Posts on the economy, work, business, income, and labour
Written By: - Date published: 10:47 am, September 6th, 2011 - 15 comments
The New York Times has a graphic comparing the outcomes of economic policy in the US, specifically comparing the broadly social democratic policies prevalent between 1847 and 1979, and the NeoLiberal policies since 1980. The differences are astounding.
Written By: - Date published: 10:05 pm, September 5th, 2011 - 123 comments
The stories coming out of the Pike inquiry paint a picture of a company with a basic disregard for workers’s safety.
But we shouldn’t expect anything else after thirty years of putting the interests of business ahead of everyone else.
Written By: - Date published: 9:41 am, September 5th, 2011 - 45 comments
Denis Tegg on National’s head in the sand Energy Strategy. All the official international warnings have been dismissed and the government has forced official to remove any reference to peak oil. The minister flatly refused to answer questions about the impact of peak oil on her fossil-fuel centred plan at the strategy launch.
Written By: - Date published: 11:00 am, September 4th, 2011 - 66 comments
Reading the political spin from David Farrar (channeling Bill English) over the weekend, I have to keep reminding myself that he really has very little idea about the practicalities of business. Where he is concerned about political costs, I find from a perspective of an exporter that I’m far more concerned about reliability of services.
Written By: - Date published: 11:51 am, September 3rd, 2011 - 14 comments
Guns don’t kill people, the old saw goes. People do. By the same token, corporations don’t dodge taxes. People do. The people who run corporations are reaping awesomely lavish rewards for the tax dodging they have their corporations do. A report from the Institute of Policy Studies shows that 25 major U.S. corporations last year paid their chief executives more than they paid Uncle Sam in federal income taxes. Creative accounting is also a problem here.
Written By: - Date published: 7:29 am, September 3rd, 2011 - 48 comments
Remember those thundering editorials and opinion pieces chastising Labour for focusing on trivia instead of the substantive issues?
Written By: - Date published: 6:45 pm, September 2nd, 2011 - 11 comments
Professor Robert Wade of the London School of Economics and author of the acclaimed Governing the Market will speak on this topic at LHT2, Rutherford House, Bunny Street, Wellington at 6pm on Thursday 22nd September. All are welcome to attend this free lecture; if you wish to come please register here as places may be limited. Click through to see abstract.
Written By: - Date published: 12:41 pm, September 2nd, 2011 - 29 comments
The wealthy elite in Europe are now joining Warren Buffett in these calls for higher taxes for the rich (including CGT), why? Maybe it’s because they know the truth, they know that the world is likely to enter another global recession, and they know the risk this will bring to social cohesion, which they rely on for maintaining the lifestyle they enjoy.
Written By: - Date published: 11:07 am, September 2nd, 2011 - 11 comments
Written By: - Date published: 9:07 am, September 2nd, 2011 - 11 comments
The Tertiary Education Union has revealed that 350 jobs are for the chop at Canterbury University – 18% of the workforce. The Uni, hardly reassuringly, says its 100 to 500. The Nats blame the quake. That’s rubbish. These kind of cuts will permanently gut the Uni, leaving it in no position to be part of the recovery. National: the anti-education government.
Written By: - Date published: 1:33 pm, September 1st, 2011 - 92 comments
This afternoon Labour released a substantial policy package targeting youth unemployment. Once again the public is being offered a choice between Labour’s realistic response to a significant problem, and more do-nothing smile and wave.
Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, September 1st, 2011 - 47 comments
Spotted in an English pub. Check out the artist’s name.
Written By: - Date published: 9:33 am, September 1st, 2011 - 21 comments
Paul Reynolds is leaving Telecom having pocketed tens of millions and seen the value of the company halve. He follows in the footsteps of Theresa ‘Goldeneye’ Gattung who lost Telecom shareholders billions and has put the millions she was paid in gold. Isn’t something broken when bad CEOs paid so much? Danyl notes that’s not the exception, it’s the rule.
Written By: - Date published: 10:31 am, August 31st, 2011 - 39 comments
National’s Energy Strategy has been roundly criticised. The promises of more renewables and energy efficiency are more ‘aspirational’ fluff with no plan to actually get there. And, worse, the heart of the strategy works against sustainability and environmental responsibility – it’s all about drilling up and burning more oil. I/S at NoRightTurn explains.
Written By: - Date published: 10:45 am, August 30th, 2011 - 38 comments
Free trade is meant to be about opening up markets for our exports so that we can improve our trade balance and, ultimately, become less indebted as a nation. Yet the opposite seems to be happening. Darkhorse shows that this is the experience of all countries that lower their trade barriers in a still largely protectionist world.
Written By: - Date published: 7:13 am, August 29th, 2011 - 75 comments
One of the lies at the heart of the Nats’ approach to industrial relations is that negotiating directly with the employer “empowers” the individual worker and allows them to get better wages and conditions. The facts prove otherwise.
Written By: - Date published: 3:28 pm, August 28th, 2011 - 14 comments
Brian Gaynor notes vampire economics of neoliberalism means nearly all the largest listed companies are either privatised former public assets and/or monopolies thanks to government regulation. The capitalist elite has failed to generate wealth and stripped previously privatised assets. Now, their party, the Nats, plans to suck out more of our public wealth.
Written By: - Date published: 12:17 pm, August 28th, 2011 - 21 comments
Like many countries worldwide, New Zealand has an aging problem. Digging around the available charts it isn’t hard to see why. But New Zealand has less of a problem than many developed countries because of the demographics of our Maori and Pacifica populations plus the continuing immigration. It is still pretty bad.
Written By: - Date published: 1:13 pm, August 27th, 2011 - 67 comments
Following the release of data by the Chief Coroner, suicide is once again getting some time in the headlines. Coincidentally, news from Christchurch supports the suggestion that stronger communities reduce suicide rates.
Written By: - Date published: 9:09 am, August 27th, 2011 - 64 comments
According to John Key all New Zealanders have a socialist streak. But wait, there’s more…
Written By: - Date published: 7:48 am, August 27th, 2011 - 80 comments
Extracts from an article by Dr Campbell Jones (Senior Lecturer in Sociology, University of Auckland). Who creates wealth? Is wealth evidence of merit?
Written By: - Date published: 7:23 am, August 26th, 2011 - 103 comments
Remember Greg Clydesdale? He caused quite a fuss in 2008 when the Dom uncritically ran a frontpage story based on his “research” that concluded Pacific Islanders are a drain on a society who are, amongst other sins, crowding ‘our’ beaches. Well, he’s back, spouting more anti-immigrant trash, and Farrar’s blowing the dog-whistle for him.
Written By: - Date published: 12:19 pm, August 25th, 2011 - 42 comments
Angry Old White Man Party (ACT) Leader Don Brash is to launch another attack on young people. It’s strange that this once significant and principled party has sent its dying days picking the on the young. The latest stupid idea is to remove the minimum wage for under 20s altogether and cut spending to cut taxes that the rich pay.
Written By: - Date published: 12:10 pm, August 25th, 2011 - 23 comments
The government reckons it can cut the number of public sector workers without cutting services. That wasn’t the experience of the 80s and 90s when vital institutional knowledge and expertise were lost in a frenzy of asset sales, privatisation and brutal job cuts– when public service numbers dropped from around 85,000 public servants to under 30,000 […]
Written By: - Date published: 11:01 am, August 24th, 2011 - 17 comments
Written By: - Date published: 10:14 am, August 24th, 2011 - 20 comments
It’s interesting to watch the economists flip as the economic system implodes. The most dramatic (and welcome!) NZ example has been Bernard Hickey but many of his colleagues are also throwing off their neoliberal blinkers. In this post, a former NZ Reserve Bank adviser explains why the world economy is mired in crisis and why it won’t just fix itself.
Written By: - Date published: 6:17 am, August 24th, 2011 - 106 comments
Gareth Morgan and Susan Guthrie’s piece in the Herald brilliantly elucidates the crisis of capitalism and the inadequacy of an economic system that only recognises value in work that produces market goods and services. Their book, The Big Kahuna, on their alternative tax system has just been published and I found these videos of Morgan explaining.
Written By: - Date published: 12:44 pm, August 23rd, 2011 - 33 comments
Written By: - Date published: 11:48 am, August 22nd, 2011 - 43 comments
Pike River had lax safety systems. Profits came first. The workforce was highly casualised to weaken the bargaining power of the union. The boss, Peter Whittall, will end up getting the blame. Labour says it will restore miners’ power over their safety by bringing back check inspectors. It’s now up to the Nats to explain why they won’t.
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