This is an extract from the first chapter of the history book I am writing. In early 1855 there was an earthquake in the centre of Cook Strait, thought to be of a magnitude of about 8.1-8.2, the largest in human memory. [1] (Maori elders said there was no record in their traditions of an…
Continue reading this entry »
This was an essay I wrote for a competition; when I realised it it did not not meet the competition rules, I did not submit it. While writing a history of New Zealand from an economic perspective, I have been continually confronted by the environment as an integral part of New Zealand’s history. This is…
Continue reading this entry »
Science Express: 2 August, 2012; Te Papa Tongarewa. I am writing a history of New Zealand from an economic perspective. It’s about two thirds complete – up to the 1970s, with 250,000 words of text – that is already about three conventionally sized books. Tonight I am going to talk about one aspect of the…
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: 17 September, 2011. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Governance; The cinema may give a good idea about the sewers of Paris and Vienna, but I have little idea what goes on underneath the city in which I live. I just pull the plug or chain and the waste magically disappears. For the citizens of Christchurch,…
Continue reading this entry »
Making the emissions trading scheme “affordable” may hit future generations hard. Listener: 10 October, 2009. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Distributional Economics; Global warming is a consequence of a market failure: polluters emit chemicals without having to pay the price of their emissions. Some sort of taxation regime would no doubt make the…
Continue reading this entry »
Report prepared for Te Maru o Ngati Rangiwewehi (June 2009) Keywords: Environment & Resources; Maori; Introduction My name is Brian Henry Easton. I am an independent scholar with particular expertise in economics, social statistics and public policy analysis. I hold a D.Sc. from the University of Canterbury and am an adjunct professor at the Institute…
Continue reading this entry »
Statement of Evidence of Brian Henry Easton in an Appeal Under The Resource Management Act 1991 between Margaret and Stephen Thompson Marlborough District Council (Env-2006-WLG-000038) Keywords: Environment & Resources; Regulation & Taxation; Introduction I. My name is Brian Henry Easton. I am an independent scholar with particular expertise in economics, social statistics…
Continue reading this entry »
Revised version of the paper to 7X7 seminar, Wellington, 22 July, 2008 Keywords: History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy; What is the purpose of it all? For 200 years economists have assumed that the more material goods the better, and the purpose of the economy was to supply those goods. The notion that…
Continue reading this entry »
Paper to MSD seminar of the Social Impacts of the Emissions Trading Scheme, Thursday 28 February, 2008. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Thankyou for the invitation to talk today. It is a pleasure to be working again with Computable General Equilibrium Models. In the early 1980s New Zealand was a world leader in CGE…
Continue reading this entry »
This was a draft an affidavit I prepared for the Environment Court. in November 2007. It was rules out as not relevant to the proceedings. It is included here because it shows an ingenious method for valuing physical resources in some instances. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Maori; Introduction My name is Brian…
Continue reading this entry »
This is a note I prepared for some colleagues. written on October 1, 2007. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Governance; Seeking sustainability is like transforming the economy. It is always going on and there is no once in a lifetime policy, although (as for the economic transformation) there are periods of acceleration. …
Continue reading this entry »
Limit Your Carbon Emissions for Honourable Reasons, But Don’t Expect the World to Follow. Listener: 11 August, 2007. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Globalisation & Trade; It will not be easy for the world to solve the threat of global warming. It requires collective action, but there is no supranational political entity to…
Continue reading this entry »
Revised commentary on “Energy Policy, Climate Change and Targets”, by Jonathon Boston. To the Institute of Policy Studies Roundtable on Energy Policy and Climate Change: Tuesday 20 March 2007. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Regulation & Taxation; Targeting is a form of indicative planning. What have we learned from past exercises? First we need a taxonomy,…
Continue reading this entry »
MMP has reduced policy extremism, but more consensus politics are needed to solve our big economic questions Listener: 21 October, 2006. Keywords: Environment & Resources; Governance; The rise in personality politics is an unexpected consequence of MMP. Certainly there are other factors, including a change in the US political debate (recall the attacks…
Continue reading this entry »
Guest Column for http://norightturn.blogspot.com/ 16 October, 2006. Keywords: Environment & Resources; There appears to be a tendency to pose carbon taxes as the only economic way to address carbon emissions. But tradeable emission permits (TEPs) are a serviceable alternative which have both strengths and weaknesses over carbon taxes. Their greatest strength may be…
Continue reading this entry »
Keywords: Environment & Resources; Introduction This is a response to the IPS Bio-fuels seminar series of July-August 2006. It is is both a reflection of what I learned and an attempt to put it in an economic framework. It may be useful to begin with a little of my view of economics….
Continue reading this entry »
Listener 3 June 2006.
Keywords: Environment & Resources; Political Economy & History;
The last time I talked with Rod Donald was shortly after the 2005 election, walking along Lambton Quay. Rod was very disappointed with the election outcome, for his Green Party lost voter share, and hence seats. He thought that the scurrilous anti-Green election pamphlet did a lot of damage. I said that anyone who thought it valid was too ignorant to vote Green, although it damaged the Greens when the new government was being formed.
“Peak Oil: Economic, Political & Environmental Impacts” Monday 26th September, organised by the VUW chaplaincy.
Keywords: Environment & Resources;
When we were young we assumed that our parents will live for ever. As adolescents, we realise they will die one day, but at a time so far in the future it hardly seems relevant. As mature adults we realise that day is closing in, and we wonder what it will be like when they go. And so they pass on, but you survive in the world without them – perhaps, like me, missing them.
Listener: 26 March, 2005
Keywords: Environment & Resources;
One day the world’s total oil production will peak, and decline thereafter. Some experts think that it will be this year or next, others predict that the peak is decades off. In 1979, British Petroleum experts predicted that it would happen in 1985. Forecasting the date involves a complicated assessment of future oil demands, production possibilities and costs of depleting fields, the discovery of new fields, and the extent to which alternative fuels will substitute.
But one day – probably in our lifetime – the world’s total oil production is going to peak.