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    Martin Sandbu

    European Economics Commentator

    Martin Sandbu is the Financial Times's European economics commentator. He also writes Free Lunch, the FT's weekly newsletter on the global economic policy debate. He has been writing for the FT since 2009, when he joined the paper as economics leader writer.

    Before joining the FT, he worked in academia and policy consulting. He is the author of three books, on business ethics, the euro, and on the economics of belonging.

    Sign up to the Free Lunch newsletter here.

    Email Martin Sandbu @MESandbu  on Twitter (link opens in a new browser window)

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    • Thursday, 23 November, 2023
      Free LunchUK public finances
      Autumn Statement: a very British (tax) affair Premium content

      The problems with letting the fiscal rule tail wag the budget dog

      The Treasury building in London
    • Sunday, 19 November, 2023
      German economy
      Berlin is hoist with its own legalistic petard

      The repercussions of Germany’s top court striking down a domestic budgetary manoeuvre will spread to EU politics

      Three judgeds in red robes put their hats on
    • Thursday, 16 November, 2023
      Free LunchChinese economy
      Can China get its economic mojo back? Premium content

      Beijing’s path back to growth may be a European one

      People at Shanghai’s commercial and tourist area
    • Thursday, 9 November, 2023
      Free LunchArtificial intelligence
      In AI, focus on technocrats not terminators Premium content

      Boring regulation, not sci-fi heroism, is what is needed

      Members of the press outside the Bletchley Park Estate where the AI Safety Summit was being held
    • Sunday, 5 November, 2023
      War in Ukraine
      The west must not prevaricate when it comes to seizing Russian reserves

      Confiscating and deploying them for Ukraine’s benefit is the morally obvious next step

      People walk past a poster depicting Ukrainian servicemen and a slogan which reads “Bring the victory soon” in Kyiv
    • Thursday, 2 November, 2023
      Free LunchUS economy
      What the US got right that Europe did not Premium content

      America’s post-pandemic recovery has left Europe in the dust

      Pedestrians on Wall Street
    • Thursday, 26 October, 2023
      Free LunchRussian politics
      The Schrödinger’s cat of Russian foreign reserves Premium content

      Now you see them, now you don’t

      The Spasskaya tower of the Kremlin and Saint Basil’s Cathedral in Moscow
    • Sunday, 22 October, 2023
      EU economy
      Narcissism of small differences delays accord on EU fiscal rules

      The 27-nation bloc must strike a deal soon in order to prepare for much bigger economic and geopolitical challenges

      The European Commission headquarters in Brussels
    • Thursday, 19 October, 2023
      Free LunchPoland
      Liberal democracy strikes back in Poland Premium content

      The economics of the European country’s restoration

      People queue outside a polling station in Warsaw
    • Thursday, 12 October, 2023
      Free LunchGlobal Economy
      Three ways to think about the future world economy Premium content

      How to make some sense of our ignorance

      A security guard stands in the middle of the frame below the flags while a suited delegate with a green folder walks past
    • Thursday, 5 October, 2023
      Free LunchCarbon tax
      Global carbon pricing has a bright future Premium content

      Resistance is futile

      People watch smoke and steam from a coal-fired power plant in Poland
    • Thursday, 28 September, 2023
      Free LunchEU trade
      Europe should worry but not panic over China Premium content

      Lack of nuance makes for bad policy

      A truck lifts a shipping container at the port in Duisburg, Germany
    • Sunday, 24 September, 2023
      EU enlargement
      A multi-speed Europe holds the key to EU enlargement

      A Franco-German report proposes four overlapping circles from an inner core to the new European Political Community

      The European Commission building in Brussels. The power of the purse is strong: if countries paying most of the bills see such reforms as worthwhile, it will be difficult to be a holdout
    • Thursday, 21 September, 2023
      Free LunchWar in Ukraine
      What next for Europe’s sanctions on Russia? Premium content

      The EU must confront its €300bn question

    • Thursday, 14 September, 2023
      Free LunchChile
      (Mis)remembering Chile’s military coup Premium content

      There is no economic justification for abandoning democracy

      Soldiers positioned on a rooftop fire at Chile’s presidential palace on September 11 1973 during the military coup
    • Sunday, 10 September, 2023
      Brexit
      The EU’s transformations will reshape its ‘British question’ too

      Ukraine’s likely accession to the bloc and the process of internal reform will have a transformative effect

      Charles Michel, president of the European Council, Ursula von der Leyen, head of the European Commission, and Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
    • Thursday, 7 September, 2023
      Free LunchGreen solutions
      In green tech, overcapacity is a boon Premium content

      We cannot produce too much of the stuff that will help us decarbonise

      A female employee assembled lithium-ion battery modules at a BMW manufacturing plant
    • Monday, 4 September, 2023
      European Union
      The EU is poised for a giant leap towards further integration

      There is increasingly serious talk in the bloc about all manner of far-reaching reform

    • Thursday, 17 August, 2023
      Free LunchChinese economy
      Debt overhang economics with Chinese characteristics Premium content

      Beijing should avoid the mistakes the west makes again and again — but it probably won’t

      Construction cranes in Shanghai with the city landscape stretching into the background
    • Sunday, 13 August, 2023
      European Union
      No, there isn’t a ‘democratic deficit’ in the EU

      A busy timetable of polls at national and European level will show that voters’ choices matter

      An anti-government march in June in Warsaw, Poland, led by the centrist opposition party leader Donald Tusk, who along with other critics accuses the government of eroding democracy
    • Thursday, 10 August, 2023
      Free LunchEurope
      Universalism, hypocrisy and European identity Premium content

      Remedy for the flaws of ‘Europeanness’ is to have more of it

      Pedestrians on a street in Frankfurt, Germany
    • Tuesday, 8 August, 2023
      Global trade
      The west shouldn’t give up on ‘gentle commerce’ just yet

      Although it has been strained in recent years, the link between trade and political liberalisation still holds

      James Ferguson illustration of several skyscrapers perched on the edge of a navy aircraft carrier with a civilian jumbo jet taking off from the ship’s runway
    • Thursday, 3 August, 2023
      Free LunchGlobal Economy
      Free Lunch summer reading Premium content

      Good writing on economic phenomena that affect us all

      A close-up picture of a Covid jab being administered into a person’s arm
    • Thursday, 20 July, 2023
      Free LunchEmployment
      There is more slack in labour markets than we think Premium content

      If economies have been overheating, why are average hours worked so weak?

      Workers at a car manufacturing plant in Germany
    • Wednesday, 19 July, 2023
      Global InsightCentral banks
      The EU is doubled up over riddle of Russia’s euro assets

      The fate of hundreds of billions of euros of Moscow’s money hinges on the intricacies of double-entry bookkeeping

    Previous page You are on page 1 Next page

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