Philip Hammond tried to talk up the U.K. economy, but the numbers don’t back him up. In 2021, when the U.K.’s Brexit transition will have ended, the government’s budget watchdog lowered its growth forecast. What’s more, it looks like the country is going to be paying money to the European Union for decades to come, well into 2060. The U.K. chancellor is in an bind: voters are angry after eight years of austerity but Hammond lacks the resources to be able to significantly relax the pain. At the same time his Conservative Party is deeply divided on how to tackle Brexit, and he falls firmly in the camp of those in the ... (full story)