Britain, it’s painfully obvious, is getting poorer. Growth is failing. Incomes are stagnant. And with that lives, opportunities and ambitions. But what few people realise is that growth is failing right here in London. The city is falling behind its rivals with lagging productivity. This isn’t just the Brexit-hit to its service economy. London is lagging because growth is being strangled.
The entire system is broken, maintaining stagnation with thousands of vetoes. Instead of a real Mayor with the power and instruments to power up the economy, we’ve got a hamstrung one who ends up being largely symbolic. And that’s by design. The way London works is that councils hold lots of economic power — from planning and permitting to licensing — but aren’t responsible for the economy they operate in, or benefit from any rewards by growing it. This means they have the worst incentive structure possible for growth. Which is to throttle it and keep things the same for activist (read Nimby) local residents.
