Rolling coverage of the latest economic and financial news, as economist warns OBR productivity forecasts are much too optimisticIFS warns of Labour and Tory ‘conspiracy of silence’ over future tax and spending plans‘We deserve better’: what the papers say about Jeremy Hunt’s pre-election budgetResolution Foundation are presenting their analysis of the budget now.Their CEO, Torsten Bell, begins by saying it was inevitable that we’d get tax cuts yesterday, as it was a pre-election budget (although he doesn’t believe we’ll go to the polls as early as May).An extra 2p cut in the basic rate of NI takes it to its lowest level since the 1980s in April, handing workers gains of up to £750 next year (2024-25) with 78 per cent going to the top half of the household income distribution.This will be partially offset by the latest set of threshold freezes this April, leaving the majority (79 per cent) of employees paying less tax as a result. Gains will average £450, with the largest net tax cuts going to those earning £50,000 (who will gain £1,200) while taxpayers earning £19,000 or less will be worse off, losing more from threshold freezes than they gain from rate cuts. Continue reading...