Institute for Fiscal Studies

The institute was founded in response to the passing of the Finance Act 1965, by four financial professionals: a banker and later Conservative Party politician (Will Hopper), an investment trust manager (Bob Buist), a stockbroker (Nils Taube), and a tax consultant (John Chown). Nils Taube had commissioned John Chown to prepare a professional analysis of the speech and its effect on share prices. Chown described what he thought the impact of the proposals would be if implemented but also treated the exercise as a "reductio ad absurdum" and suggested that "the government and its advisers had three or four months for second thoughts and, recognising some of the dire consequences, would modify their original proposals." In 1971 a Council of the institute was formed, with President Sir Richard Powell (civil servant) and Vice-Presidents Roy Jenkins (Labour Party) and Selwyn Lloyd (Conservative Party). In 1994, the Tax Law Review Committee was established. ==Research==

Areas of research covered by the institute include public finance and spending, pensions and saving, company taxation, consumer behaviour and poverty and inequality. Although most of the institute's research is UK-focused, recent work has also looked at international development policies, for instance at education and nutrition programmes in Colombia. In October 2016, Professor Orazio Attanasio, the IFS' Research Director and Head of UCL Economics, won the Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize for his work in the latter field. The institute is home to – or a partner in – the following research centres (some of which are described further, in following sections): • Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy (CPP) • Centre for the Evaluation of Development Policies (EDePo) • Tax Law Review Committee (TLRC) • English Longitudinal Study of Ageing (ELSA) • Centre for Microdata Methods and Practice (cemmap) • Centre for Tax Analysis in Developing Countries (TaxDev) • formerly Programme Evaluation for Policy Analysis (PEPA) Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy Since 1991 the institute has hosted an Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) research centre, the Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy (CPP). It is directed by Professor Imran Rasul, and co-directors Professor Richard Blundell, Professor James Banks, Professor Eric French, Professor Rachel Griffith and Professor Fabien Postel-Vinay. Cemmap's activities include: • conducting research and organising conferences, symposia, workshops and training courses; • developing and applying methods for modelling individual behaviour, the influences on it and the impact of policy interventions; and • maintaining an extensive network of fellows in the UK and abroad. Cemmap organises training courses and masterclasses and is home to a working paper series in the field of microeconometrics. Cemmap was founded in 2000 with a grant from the Leverhulme Trust and since 2007 has been an ESRC research centre. ==Publications==

The institute regularly publishes policy-reports and academic articles. It also produces a peer-reviewed quarterly journal, Fiscal Studies, which publishes articles submitted by a range of academics and practitioners in the field. The IFS Green Budget, which discusses policy issues which are likely to be relevant for the Chancellor of the Exchequer's annual budget statement, is published early each year. Another noteworthy publication is the Mirrlees Review, which was published in September 2011. The review consists of two volumes. The first of these is a series of chapters covering different aspects of the UK tax system, accompanied by commentaries voicing different opinions. The second sets out the conclusions of the review. The review was chaired by Nobel laureate James Mirrlees and included contributions from IFS staff alongside prominent economists from various universities around the world. ==Criticism==

The institute frequently speaks out on politically important issues. In October 2010, Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg accused the IFS of using methods that were "distorted and a complete nonsense", after it challenged government claims that tax and benefit reforms in the June 2010 Budget were "progressive". Concern is sometimes expressed regarding the sources of the institute's funding. In October 2010 an Early Day Motion in Parliament pointed out that "95 per cent. of [its] 5.1 million funding comes from so-called research grant contracts, details of which are not itemised in its accounts; [...] that the vast majority of its official funding bodies are Government departments, the wider public sector, the European Commission and publicly-funded organisations, notably including the BBC, H M Treasury, the Department for Work and Pensions, the Government Equalities Office, the Department for International Development, the Department of Health, the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills, the Department for Education, the Department of Finance and Personnel for Northern Ireland, HM Revenue and Customs, the Food Standards Agency, the International Monetary Fund, the Low Pay Commission and the Office for National Statistics; [and] that the Institute for Fiscal Studies recently received a substantial part of its core funding from the Economic and Social Research Council, which is ultimately funded by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills...". In 2016, The Guardian said: "Some left-leaning economists look with particular scepticism on the claim that the IFS has no ideology, arguing that the institute holds an excessive faith in the power of market forces. The tax campaigner Richard Murphy said the IFS was 'embedded in all the normal, standard pro-market assumptions that dominate conventional economic thinking in the UK and elsewhere'." In July 2011, The Spectator published an article that said that institutes' funded by research grants (which means, usually, tax money) will always argue for more expensive meddling by the state" and that the Institute for Fiscal Studies was "the most striking example" of this. A week before the manifesto analysis for the 2019 UK general election was released, economist John Weeks commented that while the institute had no links to political groups, it had an inherent bias in its judgement criteria that "favour[ed] accounting balance over social outcome", saying that an IFS analysis cannot tell the public "whether a policy is a good idea, only whether the numbers add up." ==Directors and notable staff==

The following have been directors of the IFS: • Dick Taverne (1970–1979) • John Kay (1979–1986) • Bill Robinson (1986–1991) • Andrew Dilnot (1991–2002) • Robert Chote (2002–2010) • Paul Johnson (2011–2025) • Helen Miller (since 2025) Former members of staff of the IFS include Evan Davis and Stephanie Flanders (journalists), Steve Webb (Liberal Democrat Pensions Minister) and Rupert Harrison (Chief of Staff to former Chancellor George Osborne). == Funding ==

The Institute for Fiscal Studies receives funding from various sources, such as the Economic and Social Research Council, international organisations and other non-profit organisations. It was rated as 'highly transparent' in its funding in 2018 by Transparify, and has been given an A grade for funding transparency by Who Funds You?. ==See also==