Thatcher's economic policy was influenced by monetarist thinking and economists such as Milton Friedman and Alan Walters. Together with her first chancellor, Geoffrey Howe, she lowered direct taxes on income and increased indirect taxes. She increased interest rates to slow the growth of the money supply and thereby lower inflation, introduced cash limits on public spending, and reduced expenditure on social services such as education and housing. Cuts to higher education led to Thatcher being the first Oxford-educated, post-war incumbent without an honorary doctorate from Oxford University, after a 738–319 vote of the governing assembly and a student petition.