Box sets » Public sector net investment
Public spending can affect the economy through a range of channels, including health, investment, housing, and labour market outcomes. In this box, we summarised previous analysis of these effects and highlighted that while public spending can have significant long-term economic benefits, its impact on overall economic performance takes time to materialise and is highly uncertain.
At Budget 2020 we assessed the Government's performance against the three proposed fiscal rules that featured in the Conservative Party's 2019 election manifesto. In this box we assessed whether the Government could meet these fiscal rules under our central, upside and downside scenarios.
The Government used new fiscal rules to guide the policy decisions at this Budget. This box discussed the composition of two of these rules which had not previously been used in the UK.