Resolution Foundation Podcasts

Britain is in relative decline, as productivity and wages stagnate. This reflects a decade of shocks but also a longer lasting problem – Britain has spent recent decades living off its past rather than investing in its future. In both public and private investment the UK consistently lags behind its international peers, leaving British workers with less kit to work with, and fewer British firms competing at the cutting edge. Ensuring firms want to invest, and making sure they are able to do so, is therefore fundamental to our hopes of an economic revival. Both main parties recognise this task, but their focus on changes to corporation tax or promises of a more stable period of government are unlikely to deliver the scale of change required. Why are so many firms reluctant to invest in their, and Britain’s, future? Are firms held back because returns on investment are low, or because finance is unavailable? What reforms – from corporate governance to pensions, taxation and planning – might move the dial? And i