Want to know what an MP cares about? Look at their pay packet.
Details released by IPSA show MPs pay in real terms over the last hundred years. Since 1911, when it was introduced at a rate of £400 per year, the pay of elected representatives has fluctuated between six times, and one and a half times, the average wage in the UK. It currently sits a little over two-and-a-half times higher.
Everyone earning a salary is hit by inflation to some extent. But MPs are in the category of workers who are hit hardest. They don't have the annual pay rises typical in many industries; they have no ability to negotiate individually in response to changed circumstances; they can't leave for a better paid job without completely switching industry. And that's even before you take into account the unique peculiarities of their situation: asking for a pay rise due to inflation is a bad idea if the inflation is seen as your fault to start with.
All of which means that the economics of being an MP are directly aligned with a tendency to over-value inflation, and undervalue growth, in setting priorities for the country. In so far as the new Governor of the Bank of England, Mark Carney can fight that consensus, he should, but IPSA could have a role to play as well. In deciding what to do with MPs pay, they could look at a wider economic index of how the country is doing. That way, MPs would know that getting their dinner relies on everyone else getting theirs.
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