and needed to be regulated as such. They asked for government regulation of Mythos and championed the guardrails on Fable. If there is a vulnerability — big or small — it is Anthropic’s responsibility to patch.)

— A highly credible trusted partner of both Anthropic and the USG who was testing Fable came forward with a jailbreak of those guardrails. The Admin asked Dario to fix the jailbreak or de-deploy the model. Dario refused.

— In their blog post, Anthropic defended its decision by saying the jailbreak isn’t serious. That is not what the trusted partner and the USG believe; nor is that kind of minimizing language consistent with Anthropic’s brand as the AI safety company. It’s difficult to fathom how they could claim a jailbreak allowing operability of a cyber weapon could be defined as not “serious.”

— In the past, Anthropic has always said that safety must be top priority and taken super seriously. In this case, Anthropic prioritized the continued offering of the consumer model over safety.

— In reaction, the Admin issued the export control. The Admin did this reluctantly. It’s been very surprised that Anthropic hasn’t wanted to cooperate with a reasonable safety request (ie fixing the jailbreak issue). Anthropic’s reaction is very much at odds with their branding and ethos as a safe AI research community.

— The Admin’s hope now is that Anthropic remediates the safety issue, the export control is lifted, and Fable goes back into general release. The Admin wants all of this to happen as soon as possible. It is frankly bewildered that Anthropic hasn’t wanted to comply with safety requests that it previously said were its highest priority.

— Those trying to misdirect and tie this action to the prior DoW/Anthropic issues are wrong. The Admin values Anthropic’s technical capabilities and feels that this issue, while serious, should be easily resolved. The ball is in Anthropic’s court.

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

Ah yes, our pensions must grow as a share of GDP each year until it swallows the entire economy! Don’t let anybody tell you otherwise

[Malcolm Reavell @malcolm_reavell]

This is pure, shameful, propaganda and economic illiteracy. The Resolution Foundation are vile neoliberal henchmen. The state pension triple lock is essential to protect those on fixed income, is perfectly affordable, and actually benefits the economy. Thread👇

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

NEWS:
Reform UK's Richard Tice wants fly-tipping fines raised from £1,000 to £5,000, calling current litter levels a 'national embarrassment'. With fly-tipping incidents up 9% to 1.26m in 2024/25, it reflects deeper questions about civic responsibility and enforcement.

[Henry Smith @LordHenrySmith]

Yes the UK government could always make payments in pounds but you’ve highlighted the problem with the argument. When spending is too high, there are balance of payment issues and a loss of confidence in the currency then there might be a need to borrow in other currencies.
Argentina was a currency issuer but still defaulted because at some point that had to start borrowing other currencies