In this week’s IEA Podcast, Director General Lord Daniel Hannan is joined by regulars Dr Christopher Snowdon, Head of Lifestyle Economics, and Dr Kristian Niemietz, Editorial Director, to discuss the widening pay gap between the public and private sectors, the real cost of net zero, and the economics of gambling sponsorship in football.
The panel opens with new earnings figures showing public sector pay rising faster than private sector pay, and examines how the Employment Rights Act has added hidden costs for employers that are being absorbed through slower wage growth rather than paid openly. They discuss why the number of people on the Government payroll has grown substantially over the past decade despite falling public sector productivity, and debate whether a smaller, leaner state might actually work harder. The conversation then turns to net zero, looking at new research on the costs it adds to household energy bills, before moving to a lighter discussion of gambling sponsorship in football, the economics of banning adverts for so-called sin industries, and what snooker’s history with tobacco sponsorship reveals about unintended consequences.
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