Dillon Wamsley

Placing the power to set the rates of interest & unemployment in the hands of an independent body whose regional branches are run by bankers and whose top job is held by exceptionally conservative and Wall Street-friendly technocrats has been a 𝘬𝘦𝘺 𝘱𝘪𝘭𝘭𝘢𝘳 𝘰𝘧 𝘤𝘪𝘷𝘪𝘭 𝘰𝘭𝘪𝘨𝘢𝘳𝘤𝘩𝘺 in the United States. 1/2

How not to talk about capitalism The more it penetrates our daily lives, the less we seem to understand the “system that runs the world”

How not to talk about capitalism

The more it penetrates our daily lives, the less we seem to understand the “system that runs the world”

By Dominik Leusder

This is a very interesting piece, both in terms of its analysis of the Truss government and its implications for how we think about the politics of depoliticisation today.

When neoliberalism meets technocracy: intra-elite conflict and the realignment of Britain’s macroeconomic regime under Liz Truss This article offers a new account of Liz Truss’s premiership by analysing the political economy of the 2022 mini-Budget crisis. Engaging with literature on depoliticisation, statecraft, and the Cit...

More here: doi.org/10.1080/1356...

Without denying the enhanced power of bond markets in the UK’s current economic context, this shows how it is also the institutional arrangements around economic policymaking — which are not subject to iron economic laws — that shape fiscal space.

2) the institutionalised market sensitivity baked into UK macroeconomic policy, in large part from an over-reliance on speculative OBR forecasts and continually adjusted estimates of fiscal headroom based on arbitrary fiscal rules.

The Budget and bond markets: ‘when you’re in a hole, stop digging’ | Institute for Fiscal Studies Against a challenging backdrop, the Budget will be a key moment to announce measures needed to maintain and bolster bond market confidence.

More on that in this IFS report: ifs.org.uk/publications...

Not mentioned is: 1) how QT and the Bank’s discretionary decision to aggressively downsize its balance sheet amplifies the power of bond vigilantes. This has led to a shifting demand base of gilts toward private and more price-sensitive investors needed to absorb increased supply.

The Bank of England is misusing its fiscal powers Unwinding QE must not be allowed to tie the hands of Government

In presenting a story of the Labour gov’t vs. bond vigilantes, it overlooks the amplifying effects (and power) of the Bank of England, and the UK’s macroeconomic regime, in mediating the power of bond vigilantes. www.ft.com/content/5209...

Meet the bond market vigilantes Governments are now at the mercy of unseen investors

Good read from @willdunn.bsky.social in @newstatesman1913.bsky.social, especially this on trader views of the (lack of) credibility of the Labour gvm’t: ‘there is no plan, there is no vision, and they’re not going to succeed because they don’t have the talent’ But two things are missing🧵

Extraction w/ Thea Riofrancos Featuring Thea Riofrancos on Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism. The green energy transition requires a vast array of inputs: copper, cobalt, rare earth elements, and the focus of this disc...

Pleased to post this new Dig ep w/ my partner in all things @triofrancos.bsky.social on her beautiful book Extraction: The Frontiers of Green Capitalism. We go from Chile to Nevada, from dawn of colonialism to geoeconomic conflict between the US and China—and more www.thedigradio.com/podcast/extr...

📝 Don't miss this article from the current issue of #BJPIR

'Reframing centre-left neoliberalism: New Keynesian theory, Third Way ideology, and the construction of an elite consensus in the US, Britain, and Australia' by Brent Toye & @dillonwamsley.bsky.social

🔗 buff.ly/62G4GAB

Martijn Konings, Fiscal Dominance? — Sidecar Trump and the Federal Reserve.

New piece about MAGA's Fed strategy:

newleftreview.org/sidecar/post...

Recommended alongside this in @lrb.co.uk: bsky.app/profile/lrb....

In response to Truss’s challenge to their autonomy, I argue that key institutions realigned as part of a ’Bank-Treasury-OBR’ nexus around a conservative macroeconomic consensus, ultimately playing a key role in Truss’s downfall.

Beyond Truss incompetence and bond vigilantism, the article highlights the Truss moment as a key shift in the UK macroeconomic regime.

It offers a heterodox take on the Truss government, framing the mini-Budget crisis as a moment of intra-elite conflict between Truss’s neoliberal project and depoliticised institutions in the British state.

When neoliberalism meets technocracy: intra-elite conflict and the realignment of Britain’s macroeconomic regime under Liz Truss This article offers a new account of Liz Truss’s premiership by analysing the political economy of the 2022 mini-Budget crisis. Engaging with literature on depoliticisation, statecraft, and the Cit...

My new article on everyone’s favourite PM, Liz Truss, is out in New Political Economy 🧵

Bank of England’s Andrew Bailey says QE will offset its costs in long term Bank governor responds to investors and politicians after value of its holdings of UK government bonds fell

BoE rolls out new defence of QE-QT, stressing low costs for long-maturity debt in QE decade. But it's drawing arbitrary boundaries: analysis (APF Q3 Rept) fails to note that BoE conditioned QE on HMT accepting gilt issue limits, part of causal chain to catastrophic austerity. on.ft.com/3JY23EM

Keir Starmer puts Labour MPs on notice for Budget tax rises Prime minister declines to rule out higher income taxes as Treasury lays foundations for bigger fiscal buffer

Labour government preparing to hike income taxes - blaming bond markets.

not one adult in the room will say the obvious:

1. Britain's fiscal rules are shambles
2. Bank of England has too much power over fiscal decisions
3. ignore bond vigilantes

www.ft.com/content/5c8f...

Paying for It | David I. Backer Should Zohran Mamdani become the next mayor of New York City, he will be restricted by the municipal bond market.

“There are entire ruling class industries on the market side…and committees and subcommittees and consultants on the government side, working hand in hand that take in billions of public dollars to make that opaque… regime of credit allocation function.”
thebaffler.com/latest/payin...

From Fiscal Austerity to Monetary Abundance w/ Melinda Cooper Featuring Melinda Cooper on Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance. Balanced budget conservatism and supply side populism engineered a politics of austerity and budget deficit...

New @thedigradio.bsky.social: SECOND of two w @melindacooper.bsky.social on Counterrevolution: Extravagance and Austerity in Public Finance. How asset boom and bust drove MAGA’s rise and also revealed powerful monetary tools that could make socialism—that and more www.thedigradio.com/podcast/from...

Does China's party-state capitalist model mean it can fully decarbonise its economy?

Our exec producer Chris Saltmarsh joins Remi to discuss his @ripejournal.bsky.social article on the development of the Chinese political economy and implications for tackling the climate crisis

🎧 shorturl.at/xUwW5

Independent from who exactly? Central banks and democracy (part 1) Quickly and easily listen to The Rhodes Center Podcast with Mark Blyth for free!

The Rhodes Center Podcast is back. Me and Leah Downey on her wonderful book Our Money: Monetary Policy as if Democracy Matters. This is part one of two. In part two we discuss what happens when democracy starts to get the upper hand. Coming soon: player.captivate.fm/episode/eb5e...

I can take or leave central bank independence, frankly It makes no difference to growth and policymakers are always in hock to someone

“What is more, one wonders why something as crucial as borrowing costs to the lives of every citizen should sit beyond a country’s democratic process.”
www.ft.com/content/a667...

Meet Danielle Smith, Canada’s Ayn Rand in Cowboy Boots Danielle Smith, Alberta’s leader, is fusing libertarian dogma with oil-soaked grievance politics. It’s Canada’s version of the New Right, dressed up in provincial pride.

My newest piece for Jacobin traces the ideological inheritances of Danielle Smith.

jacobin.com/2025/08/albe...

@johncke.bsky.social @charlieangus104.bsky.social @dgrdon.bsky.social @nolore.bsky.social @youcaughtscott.com @desmondcole.bsky.social @temcd.bsky.social @dillonwamsley.bsky.social

The Long Twilight of Central Bankism Historically low levels of inflation and a defeated labor movement made the era of central bank independence possible. But the 2008 crash repoliticized the institution. Donald Trump’s attack on Lisa Cook is a backlash that has been brewing ever since.

Historically low levels of inflation and a defeated labor movement made the era of central bank independence possible. But the 2008 crash repoliticized the institution.

Donald Trump’s attack on Lisa Cook is a backlash that has been brewing ever since.

🏠 Why is the housing market so broken?

Professor Johnna Montgomerie joins Chris Saltmarsh and Dillon Wamsley to explore how housing became a source of debt instead of security, and what it would take to change it.

🔊 Listen: player.sheffield.ac.uk/events/housi...

#HousingCrisis

Why does austerity keep coming back?

In Crisis Point, Clara Mattei joins us to explain how austerity has shaped capitalist societies for over a century.

Listen now on The Player: bit.ly/45zUEU8

#Austerity #CrisisPoint #PoliticalEconomy

Prof Matthew Watson joins @sperishefuni.bsky.social's podcast to ask: was the Long Depression truly a crisis?

From falling profits to class conflict, this period changed how we think about capitalism.

Listen now: bit.ly/3H4K4Lw
#EconomicHistory #PoliticalEconomy #ThePlayerSheffield