Husband of @lisgalvis, father of Emilio. Director (Data & Modelling) at Public First. 🇬🇧🇨🇴
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Articles by Scott Corfe
Fairer, warmer, cheaper: New energy bill support policies to support British households in an age of high prices
The current system of policies supporting households with high energy bills is inadequate for an era of high energy bills. In this final, report with Public First, we present a new policy framework that should be in place by spring 2024 – to ensure warmer homes, fairer use of public money, and overall cheaper bills. It is part of a wider project commissioned and supported by Citizens Advice. What should energy bill relief do?
Squeezed out or opting out? Understanding ethnic differences in use of financial products and services
Published: 06 February 2023 The ethnic minority gap in financial products such as pensions and insurance is well-documented, but poorly understood. Drawing on existing and new survey data, and in-depth interviews, this report seeks to understand the scale of this gap, and possible explanations behind it, as well as proposing recommendations to policymakers and the industry on how to reduce the risk of disadvantage faced by ethnic minorities.
Did the pandemic change the way we shop? — Public First - Data
For the most part, it seems not. Groceries are an exception. The Covid-19 pandemic - with the social distancing and lockdowns it brought on - saw Brits shop online like never before. At the peak of our internet shopping frenzy, in January 2021, almost two fifths of retail sales (37.8%) in the UK were online, almost double what it was in January 2020 (20.2%). Internet Retail Sales as a percentage of total sales Source: ONS And there were signs that this change in shopping patterns would stick.
Energy bill support – designing policies to support British households in an age of high price - Social Market Foundation.
Published: 01 December 2022 Energy bills are expected to remain high for several more years, and are a reminder that we do not have durable and considered bill policies at a UK level. In this join interim report, we set out a series of choices and challenges around the future of energy bill policy. It is part of a wider project commissioned and supported by Citizens Advice.
Let's talk about Towns: Building a better understanding of town vitality
Published: 22 September 2022 Towns, less populous than cities, often fall by the wayside in policy discourse – particularly when it comes to conversations about the economy. We’ve developed the first-of-its-kind Town Vitality Report, looking at what kind of policy focus is needed to unlock the potential of the different kinds of towns across the UK.
Childcare costs and poverty
Childcare costs are contributing to poverty. Government needs to act. The SMF recently launched a cross-party Commission on Childcare, supported by John Penrose MP and Siobhain McDonagh MP. Through engagement with expert stakeholders, and new research, we want to provide policy solutions to reduce childcare costs in the UK, which are among the most expensive in the world.
Banking on access: Ensuring access to banking in a digital age
The shift towards digital banking, accelerated by the pandemic, creates many opportunities and offers benefits for the economy as a whole – but also brings with it some risks. This report explores future access to retail banking services, and the best way to ensure any such changes take place fairly and sustainably, and no one is left behind. KEY POINTS The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated change in how we bank.
Miles Ahead: Road pricing as a fairer form of motoring taxation
As we transition towards electric vehicles that don’t incur fuel duty, the Treasury faces a revenue loss of £30bn each year. Given the unpopularity of fuel duty, this report explores the case for introducing a nationwide road pricing system in the UK – setting out a model that is fairer than fuel duty, replaces lost tax revenue, and reduces the burden on low-income households.
Financial services and net zero: Seizing the opportunity
This briefing explores the role of financial services in decarbonising the UK economy. Looking at the exports and jobs opportunities that could arise from the UK capitalising on its comparative advantage in green financial services, the paper calls on policymakers to ensure that financial services can provide the capital needed for British industries to reach net zero. Key Points A high share of “green jobs” are and will be in the professional services sector.
A Guiding Hand: Improving access to pensions advice and guidance
Published: 23 February 2022 This report calls on the Government to improve access to and quality of pensions advice and guidance to reduce the risk of financial harm caused by under-saving as well as sub-optimal decisions made at the point of decumulating a pension pot. Although auto-enrolment has increased the rates of pensions participation, people remain far from being able to achieve their desired standard of later life living.
Banking on change: Expanding the role of banks and building societies in supporting financial resilience
This briefing paper explores the role that banks and building societies can play in bolstering financial resilience and improving outcomes for vulnerable customers. It calls for financial institutions to be made to compete with each other on providing quality financial wellbeing services, and ultimately empower customers. The pandemic has seen already substantial gaps in financial resilience widen.
Treating and preventing adolescent obesity
Published: 13 December 2021 Author(s): Scott Corfe, Jake Shepherd, Linus Pardoe This briefing paper examines adolescent obesity in Britain. It explores trends in obesity rates, their drivers and policy options for improving adolescent health outcomes and reducing the substantial societal costs of adolescent obesity and its frequent persistence into adulthood. KEY POINTS Obesity rates in England have increased significantly since the mid-1990s.
The Retirement Housing Dividend: Exploring the case for an expansion of retirement housing in the UK
This provocation paper explores the case for an expansion of retirement housing in the UK. It demonstrates that specialist retirement housing brings with it a range of benefits to government, retirees and wider society. This “retirement housing dividend” should be quantified and considered by policymakers, and embedded into local strategies. KEY POINTS Expanding retirement housing could generate a societal “retirement housing dividend” through a range of channels.
Gendered experiences of obesity: Narrowing gender gaps in prevention and treatment
Published: 23 November 2021 Author(s): Scott Corfe, Jake Shepherd This report explores gendered experiences of obesity in the UK , examining how obesity rates differ between men and women, the drivers of these trends and the extent to which policy aimed at reducing obesity rates needs to be gender specific. The key findings of our research are outlined below. Trends in obesity rates among men and women In England, the obesity rate is slightly higher for women (29%) than for men (27%).
Road to ruin? Public attitudes towards road pricing as an alternative to the current fuel duty regime
Published: 15 October 2021 The UK's transition to electric vehicles is expected to result in billions of pounds of lost revenue for the Exchequer, raising questions about what system of taxation should replace existing motor taxes. This briefing sets out new public opinion data on one - often deemed controversial - solution: road-pricing. Key findings More people support than oppose road-pricing as a replacement for fuel duty. This holds true across income groups and regions.
Baby bust and baby boom: Examining the liberal case for pronatalism
Published: 20 September 2021 This briefing paper considers the liberal case for explicitly ‘pronatalist’ policies that aim to increase the birth rate in the UK. 28% of countries have adopted explicitly pronatalist measures, seeking to avert the economic and societal costs of potential population decline and ageing. Should the UK join them? Birth rates in Britain are on the decline.
Guaranteeing a rapid recovery
This briefing paper explores how innovative solutions can help to secure a rapid economic recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic, regarding both jobs and financial resilience. The paper draws on findings emerging from the Rapid Recovery Challenge, a £3 million challenge prize that set out to find innovative tools and services that could support people with jobs and money in response to the COVID-19 crisis.
Zeroing in: Net Zero disruption and opportunity at a local level
As part of this research, we have created Opportunity and Disruption Indices, which rank the impact of the Net Zero transition across local authorities in England, Scotland and Wales based on a range of sub-measures. These two indices are also combined to categorise each local authority as either a high/low opportunity and high/low disruption area. You can search interactive versions of the indices and maps below.
Getting the green light: achieving sustainability at a local level
Local authorities and the private sector have significant scope and influence to help the UK decarbonise on a local level. This briefing, based on an expert roundtable supported by DAC Beachcroft, assesses what role councils and businesses can play in reaching Net Zero and makes a series of recommendations for financing and delivering vital net zero projects in our communities. Key points The built environment accounts for about 40% of the country’s total carbon footprint.
A matter of perspective? Outlook inequality and its impact on young people
Published: 07 July 2021 Author(s): Scott Corfe, Aveek Bhattacharya This report explores young people’s “outlook” in the UK, and the role of outlook in shaping life outcomes. Drawing on new survey data and interviews with 16-25 year olds from relatively disadvantaged family backgrounds, it identifies a significant “outlook inequality” amongst young people, worsening since the Global Financial Crisis and further deepened by COVID-19.
Firing up the post-COVID economy: How to be “pro-business” in the 2020s
Publication Published: 08 June 2021 Author(s): Richard Hyde, Scott Corfe The UK’s economic model has displayed numerous shortcomings for many years. It is time for a new approach. This briefing sets out why a social market-based pro-enterprise agenda is the strongest foundation for a successful and sustained post-Brexit and post-pandemic economy that is also able to weather the headwinds of technological change.
Banking and competition in the UK economy
Published: 10 May 2021 Author(s): Scott Corfe, Aveek Bhattacharya, Richard Hyde This report explores the state of competition in the UK economy, and the extent to which supposedly competitive markets are delivering good outcomes for customers, with a particular focus on the retail banking sector. It sets out a range of policy recommendations for enhancing competition in the banking sector and the UK economy more broadly.
A stake in success: Employee share ownership and the post-COVID economy
This report sets out the case for an expansion of employee share ownership in the UK, and for the share ownership agenda to form a key part of a “fair and strong economic recovery” narrative as we emerge from the Coronavirus crisis. Evidence suggests that employee share ownership could play a role in tackling the UK’s productivity crisis, improving economic growth, innovation and outcomes for employees such as higher wages.
London coronavirus economy tracker - April 2021
Published: 22 April 2021 Author(s): Amy Norman, Scott Corfe This report, the fifth in a series commissioned by Peabody, updates our analysis of the impact of COVID-19 on London's economy. It explores the latest timely data on economic outcomes to produce an as up-to-date picture as possible. The latest claimant count data show unemployment increasing in both London and the UK as a whole, with a more rapid increase in the capital.
Double or nothing? Assessing the economic impact of gambling
This report explores the economic footprint of the entire gambling industry and its sub-sectors, and considers the extent to which the “economic defence” of business as usual stands up to scrutiny. The aim of this research is to inform and broaden the debate surrounding the Government’s review of the 2005 Gambling Act, given the prevalence of economic arguments in the policy debate surrounding future reform.
(Adult) education | Think Tank Report | Smart Thinking
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(Adult) education, education, education
Published: 12 November 2020 Author(s): Aveek Bhattacharya, Scott Corfe, Amy Norman Funding for adult education (excluding apprenticeships) has nearly halved since 2009/10. Participation rates have suffered similarly, seeing a 49% decline since 2004. As Britain faces up to the growing COVID unemployment crisis, remedying the decline in funding and provision of skills and training will be essential for helping workers back into good jobs.
SMF Monthly | Savings auto-enrolment: an answer to the financial resilience crisis?
Monthly Briefing October update It is neither sensible nor tasteful to look for positives in a pandemic that has killed tens of thousands of our compatriots and will leave hundreds of thousands more people short of money and work. But change brings opportunity, and COVID-19, which has already changed so much, should lead to more change still.
Funding fibre
Marketing PermissionsSmart Thinking will use the information you provide on this form to send you newsletters, occasional company updates and event invites. Please confirm that you are happy for us to contact you in this way Email You can change your mind at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the footer of any email you receive from us, or by contacting us at [email protected] We will treat your information with respect.
Alcohol-free and low-strength drinks: understanding their role in reducing alcohol-related harms
Published: 08 September 2020 The UK Government has outlined its interest in how alcohol-free and low-strength drinks - "NoLo" - might improve public health outcomes. Evidence presented in this report finds that whilst NoLo products may help individuals reduce their consumption, NoLo drinks are unlikely to produce the aggregate level reductions in alcohol-related harms public health experts would desire.
A new life for the high street
COVID-19 is catalysing changes to our working and consumer habits. This is likely to have a significant impact on town and city centres. Rather than letting our high streets fade into obscurity, politicians can create an ambitious vision of repurposed urban space and reinvigorated communities. Key points Emerging evidence suggests that lockdown will change consumer and business behaviour on a long-lasting basis, with a permanent shift to homeworking and digital retail.
Intergenerational fairness in the coronavirus economy
This briefing paper, written by Research Director, Scott Corfe, discusses the need for the economic costs of responding to the coronavirus pandemic to be shared fairly across the generations. Key points The economic cost of tackling coronavirus will fall heavily on those of working age especially in terms of redundancies and lost income. Public sector net borrowing could rise above £200bn per year – higher than that seen in the financial crisis.
Pour Decisions: The case for reforming alcohol duty
Published: 06 September 2019 This report explores the case for reforming alcohol duty in the United Kingdom, and the principles which should underpin a new, improved alcohol duty regime. This includes consideration of alcohol duty reforms that could be implemented following Brexit.
Falling off a Cliff
Published: 22 August 2019 The Social Market Foundation’s 2017 report Living on the Edge highlighted the significant economic and social challenges facing Britain’s coastal communities. Low pay, lacklustre economic growth, bad health and poor educational outcomes were found to be issues dogging many seaside communities. Building on Living on the Edge, this SMF briefing note provides an update on the state of Britain’s coastal communities.
SMF Monthly Briefing - July
Dear colleague, Foreword from the Director of the SMF, James Kirkup. We sometimes talk about Westminster as a place of “national debate”. In truth, our national debate misses out many issues – and people – entirely. For hundreds of thousands of people, most of them poorer than average, Further Education can be a vital route to skills and qualifications. Yet FE budgets have been slashed, staff are deserting and its leadership lacks support.
Working hard or hardly a working week
This is originally from the Progress Daily Email. If you like what you see and would like to sign up to receive it, click here. The Democratic Unionist party has accused Theresa May of preparing to renege on her promise not to allow for a border in the Irish sea as party of a Brexit transition.
A Farage in every country
This is originally from the Progress Daily Email. If you like what you see and would like to sign up to receive it, click here. There is now ‘a Farage in every country’. It’s a horrifying thought, isn’t it? The EU’s Brexit negotiator Michel Barnier made that claim today, suggesting we all live on a dystopian continent full populist tinpot demagogues, threatening the existence of the European Union itself. Which, to be honest, had not passed me by.
Rise of leisure society: how could a four-day week work?
A four or three-day working week could become the norm for full-time workers over the coming decades, writes Scott Corfe In his essay, Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren, the great economist John Maynard Keynes presented us with a compelling vision of the future – one in which we would increasingly become a leisure society in which hours worked dwindled as technological progress enabled us to achieve more in a shorter space of time.
Market competition bulletin 2018
This SMF report presents new estimates of industry concentration in consumer markets, exploring the extent to which markets are dominated by a small number of large businesses. It also assesses whether consumer outcomes are improving and deteriorating in markets where there have been notable changes in industry concentration.
The impact of Insurance Premium Tax on UK households
Insurance Premium Tax (IPT) – covering most general insurance – has increased substantially since its inception in 1994. In particular, since 2011 IPT has climbed rapidly as policymakers have sought additional revenue to reduce the deficit in the public finances. At present the standard rate of IPT stands at 12%, about five times its initial rate of 2.5%. IPT now raises more revenue than beer & cider duties, wine duties and spirits duties.
Concentration, not competition: the state of UK consumer markets
Published: 02 October 2017 The UK’s economic status quo is at a critical juncture. Faith in a largely “free market” settlement is increasingly in doubt, as household incomes are squeezed and many fail to see economic growth translating into an improvement in their day-to-day lives.
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