In defence of eating out

Scheduling the Budget almost four months after their election victory would have counted as a monumental misjudgment for the Labour government were it not for all the other cock-ups that turned their first 100 days into a sitcom. Still, the extended period of speculation about which taxes Rachel Reeves is really planning to raise has done no good at all to her carefully groomed reputation as a ‘serious economist’ (to quote Mark Carney) who is somehow uniquely pro-business and pro-worker. On the contrary, there have even been suggestions that she could be about to unleash chaos on the financial markets akin to the Truss-Kwarteng fiasco of two years ago.

But in essence it’s pretty obvious. Having sworn not to raise taxes on the earned incomes of ‘working people’, she must raise them on capital and unearned income, and from business. Pensions, savings, dividends, capital gains – everything the middle classes have always been encouraged to accumulate to secure their old age and help their offspring – are in her sights.