For the more hysterical of the Scottish Government’s critics, a survey on businesses’ views of how devolved income tax policy has affected them might have come as something of a surprise.

If you were to believe this overwrought contingent, you would think that the greater income tax burden for higher earners in Scotland that has resulted from devolved income tax policy had created some kind of economic Armageddon and is killing off business.

Clearly, from the official data, anyone can see that it has not.

However, the narrative that it has is a sticky one, so it has been good this week to see some proper objective analysis of the effect on Scottish businesses of devolved income tax policy, based on a survey of more than 300 of them by the University of Strathclyde’s highly regarded Fraser of Allander Institute.

The most interesting finding from this, especially given the narrative of doom and gloom, is that 57% of the businesses surveyed believe the Scottish Government’s particular income tax policy has had either “little” or “no” impact on them.

This is not really a great surprise, given the economic data and business survey evidence for Scotland has compared favourably enough with that for many other parts of the UK.

However, the more hysterical critics of the Scottish Government are a noisy bunch so the findings of the Fraser of Allander Institute survey might come as a shock to many who have been taken in by this hullabaloo.

That is not to say that differences in income tax policy between Scotland and the rest of the UK, and the effects of these such as they are, should not be kept under careful consideration.

A minority of businesses said that Scottish Government income tax policy was having either a “fair amount” of impact or a “significant” effect on operations.

However, it was interesting to see some of the survey respondents point out the benefits of a greater tax take for the likes of crucial public spending on education and health.

So what, exactly, did the survey show?

It........

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