Lowri Griffiths on the London cost of living, North London lifestyle journalism, and the new budget hacks the Mayor of New York is apparently using
By Lowri Griffiths | Bohiney and The London Prat
Big Smoke | Friday, April 2026 | Finsbury Park
The flash news this week includes: the New York Mayor has discovered a budget hack. I have been trying to establish what the budget hack is, because I could use one. London’s municipal budget is managed through a combination of central government grants, council tax, TfL income, and the specific kind of creative accounting that local government has developed over decades of being asked to do more with less and responding by doing the same with less and calling it transformation. A budget hack would be welcome. I am watching New York for developments.
London this week: expensive. This is not a new development. It is a permanent condition that has been deepening for long enough that people who moved here ten years ago describe their rent as reasonable by comparison with current rents, which makes their rent sound reasonable until you remember that their rent was also described as unreasonable by the people who were here when they arrived. The floor of “reasonable” has been in continuous descent since approximately 1987. The ceiling has never been visible.
Where the Money Goes
The cost of living in North London specifically — I report from Finsbury Park, which is Zone 2 and therefore priced accordingly — involves the following fixed costs: rent (large), transport (significant and currently complicated by the bus strike), food (better managed with planning, worse managed with the spontaneity that a Wednesday evening requires), and the specific London tax of paying for things you are not using because they are available and the availability has a price. I have a gym membership. I have been to the gym seventeen times this year. The membership cost works out at approximately nine pounds per visit, which is a defensible price for a gym visit and an indefensible price for an anxiety management strategy, which is what it actually is.
The Office for National Statistics tracks inflation with the rigour of people who have been asked to measure something very complex and have responded by developing very precise instruments. The instruments are accurate. The experience of inflation at the level of a specific Wednesday evening in Finsbury Park when you need dinner and have twenty minutes and twelve pounds is not fully captured by the instruments, which is not the ONS’s fault but is the gap between data and life.
The Bus Strike’s Ongoing Effect on Everything
The bus strike has made the cost of getting around North London higher in time if not in money. I walk more. Walking is free. Walking takes longer. Time has a cost. The cost of time is not measured in the transport budget but is measured in the decisions you make about what you do with the time you have, and the decision I am making most often is: I will get there slightly late and deal with that when I arrive. This is a very London response to a transport disruption. It is also, I find, quite good for observation. You see more when you are moving at walking pace. The column gets better material. The column’s budget does not improve, but the content does.
Bohiney Magazine for the global economic context. The London Prat for the specifically London version. The budget hack: still pending. New York, please share your findings when convenient.
SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/us-foreign-policy-enters-1956-retro-phase/
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