Listener: 26 May, 2010. Keywords: Business & Finance; Governance; Regulation & Taxation; The row that has erupted over the proposed SkyCity convention centre in Auckland involves gambling, but there are deeper fiscal issues. But this is not a column about gambling, even though a study I was involved with found that pokies were the most…
Continue reading this entry »
PROBLEMS WITH EXPERTS New Zealand Books, Winter 2012, p.9. Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money; Regulation & Taxation; The New Zealand Economy: An Introduction by Ralph Lattimore & Shamubeel Eaqub (AUP) 170pp. $34.99. ISBN: 978-1-869404-89-5 The New Zealand Tax System: New Zealand Taxes in Comparative Perspective by Rob Salmond (Institute of Policy Studies) 129pp. $30.00. ISBN: 978-1-877347-45-0…
Continue reading this entry »
Listener: 14 April, 2012. Keywords: Business & Finance; Regulation & Taxation; Last year, this column argued for the mixed-ownership model of some state-owned enterprises as a means of deepening the capital market for private savers. Even then, it argued that not all partial privatisations were sensible. It depends on the market structure and the way…
Continue reading this entry »
Listener: 31 March, 2012. Keywords: Regulation & Taxation; It would be wrong to prejudge the findings of the royal commissions on the Pike River coal mine deaths and the Canterbury earthquakes. But it’s still a good idea to respond promptly to the available evidence and take necessary measures, as the Department of Labour did by…
Continue reading this entry »
Presentation to the Wellington School of Medicine: 23 March 2012 Keywords: Health; Regulation & Taxation; This presentation was based upon the paper to the Global Alcohol Policy Conference, 14-16 February. It is at http://www.eastonbh.ac.nz/?p=1633
Listener: 17 Match, 2012. Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money; Regulation & Taxation; Eminent economist James Tobin in 1972 suggested a financial transaction tax on spot-market currency conversions. Many others have supported him. That includes people who don’t like money and think of a financial transaction tax as a sin tax. (Tobin certainly did not. He was…
Continue reading this entry »
Listener: 3 March 2012. Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money; Regulation & Taxation; Forecasts for the New Zealand economy have been wound back since last year. Given the deteriorating state of the world economy, they will probably be wound back even further. And that’s going to make it even harder for the Government to meet its election…
Continue reading this entry »
Global Alcohol Policy Conference: Thailand, 14-16 February as Honorary Research Fellow at SHORE, Massey University. Keywords: Health; Regulation & Taxation; Social Policy; The theme of this presentation is that alcohol is no ordinary commodity; economic policy has to think about it differently. The alcoholic beverages industry, of course, produces jobs and profits for investors, just like any…
Continue reading this entry »
Chapter 3: “The Leaky buildings Crisis: Understanding the Issues Keywords: Regulation & Taxation; Introduction[1] The first commercial transaction in New Zealand involved Maori exchanging with the Endeavour’s seamen fish for tapa cloth. (Not nails; despite their iconic appearance in a host of images; the ship’s officers offered them, but the neolithic Maori did not yet…
Continue reading this entry »
THE TOO HARD BASKET Listener: 19 January, 2012. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Distributional Economics; Macroeconomics & Money; Political Economy & History; Regulation & Taxation; Social Policy; Every government has issues it hopes will go away. They don’t. Here are some for our one. Our Emissions Trading Scheme is looking like a dog’s breakfast, and/or something…
Continue reading this entry »
Listener: 14 October, 2011. Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money; Regulation & Taxation; I have been preoccupied by leaky building syndrome, which may have damaged up to 110,000 dwellings as well as costing considerable domestic stress and even lives. Commercial and public buildings have suffered, too. There were many causes of the disaster but it illustrates the…
Continue reading this entry »
This article by John McCrone, features writer of “The Christchurch Press”, was published on 20 August in the Mainlander Section of “The Press”. It was also published by “The Dominion Post” on the same day under the title ‘Legacy of Rogernomics: Less Red Tape But More Heartache and Financial Disasters’. It is republished here because…
Continue reading this entry »
Listener: 9 May, 2011 Keywords: Macroeconomics & Money; Regulation & Taxation; John Key has shown considerable ability responding to the moods of the New Zealand public. That’s why I’m astonished by his rejection of an earthquake levy, involving a relatively small tax on income over 10 or more years to pay off the costs incurred…
Continue reading this entry »
Keywords: Health; Regulation & Taxation;
The Social Costs of Alcohol Misuse
The Regulation of Alcohol
Paper for the launch of “Alcohol No Ordinary Commodity 2 ed”, 19 August, 2010. Keywords: Health; Regulation & Taxation; Executive Summary: This paper argues that the harm from the consumption of alcohol can be reduced by targeting the minimum of price of alcohol, but by using an excise drawback rather than setting a minimum price…
Continue reading this entry »
Commissioned Report: April 2010 Keywords: Health; Regulation & Taxation; Social Policy; Executive Summary The following is not the usual executive summary. Rather it draws out the policy implications of the known costs and benefits of gambling, thereby summarising the main report, which consists of two parts. Appendix I is a general account about how economists…
Continue reading this entry »
PSA Journal, March 2010. Keywords: Distributional Economics; Regulation & Taxation; In my Commercialisation of New Zealand there is a chapter on ‘the abandoning of equity’, of how under Rogernomics social fairness went steadily down in the policy priorities. The report on tax reform by the Victoria University of Wellington Tax Working Group (TWG) confirms the…
Continue reading this entry »
We are paying a very high price for failing to regulate properly. Listener: 20 February, 2010. Keywords: Regulation & Taxation; The global financial crisis is estimated to have cost the US Government US$90 billion, or about 0.6% of its annual output. The equivalent cost in New Zealand would be NZ$1.1 billion. But take a look…
Continue reading this entry »
Policy Quarterly, Vol 6, No 2, May 2010., based on a paper presented to a seminar on 16 February, 2010. Keywords: Regulation & Taxation; I begin this paper with a manufacturer’s warning: that I use the term ‘regulation’ slightly differently from the way it is used in some other papers presented in this symposium, coming…
Continue reading this entry »
Sue Bradford’s departure leaves a huge gap in the Greens, and Parliament. Listener: 12 December, 2009. Keywords: Regulation & Taxation; Social Policy; To work properly, the market must be “complete” – that is, all possible transactions must be able to be carried out. For example, those who invested in finance firms such as Bridgecorp should…
Continue reading this entry »