Remarks to: Worshipful Company of Bakers Livery Lunch,
Wednesday, 1 September 2021, Bakers’ Hall, London, by Alderman & Sheriff Professor Michael Mainelli.
Master, Alderman, Brother Sheriff, Warden, Ladies & Gentlemen,
Well, we are back at a physical event at last and no longer have to utter those immortal words ‘you are on mute’! As someone suggested to me last week at the Central Criminal Court, it feels a bit like ‘being let out of prison’.
Continue reading
Remarks to: The Brigantes, the Northern Liverymen, Tuesday, 24 August 2021, The Garden Rooms at Tennants Auctioneers, Leyburn, North Yorkshire by Alderman & Sheriff Professor Michael Mainelli
Tribal Chieftain, Lord Mayor, Your Excellency, Alderman, Masters, Wardens, Distinguished Guest, Local Native Peoples:
Continue reading
Johnson’s wry note suggested replacing “one fell swoop” with “one foul swoop”. Macduff wails in Macbeth, “Did you say all? O hell-kite! All? What, all my pretty chickens and their dam, At one fell swoop?” Shakespeare is using an avian metaphor to compare the murder of Macduff’s wife and children to a hawk suddenly swooping down on defenceless prey. Surely “one fowl swoop” is to be preferred?
Professor Michael Mainelli
Emeritus Professor
Gresham College
London
7 August 2021 – https://www.economist.com/letters/2021/08/07/letters-to-the-editor
Remarks to: the Company Of Watermen & Lightermen, on paddle steamer Elizabethan, on 8 July 2021.
Master, Wardens, Fellow Freemen, Ladies & Gentlemen. Thank you Master for inviting me to join our company on this evening, as we pay tribute to the immense service Colin and his team have given us over the past quarter of a century.
People in the livery sometimes ask why I am a craft-owning freeman of the Watermen & Lightermen. I am proud to say as a sailor and rower that water runs in my veins, and that having owned a Thames sailing barge, the Lady Daphne, for over two decades, some of that water in my veins definitely comes from the Thames. In fact, next week, I’m giving a lecture to the Guildhall Historical Association on the economic history of the Thames, the lighters, and the barges.
Continue reading
Mike Godwin’s law of Nazi analogies states that as an online discussion grows longer, the probability of a comparison involving Nazis or Hitler approaches one. A corollary adage might be that as an economic discussion grows longer, the probability of creating a new form of taxation approaches one. Your leader on the rise of e-money violated this proper economic discussion by creating no new tax (“The digital currencies that matter”, May 8th). In fact, tax got no mention at all.
You summed up well the positive aspects of central-bank digital currencies (CBDCs). Yet government-issued fiat currencies are deeply entwined with tax (fiat currencies are arguably just tax credits). CBDCs provide new tax-collection powers. Complex taxation algorithms can be applied to any CBDC transaction in real time. Once people realise the power of CBDC systems to support various taxation initiatives at low transaction costs, we should expect avalanches of proposals: town taxes, child-noise taxes, sugar taxes, alcohol-consumption taxes, foreign-visitor taxes, and so on.
In 2016 I gave an example of such a CBDC-based tax to the House of Lords. Given widespread sentiment that London is too overweening, imagine a populist redistribution tax whereby transaction taxes rise in wealthy districts. To bring about levelling up, politicians increase the taxation rate as you approach Trafalgar Square, up to 99.9% beside Nelson’s Column, or spend your money in the Outer Hebrides at 0.1% tax. Technology cuts two ways.
Professor Michael Mainelli
Executive Chairman
Z/Yen Group
London
29 May 2021- https://www.economist.com/letters/2021/05/29/letters-to-the-editor
Remarks to: National Liberal Club – Livery Dinner, Monday, 24 May 2021, London by Alderman & Sheriff Professor Michael
Chairman, Fellow Aldermen, Fellow Liverymen, Ladies & Gentlemen.
The Real Time Club, a group of computer geeks I once had the privilege of chairing, has met at the NLC regularly since 1967. I may have spoken at this venue many times, but I have never had the honour of addressing NLC members.
Alderman Tim McNally asked me to speak on the future of industry in the City of London, so I am doubly pleased to begin by addressing livery members of the Club who start with a solid grounding of the City.
Continue reading
What a week! The Lord Mayor and the Civic Team had the privilege of continuing to ‘open’ the City. During the week of 12 April we participated in a significant number of events showing that shops were open. During this week of 17 May we participated in a significant number of events showing that hospitality locations and clinics were open. Just on Monday we ‘opened’ a hormonal replacement therapy clinic, an especially ‘green’ dental practice at the edge of recycling everything possible, Tower Bridge’s visitor centre, the Barbican, two pubs, a drinking club, and a hotel reception overlooking the Tower for the Central London Alliance.
Of all these, perhaps the most telegenic was Shepherd Neame brewery bringing up a dray and horses to go from Mansion House to one of my favourite pubs, a haunt for 40 years, and one of the oldest pubs in the City (1610, present premises 1666). The Lord Mayor and our host, Chief Executive of Shepherd Neame, Jonathan Neame, led the dray through the City streets, ‘guarded’ by two panting Sheriffs straggling behind, for there was no room at the ‘inn’.
And here you can see the amazing things that emerge from behind horses’ backsides from time to time…
Well, the Elf went home, the weather warms, and all good brewing seasons must come to an end. We managed to squeeze in a final batch. This time it was a porter, although my nephew Sean points out, strictly, they should always be a porter. At 6.8%, it packed a punch, fermented on coffee and barrel-matured on cocoa with a touch of cinnamon and ginger. After 10 days of fermentation and a month in the barrel we cracked it last night (anzapfenned it as we say in our household).
Continue reading
Remarks to: The Worshipful Company Of Security Professionals
Alderman & Sheriff Professor Michael Mainelli MStJ FCCA FCSI(Hon) FBCS, Executive Chairman, Z/Yen Group, Wednesday, 24 February 2021, via Zoom, on the occasion of the launch of the Sheriffs’ Award 2021.
Continue reading
Our family is full of amateur linguists. Dotted round we have fluent Italian, German, French, Dutch, and Japanese speakers. Some family members dabble in Chinese, Korean, Polish, Portuguese, Spanish, Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. A few even claim English proficiency. Many of us enjoy Duolingo, with Luis van Ahn’s great Guatemalan back story. Some of us even pay for it.
Continue reading