Severe geological and financial earthquakes are inevitable. We just don’t know how soon and how they will play out. Are we putting enough effort into preparing for them? Every decade or so the international economy has a major financial crisis. We cannot predict exactly when or exactly how it will happen. (For what its worth,…
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Fabian Society Website Writing contemporary history is challenging. New evidence appears; events move on; it is hard to provide thoughtful reflections about events close to the writing. The last chapters of my economic history of Aotearoa New Zealand, Not in Stormy Seas, are no exception. I tried to avoid providing a conclusion in Chapter 55…
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The Yes Prime Minister This transcript of a recent conversation between the Prime Minister and his chief economic adviser has not been verified. We’ve announced we are the ‘Yes Government’. Do you like it? Yes, Prime Minister. Dreamed up by the PR team. It’s about being committed to growth. Not that the PR team know…
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AIRAANZ 2025 Conference, 3 February 2025. It is perhaps extraordinary that the Ardern-Hipkins Labour Government, which said it wanted to be ‘transformational’, did not establish a Ministry of Labour. In 2012 the Key-English National Government had merged the century-old Department of Labour into the newly established mega-agency, the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MoBIE)….
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Do its Property Right Provisions Make Sense? Last week I pointed out that it is uninformed to argue that the New Zealand’s apparently poor economic performance can be traced only to poor regulations. Even were there evidence they had some impact, there are other factors. Of course, we should seek to administer effectively a system…
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Tēnā koutou katoa. Apologies for the limitations of my voice. It is the consequence of surgery on my larynx. My written submission focuses on two elements of the Treaty Principles Bill which are insufficiently covered in its public discussion. The first is that the bill is bad history. Our understanding of Te Tiriti has evolved,…
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The invitation to comment on the proposed Regulatory Standards Bill opens with Minister David Seymour stating ‘[m]ost of New Zealand’s problems can be traced to poor productivity, and poor productivity can be traced to poor regulations’. I shall have little to say about the first proposition except I can think of a lot of New…
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Spinoff 23 January 2025. Even democratically elected dictators try to avoid accountability. Until there is a considerable strengthening of the accountability mechanisms, the parliamentary term should not be extended. A British Lord Chancellor described the British political system as an ‘elected dictatorship’. Even so, it is meant to act in the interests of the people….
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The state of the current economy may be similar to when National left office in 2017. In December, a couple of days after the Treasury released its 2024 Half Year Economic and Fiscal Update (HEYFU24), Statistics New Zealand reported its estimate for volume GDP for the previous September 24 quarter. Instead of the expected trivial…
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Can we trust the Trump cabinet to act in the public interest? Nine of Trump’s closest advisers are billionaires. Their total net worth is in excess of $US375b (providing there is not a share-market crash). In contrast, the total net worth of Trump’s first Cabinet was about $6b. (Joe Biden’s Cabinet total was about $118…
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Chapters in Books Not in Narrow Seas (VUP: Ch.8) In Open Seas (Kea Point: Ch.12) Making Aotearoa New Zealand (Forthcoming: Ch.7) Articles ‘Was There A Treaty of Waitangi?: Was it A Social Contract?’ (Archifacts: April 1997, P.21-49) ‘What the Hell Happened At Waitangi?’ (Newsroom 9 May, 2023) Treaty Claims The Maori Broadcasting Claim: A Pakeha…
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Recommendations 1. That Parliament should not proceed with the Principles of the Treaty of Waitangi Bill. 2. That Parliament endorse the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi as set out by the Court of Appeal in New Zealand Māori Council v Attorney-General (1987) (C.A. 54/87), while acknowledging that the understandings of Te Tiriti o Waitangi…
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While we may not always have quality political leadership, a couple of recently published autobiographies indicate sometimes we strike it lucky. When ranking our prime ministers, retired professor of history Erik Olssen commented that ‘neither Holland nor Nash was especially effective as prime minister – even his private secretary thought Nash was ineffectual’. Even so,…
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I prepared an earlier version of this note in May 2024 for myself, when the ‘principles of the treaty’ (i.e. Te Tiriti o Waitangi) was a political hotpoint. The most public was ACT’s proposal to have a referendum on the treaty principles.[1] The paper concludes that the treaty principles (with one exception which is explained…
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We need to think about the pattern of the economy in 2050 (or whenever), not just its level of production. Focusing on productivity (and population) growth is a trap. Long-term strategic analysis requires attention to the composition of those aggregates. Nor should we over-focus on GDP as the ultimate outcome of the economy or the…
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A note written for some younger economics colleagues. I was lucky when I was on the Treasury Forecasting Panel (from about 1998 to 2008) that Jas McKenzie was on it too and we could discuss our experiences. Generally, our approach was that they were the Treasury forecasts and that our task was to help them…
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It is difficult to make sense of the Luxon Coalition Government’s economic management. This end-of-year review about the state of economic management – the state of the economy was last week – is not going to cover the National Party contribution. Frankly, like every other careful observer, I cannot make up my mind. Certainly Christopher Luxon and…
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By way of prologue, the closest parallel to the current economic situation may be when Ruth Richardson became Minister of Finance in late 1990. The economy had been contracting, although there were signs of a fragile recovery. She was an Austerian and cut public spending savagely. The economy plunged a further 5% in GDP per…
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This was offered to a media outlet ‘accepted’ but not published. Excerpted from the just published In Open Seas. The Labour Party halved its vote between the 2020 and 2023 elections (while National barely increased voter numbers). The coronial enquiries into the last election are yet to be held, but they will conclude Labour’s loss…
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How the Prospect Theory of Behavioural Economics Makes Economic Analysis Difficult Behavioural economics has been described as the most revolutionary thing which has happened to economics for ages. The notion that people do not behave like ‘rational economic men’ (women are mainly ignored) undermines the microeconomic foundations of the subject. Not the empirical evidence on…
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