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"The free market as we know it cannot produce gender equality. This is the bold but authoritative argument of Vicky Pryce, the government's former economics chief. 'Women vs Capitalism' is a fresh and timely reminder that, although the #MeToo movement has been hugely important, empowerment of the mind will not achieve full power for women while there remains economic inequality. Pryce urgently calls for feminists to focus attention on this pressing issue: the pay gap, the glass ceiling, and the obstacles to women working at all. Only with government intervention in the labour market will these long-standing problems finally be conquered. From the gendered threat of robot labour to the lack of women in economics itself, this is a sharp look at an uncomfortable truth: we will not achieve equality for women in our society without radical changes to Western capitalism."

In March 2013, Vicky Pryce was sentenced to eight months in prison for accepting her ex-husband's penalty points on her driving licence some ten years earlier. After a very public trial, she was sent first to the notorious Holloway and then to East Sutton Park, an open prison in Kent. Inside, she kept a diary documenting her views and experiences; from this diary, Prisonomics was born. Faced with the realities of life behind bars and inspired by the stories of the women she met, Pryce began to research the injustices she found within the prison system. In this informed and important criti

As the economies in the West are facing the very real prospect of stagflation, we have seen a shift in thinking. As oil and gas prices are going through the roof following the Russian invasion of the Ukraine, energy security rather than net-zero has for the moment moved up on the agenda. Larry Summers the former US Treasury secretary in an interview for the BBC this week argued on the that any recessionary impact from those higher prices would be less hard than what we experienced due to Covid. He also thought that any worsening in this prognosis that might follow a decision at any point to cut Russia's ability to export oil and gas to the West would be worth it in the longer term as ' freedom has its price' and restoring world order was paramount.

This past weekend has seen one of the most chaotic periods for lorries trying to leave the UK for continental Europe- compounded by the misery for passengers trying to get away for the Easter break. There have been special factors of course. Disruptions to P&O services following their controversial decision to fire some 800 workers and replace them with cheaper agency workers from abroad has not helped. Services are meant to resume soon but regulatory approval is still being awaited. But the problem has been compounded by a Brexit systems failure, something that now feels almost inevitable as we transition from an era of virtually no checks at the border to one with a multitude of checks, even if the Trade and Cooperation Agreement between the UK and the EU managed to negotiate a tariff- free goods regime.

Dr Steven McCabe in his BCU Centre for Brexit Studies blog on Jan 5, outlined the issues ahead for 2022, including concerns about inflationary pressures building up. Later that day the British Chamber of Commerce (BCC) published a poll they carried out which showed that 58% of firms responding to the survey which was carried out between November 1 and November 22, intended to raise prices for customers, with only 1% planning to reduce them. This was a record percentage planning to raise process since that survey started though it must be pointed out that it was carried out before the extra strains caused by the Omicron variant started being felt and also before the interest rate increase by the Bank of England on December 12.

The government's ambitions for 'levelling up' are laudable. Last week's long awaited eponymous White Paper [i]featured 12 national missions that will be enshrined in law and with an number of targets to be met by 2030. It also included analysis of the challenges by Andy Haldane, the ex- chief economist of the Bank of England and now head of the RSA , who was seconded to the Cabinet office for this purpose.

There are numerous concerns about whether the recent rapid acceleration in inflation in recent months will put a break to the bounce-back of the world economy in 2022. In the UK the Bank of England just revised its forecast for this year to 3.75%, a sharp cut from the 5% they expected in the autumn[i]. Not only are workers being affected by a cost of living crisis, mainly as a result of higher world energy costs, but higher interest rates will also act as a dampener to growth. However there is extra dimension that will hang over any recovery, possibly limiting its growth – namely the level of accumulated debt, both public and private during the pandemic which may well prove even more of a challenge than the disruption caused by what is now the highest rate of inflation in 30 years.

The Bank of England in its latest forecasts that accompanied the Monetary Policy Committee's (MPC) decision to raise interest rates by a further quarter of a per cent in early May made grim reading, as was well documented by Steve McCabe in an earlier BCU blog. But are we paying enough attention to the causes? Yes, energy prices are an issue that all countries have to deal with. And yes, food price rises are a problem worldwide. But while inflation is thought to be near to peaking across the Eurozone and in the US, price pressures in the UK are instead expected to intensify. And the slowdown in growth that is expected in the next few months, culminating in an overall fall in GDP next year, is not in line with general trends elsewhere.

Amongst concerns about slowing growth prospects and with the war in Ukraine intensifying cost of living pressures, the extra day off for the Queens Platinum Jubilee has reignited the discussion over the economic costs of bank holidays. The worry is that economic output and productivity suffers. In this case of course two bank holidays together mean that the whole week may be lost for some sectors, like manufacturing and construction. Yes, retail and hospitality and tourism may gain but the rest of the economy loses as it is forced to shut down

With the Prime Minister's dramatic resignation this week, much in relation to economic policy is now put into suspense. When Boris Johnson appointed Nadhim Zahawi as his Chancellor mid-week to replace the departing Rishi Sunak, the talk was, momentarily at any rate, of a change in tax policy.

The OECD has calculated that after the bounce back and return to pre-pandemic levels there will be still a lot to sort out. Their estimates are that there will be scarring that is left when countries shake themselves off- not just in relation to high levels of debt that will have been accumulated and which will need to be addressed somehow but also because of the distortions created and the misallocation of resources during the pandemic that will need to be unwound . There have undoubtedly been unequal impact of the epidemic on different parts of society, regions and sectors and that could leave permanent scarring. And that could well be reflected in a lower growth of GDP per annum than would otherwise have been the case . But for the UK it will be worse than for its European counterparts according to the OECD because of Brexit. This will mean, if true, that the UK will have to run faster to catch up than others may have to do.

With the Bank of England MPC deciding in its August meeting that despite inflation likely to stay above target for a while monetary policy should remain ultra loose for the time being, that is good for prospects for the UK economy. On the assumption of easy monetary conditions continuing to exist the IMF in late July had already upped its UK GDP forecast by most of all advanced nations to 7.0% for 2021 after a nearly 10% drop in 2020. But where is Europe going? It matters because, even though we have had the odd month since the turn of the year when we imported more from China than from Germany, the EU as a whole is still the UK's major trading partner, and will remain that for years to come . And this despite a busy Department of Trade signing as many Free Trade Agreements as it can with other nations and regions – some rollovers of previous EU deals that had to be renegotiated once the UK left the region's and some new.

Is the economic slowdown that we are seeing after the initial bouncebackable a worrying sign for the UK economy? Growth slowed down to 0.8% in May from 2 % in April according to official ONS statistics, despite the easing of restrictions on the month. This was due mainly to shortages of inputs into the manufacturing sector affecting industrial production. This may have been a temporary effect. But the June output surveys also show that authoring the further opening up of the economy meant the overall picture remains a positive one, the pace of overall economy output growth also slowed with June composite PMIs below those in May. And footfall data and latest retail sales also indicate that recent exuberance when pubs opened up indoors too has faded away somewhat. The run up to the football Euro final has helped but these bounces are never sustainable. The further easing in mid July should help but the rises in Covid cases and the confusion that exists in relation to isolation and returns from overseas trips is still bedevilling the industry and could dent consumer confidence causing serious concerned about the sustainability of the economy particularly . And it is quite likely that post Brexit issues which have been a drag on growth for some time will eventually become more pronounced.

We should be rejoicing that the worst of the pandemic seems to be over. Yes, cases are rising again but hospitalizations and deaths have up to a point become de-linked from case numbers as the people now infected tend to be the younger generation with fewer chances of complications developing to this age group. And the economy has bounced back. It is true that the pace of growth seems to be slowing down and consumers appear a bit more concerned about the future but at least the economy has picked up from the depths it had reached in mid 2020 and is now just over 2% below pre pandemic levels.