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- 16th Aug 2016
Designing a behaviourally informed banking market
Last week the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) published the final report of their retail banking market investigation. The CMA has identified that currently, only a tiny proportion of customers switch to a different bank in any year; despite the fact that many of them could save about £90 a…
- Blog
- 25th Aug 2016
Moments of Choice: how young people make career decisions
Today, young people across England receive their GCSE results. Many will now be looking forward to the next exciting step in their education; for others, it may be a time for to reflect on what their options are and what they would like to do next. In these ‘moments of…
- Blog
- 15th Sep 2016
The Behavioural Insights Team’s Update Report: 2015-16
Today we are publishing the latest in a series of annual Update Reports. It’s a proud moment for the team – and for the hundreds of government officials, funders, academics, clinicians, police officers, teachers and other practitioners we’ve worked with over the past year – giving us a chance to…
- Blog
- 22nd Sep 2016
Incremento del pago de impuestos en Costa Rica
En los últimos años, BIT ha implementado una serie de pruebas exitosas utilizando cartas para recordar a las personas que paguen sus impuestos. En marzo de 2015, realizamos nuestra primera prueba en Costa Rica. En este caso, probamos el envío de correos electrónicos, una intervención de menor costo que las…
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- Blog
- 6th Oct 2016
Setting smarter defaults for workplace pensions
By changing the default from opt-in to opt-out, automatic enrolment is successfully reversing the long-term decline in the number of people saving into workplace pensions in the UK. Opt-out rates have been between 8 and 14 per cent, rather than the 28 per cent the Department for Work and Pensions…
- Blog
- 13th Oct 2016
Reflections on the rise of evidence-based policymaking
You know how it is: you spend months waiting for the next global summit on evidence, and then when the invitations arrive they’re all scheduled at the same time. Recent weeks saw two held in London, and a few people missed them because of a rival summit in the USA!…
- Blog
- 20th Oct 2016
Poverty and decision-making: How behavioural science can improve opportunity in the UK
A third of the UK population spent at least one year in relative income poverty between 2011 and 2014. Traditionally policymakers and anti-poverty organisations such as the Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) have focused on boosting people’s economic capital (e.g., income) and human capital (e.g., educational attainment) to reduce poverty. While…
- Blog
- 24th Oct 2016
Behavioral Insights and the City
From ancient Athens to modern New York, cities have long provided crucibles for human interaction, thriving and faltering in equal measure on the density and diversity of the lives within them. With 2 out of every 3 of us set to live in cities by 2050, it is hardly surprising…
- Blog
- 11th Nov 2016
The soft drinks levy is working before it has even been applied
Back in March of this year, the government announced the introduction of a soft drinks levy (or 'sugar tax'). At the time, we published a blog pointing out that the levy’s success would depend greatly on how producers responded to it. Although shifting customer purchases is important, we predicted that…
- Blog
- 14th Nov 2016
Transformation and Inspiration - the EEF at 5
This week the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) celebrated its fifth birthday. Over the course of a few short years, the EEF has achieved truly remarkable things. One hundred randomised controlled trials (RCTs) in education have been commissioned by the EEF in that time – orders of magnitude more than had…