Tim has served as a senior UK government adviser for a decade, including as an economic adviser to two chancellors, senior policy adviser to six other cabinet ministers and chief analyst and chief scientific adviser to the Department for Education. He has taught at the London School of Economics for twenty-five years and is a multiple international prize-winning economist.

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Christmas is a time for cheerfulness. So here is ‘Santa Leunig’ - on his sleigh - bringing some good news from around the world.

The worldwide rate of inflation has fallen by half in the last three years - at least according to the International Monetary Fund - from 8.7% in 2022 to 4.2% in 2025. That is a big signal that the world has managed to cope with, and recover, from both the post-covid splurge in spending and the dislocation caused by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine. In some countries, the conquest of inflation has been absolute - prices are not rising at all in China. This will probably be the case in India in the new year as well.

All prices matter, but food prices matter more than almost any other. President Donald J Trump has got into trouble recently, claiming American food prices have fallen - they have not. Worldwide, however, many foods have gotten cheaper. It isn’t just that food price inflation is lower, food prices have actually fallen. 

Most excitingly, rice prices are down a third this year. Rice is cheaper in real terms than at any point in the last decade. The same is true for sorghum, one of those big crops we don’t think much about in the West. Wheat and corn - known to us as maize - have been flat this year, but are also cheaper in real terms than a decade ago. 

The prices of staple crops like these don’t matter a lot to people in developed countries. Even in a bad year, rice is pretty cheap. These prices matter tremendously to people in poorer countries. Of course, the absolute poorest in the world are either subsistence farmers or live in dysfunctional countries. But for the next group - those above bare subsistence, but below $8.30 a day - the price of core staple foods is critical. These price falls are tremendously good news.

Contrastingly, the price of meat matters very little to people in poor countries. Whilst they consume a third fewer calories than people in high-income countries, they eat only one-ninth as much meat. Although the global rise in the price of beef is big and important news to Americans, meat prices hardly matter to the world’s poor. 

Global poverty has been falling for years. In fact, the proportion of people living on less than $8.30 a day has fallen from over 70% to around 45% since 1990, with a pretty consistent fall year on year. Lower food prices will help that trend continue, and more and more of the world will have not only enough to eat, but adequate shelter and other basics that we would help and expect everyone to enjoy. Short-term benefits from cheaper food can also become long-term gains: people spending less on food can afford to send their children to school, rather than out to work.

With higher real living standards, countries also have higher tax bases that they can use to fund those schools, as well as roads, ports and so on. Lower food prices can kickstart development at both a family and national level. Some good news and cheer to end the year.

The Financial Times is a proper global newspaper, with knowledgeable correspondents around the world. That is one reason why it is my go-to newspaper. 

Last week they published an excellent editorial looking at India’s recent reforms. India is now the most populous country in the world, overtaking China in 2023. Yet despite that, and despite a large Indian diaspora in the UK, India is not well understood - including by me. 

The Financial Times editorial explained how India is rationalising many aspects of doing business, building on successes over the last decade. It is also allowing women to undertake more factory work. Indian women have some of the lowest rates of paid employment in the world. If they copy Bangladeshi, Chinese or Vietnamese women, then Indian growth rates will remain high for some time. 

Good news for India, but also good news for the world, as it will ensure a new supply of well-priced products for the rest of us to buy. 

You can chat to Tim on Twitter, Bluesky or drop him an email. View Tim's profile to see his content for Nesta.

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