What are the UK’s options outside the European Union?

“Life after Brexit: What are the UK’s options outside the European Union?”, a report on the UK’s post-Brexit future, was released by the LSE Centre for Economic Performance on Friday 12 February 2016

The depression report: a new deal for depression and anxiety disorders.

Crippling depression and chronic anxiety are the biggest causes of misery in Britain today. They are the great submerged problem, which shame keeps out of sight. But if you mention them, you soon discover how many families are affected. According to the respected Psychiatric Morbidity Survey, one in six of us would be diagnosed as having depression or chronic anxiety disorder, which means that one family in three is affected. That is the bad news. The good news is that we now have evidence-based psychological therapies that can lift at least a half of those affected out of their depression or their chronic fear. These new therapies are not endless nor backwardlooking treatments. They are short, forward-looking treatments that enable people to challenge their negative thinking and build on the positive side of their personalities and situations. The most developed of these therapies is cognitive behaviour therapy (CBT). The official guidelines from the National Institute for Clinical Excellence (NICE) say these treatments should be available to all people with depression or anxiety disorders or schizophrenia, unless the problem is very mild or recent. But the NICE guidelines cannot be implemented because we do not have enough therapists. In most areas waiting lists for therapy are over nine months, or there is no waiting list at all because there are no therapists. So, if you go to the GP, all that can be provided is medication (plus at some surgeries a little counselling). But many people will not take medication, either because they dislike the side effects or because they want to control their own mood. The result is tragic. Only one in four of those who suffer from depression or chronic anxiety is receiving any kind of treatment. The rest continue to suffer, even though at least half of them could be cured at a cost of no more than £750. This is a waste of people’s lives. It is also costing a lot of money. For depression and anxiety make it difficult or impossible to work, and drive people onto Incapacity Benefits. We now have a million people on Incapacity Benefits because of mental illness – more than the total number of unemployed people receiving unemployment benefits. At one time unemployment was our biggest social problem, but we have done a lot to reduce it. So mental illness is now the biggest problem, and we know what to do about it. It is time to use that knowledge. 2 But can we afford the £750 it costs to treat someone? The money which the government spends will pay for itself. For someone on Incapacity Benefit costs us £750 a month in extra benefits and lost taxes. If the person works just a month more as a result of the treatment, the treatment pays for itself. So we have a massive problem – the biggest problem they have for one in three of our families. But we also have a solution that can improve the lives of millions of families, and cost the taxpayer nothing. We should implement the NICE guidelines; and most people with mental illness should be offered the choice of psychological therapy. Everyone who wants something done should write to their MP calling for action.

Happiness and economic performance

If a nation's economic performance improves, how much extra happiness does that buy its citizens? Most public debate assumes -- without real evidence -- that the answer is a lot. This paper examines the question by using information on well-being in Western countries. The data are of four kinds: on reported happiness, on reported life satisfaction, on reported job satisfaction, and on the number of suicides. These reveal patterns that are not visible to the anecdotal eye. In industrialized countries, well-being appears to rise as real national income grows. But the rise is so small as to be sometimes almost undetectable. Unemployment, however, seems to be a large source of unhappiness. This suggests that governments ought to be trying to reduce the amount of joblessness in the economy. In a country that is already rich, policy aimed instead at raising economic growth may be of comparatively little value

Culture, beliefs and economic performance

Beliefs are one component of culture. Data from the World Values Survey is available on a subset of beliefs concerning (broadly) meritocracy and poverty that appear relevant for economics. We document how they vary as well as their distribution across countries. We then correlate these measures of beliefs with economic growth and compare them with institutional and geographical determinants of income. A strong negative relationship is found between leftist economic beliefs and growth but little evidence is found of a relationship with respect to non-economic beliefs. Finally, we briefly discuss some causal effects on beliefs. The evidence suggests that higher country risk and more dependence on natural resources shifts nations to a more leftist set of economic beliefs. Overall the evidence supports the view that cultural specificities may explain why certain institutions cannot be transplanted between nations with different cultural histories and underlines the limit to policy activism