Tomorrow's Business Today
A budget day like no other
Normally newsrooms on Budget Day are a flurry of activity. There is quite a lot of pressure on; it is tense.
I think Budgets are usually a let down which have far more to do with politics than business or the economy, but that’s an aside.
This year, Wednesday, will be different for two reasons.
1) I’ve never seen a budget more leaked in advance than this one.
2) We’re not in the office, obviously.
The big fear on Budget Day for City Editors is that they miss something big and obvious.
That they open the next day’s papers to see that every other publication figured out that the Chancellor’s move on X has a massive impact on industry Y.
And that they did not.
Normally, we’d have accountants on hand, typically in the office, running through the small print to explain nuances and reduce the chances of a blunder. This year we are on our own.
So I think the appetite for really clever stuff pointing out the clause buried on page 258 is as high as ever.
And that we won’t mind having the bleedin’ obvious told to us either, just for safety’s sake.
Budget Day is always a chance for a new media star to be born; for the smart analyst at the small advisory firm to really show what they are made of…
Go for it.
Press release of the day
A child born today would need £85,000 to a pay a 10% house deposit at age 25 if price growth continues on trend, says this from AJ Bell.
The release introduces a new word – to me, anyway – the “quarantennial”.
“Quarantennials will look back with anger on government policies of the last ten years, which have repeatedly thrown fuel on the fire of a booming housing market,” we are told.
Good topic.
