Blog
Levelling-up from the ground up
Helping neighbourhoods thrive means giving communities ownership of the buildings and spaces around them

By
Rose Grayston
20 September 2021

Depending on where you live in England, there can be huge differences in your quality of life. This is down to some areas’ economic decline and low incomes, but also poor urban planning and underinvestment in social infrastructure. This government has made ​‘levelling-up’ deprived areas a central part of this mission, but we haven’t yet seen any concrete plans for how

Blog
Reshaping finance for a green recovery
An open Letter to the Governor of the Bank of England

By
Lukasz Krebel, Frank van Lerven
17 September 2021

More than 50 MPs and peers from across Britain’s main political parties have called on the Bank of England and Treasury to coordinate their activities and seize the unprecedented opportunity to reshape finance and support a​‘build back better’ recovery. Their move was prompted by NEF research with Positive Money and academics. In a letter to the governor of the Bank of

Blog
Living standards face a perfect storm
2.5 million households will be hit by both universal credit cuts and national insurance increases

By
Sarah Arnold
16 September 2021

It is a worrying time for many UK households. Living costs are on the rise: food costs are soaring and energy bills are set to jump 12% from October. Meanwhile, many of those on particularly low incomes – five million families were on universal credit at the most recent count – are receiving text messages or emails that their support will be cut by up to £1,040 a year from

Publications
Greening public finance
The UK’s public finance ecosystem and the net zero transition

By
Laurie Macfarlane, Chaitanya Kumar
09 September 2021

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Achieving the UK’s goal of reaching ​‘net zero’ emissions by 2050 will require far-reaching changes to transform the UK economy and put it on a more sustainable path. Greening the finance system is a key part of this transition. While aligning the private financial sector with the UK’s

Publications
Greening central banking
Publications and media coverage

29 July 2021

NEF publications (March 2020 to March 2021)
Decarbonising the Bank of England’s Pandemic QE: Perfectly SensibleDecarbonising is easy: Beyond market neutrality in the ECB’s corporate QEGreening the Eurosystem collateral framework: How to decarbonise the ECB’s monetary policyThe European Central Bank and Climate Change: Five steps towards a sustainable recoveryBuilding a green stimulus for covid-19: A recovery plan for a greener, fairer futureExternal publications
Journal of Ecological Economics Finance: Climate-change

Publications
A Frequent Flyer Levy
Sharing aviation’s carbon budget in a net-zero world

By
Alex Chapman, Leo Murray, Griffin Carpenter, Christiane Heisse, Lydia Prieg
10 July 2021

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Why demand for aviation must be capped
Responding to the Paris Climate Agreement to limit warming to 1.5oC, the UK government passed into law in 2019 a commitment to deliver net zero greenhouse gas (GHG)

Podcasts
Weekly Economics Podcast: A climate conversation between two generations
Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by Ann Pettifor and Izzy Warren

By
Ayeisha Thomas-Smith
09 July 2021

With the COP26 global climate conference coming up later this year, we’re going to spend five episodes this series looking at some of the biggest climate issues. We kicked things off last week with Alice Bell explaining everything you need to know about greenwashing. This week the conversation is about the climate movement with activists from two generations.
The

Publications
The New Economics Zine
Issue 3: What world do we want to return to?

09 July 2021

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16 months after the UK went into its first lockdown, some things haven’t changed. The government is still obsessed with the size of the public debt and trying to push through fossil fuel infrastructure projects. It doesn’t seem likely that we’ll be stepping into a new world come autumn – but perhaps the pandemic has supercharged shifts that have been happening slowly for some time. 
There have been some moves in the right

Publications
We can win a decent standard of living for everyone
Introducing the Living Income campaign.

17 June 2021

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A Living Income sets a level below which no one can fall, so we can all survive and thrive.
In these uncertain times, we should all be able to afford the basics for a decent quality of life, whether in or out of work.
By fixing our broken social security system and creating new universal payments, a Living Income will guarantee a sufficient minimum income for all.
This pamphlet introduces the Living Income campaign. Visit the

Publications
The Croydon Climate Crisis Commission Report
The transition to net zero

28 May 2021

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The clock is ticking on climate change and our ability to stem the worst impacts of a warming world. As we recover from the Covid-19 pandemic, we need to ensure that we are building an economy fit for the future. In the transition to zero carbon we need to be mindful that we are designing an economy that is fair and just, providing good quality jobs, improving wellbeing, and reducing inequality for people in our communities.
As a large urban borough of

Blog
Survey: Tell us how Covid-19 has affected your income
Take our three-minute survey – and then share it with family and friends.

12 April 2021

The past year has shown that if you lose your job or are trapped in low-paid work, Britain’s broken social security system won’t protect you from poverty. NEF is planning a living income campaign to make sure everyone has enough to make ends meet.
The first step towards this is better understanding the problem, and finding out the solutions people want. So, we’re inviting you to share your experiences of how Covid-19 has affected you and your income.
In Britain, one of the richest

Blog
NEF’s 2020 reading list
A reading list of some of our most interesting work from this year, for you to digest over the festive season

28 December 2020

We’re really proud of the work that NEF has done this year, often in really challenging conditions. With this in mind, we have collated a reading list of some of our most important and interesting work, for you to digest over the festive season. From the surge in union membership this year to the impact of neoliberalism on our mental health, we hope you enjoy this selection of NEF work.
A safety net for allLockdown and the pandemic have pushed record numbers of people onto

Publications
NEF review of the year 2020
Highlights from the last 12 months

21 December 2020

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We are excited to present NEF’s Review of the Year – an overview of everything we’ve been working on during this challenging year. In it you can read about the three ways we’ve responded to the crisis: emergency response, supporting communities and Build Back Better. Here are some highlights we are particularly proud of: 
1. Winter plan for jobs, incomes and communities
In November, we launched the Winter plan for jobs, incomes and communities as part of

Publications
Winter plan for jobs, incomes and communities
How to ensure that everyone has enough to live on through the crisis and create good jobs that protect our planet.

23 November 2020

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Coronavirus has upturned our lives and this winter is set to be the most challenging chapter of the crisis yet. If left unchecked, the virus will overwhelm our National Health Service and cause untold death and suffering. But it will also wreck the economy, as people become too afraid to travel, work or socialise for fear of their own safety, and that of their family and community.
The

Blog
Bank of England needs more powers to decarbonise economy, say experts
Economists call for changes to Bank’s mandate to help UK hit carbon zero target

19 November 2020

NEF and Positive Money convened a joint letter, signed by more than 125 economists, to respond to the chancellor’s plans for greening finance. The letter was covered in the Guardian and the Financial Times.
Dear Chancellor,
We welcome your ambition to position the UK at the forefront of green finance. Faced with a dual emergency of the coronavirus pandemic and the climate crisis, the financial sector has a crucial role to play in supporting a resilient and sustainable recovery. A

Publications
The New Economics Zine
Issue 2: Is our economy making us sick?

10 October 2020

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Welcome to the second issue of the New Economics Zine, launched on World Mental Health Day. In this issue, we’re digging into what the economy has to do with our mental health. 
Mental health has never been discussed more widely, and yet mental health issues are on the rise. It will come as little surprise that the pandemic has made existing health inequalities worse — poor housing and employment conditions, unreliable wages and high levels of debt all have a detrimental impact on our

Podcasts
Weekly Economics Podcast: Building a caring economy
Ayeisha Thomas-Smith is joined by NEF’s Sarah Arnold, Marion Sharples from the Women’s Budget Group and City University’s Jo Littler.

09 October 2020

“We want to build back greener as we recover from Covid-19” — that was the message this week at the Prime Minister’s Conservative Party Conference speech. But in all the talk of wind turbines and technology, the place of care in our economic recovery didn’t really get a look in.
Why is care often so overlooked when we think about the economy? And how would our lives change if we put care at the centre of our economic decisions?
Ayeisha is

Coverage
NEF in the news, July
Media coverage of the New Economics Foundation

09 July 2020

The chancellor’s economic statement on the UK’s post-pandemic recovery Miatta Fahnbulleh appeared on BBC News, Sky News, BBC 2 Politics Live and BBC Radio 4 to talk about the mini-Budget and lay out what the government should do to protect and create jobs in its recovery plans. 
A green stimulus for Covid-19NEF’s report on tackling the unemployment crisis with green investment was covered in the Guardian, mentioned in Guardian analysis of the mini-Budget, the Metro Business Briefing and the Sun.
Rishi Sunak to create thousands of ​‘green jobs’ in new £3bn

Press Releases
Chancellor’s annoucements a step in the right direction but not at scale needed tackle the crisis
NEF responds to the Chancellor’s economic update

08 July 2020

Miatta Fahnbulleh, Chief Executive of the New Economics Foundation said:​“The Government is taking steps in the right direction. There is a new consensus emerging that says we don’t just want to get back to the old normal where we had living standards stagnant for a decade, zero-hours jobs and inequality but we want to build back better.

“To do that Government is going to have to take bold and decisive action. We need a green investment closer to £28bn than to £3bn- almost ten

Press Releases
National house retrofit programme could save families over £400 per year and create 500,000 jobs
Four-year programme would create a new National Retrofitting taskforce to oversee investment of over £100 billion to retrofit nearly 9 million homes

07 July 2020

A plan to retrofit 8.7 million homes by 2023/​24 could create over 500,000 new jobs, reduce household carbon emissions by 21% (19.23 MtCO2/​year) by 2023/​24 and cut household bills by an average of £418, according to new research published by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) today. A plan of this scale would constitute the largest infrastructure project the UK has seen ­–

Press Releases
Unemployment set to be above 2 million by Christmas 2021 without further government action
Investing £28.3 billion in quick-to-deploy green infrastructure projects could create more than 400,000, full-time equivalent jobs by December 2021

06 July 2020

The
level of unemployment is likely to be at least 2.2 million (6.4%) by
December
2021, without further support for the economy, according to new analysis
by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) published today. This would put
the level of unemployment 900,000 higher in 2021 compared with 2019.
The report includes a detailed analysis of the range of possible opportunities in zero-carbon

Coverage
NEF in the news, June 2020
Media coverage of the New Economics Foundation

30 June 2020

PM needs a ​“proper plan” protecting public services and tackling inequality and climate changeMiatta went on Sky News to talk about the Build Back Better campaign. 
Just 6% of UK public ​‘want a return to pre-pandemic economy’Polling commissioned by NEF for the launch of Build Back Better showing public support for a fairer economy after Covid-19 was covered in the Guardian, Sky News and the Daily Mirror. 
England’s independence day from lockdownMiatta appeared on the Guardian Politics Weekly podcast to discuss what’s next for the UK economy after

Press Releases
Government should cover 100% of nursery staff wages to protect the childcare sector from collapse
Government intervention in childcare through national fund could avoid mass redundancies in the struggling sector

26 June 2020

The government should protect the childcare sector during the Covid-19 crisis by covering 100% of nursery staff wages through a Childcare Infrastructure Fund, according to a new report from the New Economics Foundation (NEF). The report finds that without government intervention the childcare sector will face mass redundancies.
The report recommends that the government replace the 30 free hours of childcare