Academic (housing, poverty). Accidental community activist. Quakerish. Tweets personal. “Professor Stephens was unimpressed." - The Times
Scotland
Joined August 2009
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Mark Stephens retweeted
The UK government has given a total of £25 billion to Ukraine since February 2022.
Mark Stephens retweeted
My full background working, because this deserves open, humble, data-driven judgement: docs.google.com/document/d/1…
Mark Stephens retweeted
As the The Church of England 🏴 chaplain for RNLI Dover Lifeboat Station I pray for and support the sterling work done by staff and brave volunteers. They are funded by charitable giving and are guided by HM Coastguard to save lives at sea. It takes courage to head into a storm
Mark Stephens retweeted
I have terminal cancer. I know how it feels to look at your options. Once the option for assisted dying exists, some people may feel - or be - coerced into taking it, or do so out of fear of being a burden on their family or the NHS.
Mark Stephens retweeted
A shocking case of reference falsification and citation errors in the UCU Journal of Further and Higher Education.
The article in question predictably attacks academic standards and 'empiricist norms'.
Taylor & Francis is investigating an article in one of its journals after the editors published an editorial about academic freedom that contains multiple fake references and citation errors.
retractionwatch.com/2026/09/…
Mark Stephens retweeted
My latest cartoon for tomorrow's @Telegraph
Buy a print of my cartoons at telegraph.co.uk/mattprints
Original artwork from chrisbeetles.com
Mark Stephens retweeted
This is a report I was commissioned to write in 2011 for the Scottish Green Parliamentary Group. it sets out the history of local govt in Scotland and sets it in a European context. andywightman.scot/wp-content…
Mark Stephens retweeted
🔴 Thousands of Ukrainian civilians face torture and indefinite detention inside Russia's modern gulag system.
🧵 1/10 ⬇️
Mark Stephens retweeted
The tragic death of 26-year-old Chloe Moffat should concern everyone and @hmtreasury has serious questions to answer.
Chloe denied the allegations made against her. Yet she was confronted by two managers, refused the presence of a friend, left uncertain about whether she would lose her livelihood, and immediately locked out of her work emails. The coroner found that this meeting “materially contributed” to her death.
I know only too well the devastating power of an allegation.
An allegation is not a fact and it is not guilt. Yet handled without humanity, fairness or proper safeguards, allegations alone can destroy reputations, careers and lives.
That a great department of state apparently failed to follow its own disciplinary policy - and, according to Chloe’s father, provided no safeguarding or support during or after that meeting - is deeply disturbing.
My thoughts are with David and Anne Moffat. Their determination that something positive should emerge from an unbearable loss deserves more than expressions of sympathy.
HM Treasury must demonstrate accountability and ensure no employee is ever again left feeling so isolated and frightened when facing unproven allegations.
theguardian.com/politics/202…
Mark Stephens retweeted
David Hume died exactly 250 years ago. I have written an essay about his philosophical life and death for @EngelsbergIdeas engelsbergideas.com/essays/t…
Mark Stephens retweeted
UPDATE - Scottish Ministers confirm in a letter to me that they intend to lay regulations to reduce the number of Scottish Land Commissioners from five to four. Efficiency and effectiveness are cited as reasons for this just week after filling a vacancy on the Cairngorm National Park Authority which has NINETEEN members. For further details see my latest blog andywightman.scot/2026/08/mi…
Mark Stephens retweeted
FOUND IN A BOOK FROM LONG AGO
(Only the fee is missing) - old paper tells its own history doesn't it
The triumph of hope over experience. One more twist of the planning system will suddenly unleash 300,000 new houses every year? It’s “for the birds” as the late Lord Bob Kerslake observed. Maybe focus on the economics of the housebuilding industry, too?
Another major win for housebuilding.
Mayors across England are getting the power to call in major developments, grant permission up front and use development levies to fund infrastructure.
bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cy8m…
Mark Stephens retweeted
Richard Oliphant is the Chief of the Clan Oliphant whose motto is Tout Pourvoir – Provide For All.
So far, he is providing for nobody but himself. 5/5
Blog here andywightman.scot/2026/08/fe…
Mark Stephens retweeted
It's here! Delighted to receive the first paper copies of my new book, An Injury to All: The Unmaking of the British Working Class, from @VersoBooks.
An Injury to All is published on 27 October. You can pre-order it here: versobooks.com/en-gb/product…
Mark Stephens retweeted
A young person asked me today for a few papers that would be great to read early on in one’s career. Here is a list I came up with (I posted a shorter list earlier in reply to a comment). There are many other great papers (and I apologize if I didn’t include yours), but my goal was to focus on papers that a 21-year-old undergrad would enjoy a lot. A paper on the asymptotic properties of the bootstrap or on some subtle point about New Keynesian models, as important as it might be, is not what I am looking for. Also, of course, the list reflects my deeply biased taste. So, feel free to add in the comment section other papers you love!
Philippe Aghion and Peter Howitt (1992), “A Model of Growth Through Creative Destruction,” Econometrica.
George A. Akerlof (1970), “The Market for ‘Lemons’: Quality Uncertainty and the Market Mechanism,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Armen A. Alchian (1950), “Uncertainty, Evolution, and Economic Theory,” Journal of Political Economy.
William J. Baumol (1967), “Macroeconomics of Unbalanced Growth: The Anatomy of Urban Crisis,” American Economic Review.
Gary S. Becker (1973), “A Theory of Marriage: Part I,” Journal of Political Economy.
Douglas W. Diamond and Philip H. Dybvig (1983), “Bank Runs, Deposit Insurance, and Liquidity,” Journal of Political Economy.
Xavier Gabaix (1999), “Zipf’s Law for Cities: An Explanation,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Xavier Gabaix and Augustin Landier (2008), “Why Has CEO Pay Increased So Much?,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Luis Garicano (2000), “Hierarchies and the Organization of Knowledge in Production,” Journal of Political Economy.
Edward L. Glaeser, Bruce Sacerdote and José A. Scheinkman (1996), “Crime and Social Interactions,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Sanford J. Grossman and Joseph E. Stiglitz (1980), “On the Impossibility of Informationally Efficient Markets,” American Economic Review.
Oliver Hart and John Moore (1990), “Property Rights and the Nature of the Firm,” Journal of Political Economy.
Friedrich A. Hayek (1945), “The Use of Knowledge in Society, American Economic Review.
Bengt Holmström (1979), “Moral Hazard and Observability,” Bell Journal of Economics.
Charles I. Jones (1995), “R&D-Based Models of Economic Growth,” Journal of Political Economy.
Charles I. Jones (2005), “The Shape of Production Functions and the Direction of Technical Change,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Michael Kremer (1993), “Population Growth and Technological Change: One Million B.C. to 1990,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Michael Kremer (1993), “The O-Ring Theory of Economic Development,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Paul Krugman (1991), “Increasing Returns and Economic Geography,” Journal of Political Economy.
Robert E. Lucas, Jr. (1978), “On the Size Distribution of Business Firms,” Bell Journal of Economics.
Kevin M. Murphy, Andrei Shleifer and Robert W. Vishny (1989), “Industrialization and the Big Push,” Journal of Political Economy.
Paul M. Romer (1990), “Endogenous Technological Change,” Journal of Political Economy.
Sherwin Rosen (1981), “The Economics of Superstars,” American Economic Review.
Alvin E. Roth (2007), “Repugnance as a Constraint on Markets,” Journal of Economic Perspectives.
Thomas C. Schelling (1971), “Dynamic Models of Segregation,” Journal of Mathematical Sociology.
Andrei Shleifer and Robert W. Vishny (1993), “Corruption,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Michael Spence (1973), “Job Market Signaling,” Quarterly Journal of Economics.
Robert M. Townsend (1979), “Optimal Contracts and Competitive Markets with Costly State Verification,” Journal of Economic Theory.
Martin L. Weitzman (1974), “Prices vs. Quantities,” Review of Economic Studies.
Mark Stephens retweeted
Very pleased to attend the celebration of the life of Michael Meadowcroft, MP for Leeds West, 1983 - 1987 & a lifelong champion of liberalism, democracy & community politics. Michael was the first MP I met, at the Knowsley North By-election. He inspired so many people. 🔶👏
Mark Stephens retweeted
⚡️ A young Ukrainian family was attacked and beaten in Poland by three men who targeted them for their accents.
🧵 1/5 ⬇️
