Labour Green fiscal framework
As widely reported this morning, Labour and the Greens have set out an agreed fiscal framework. Smart politics.
Economy
Posts on the economy, work, business, income, and labour
A taxing question or two
Apple aren’t paying tax – are we doing all we can so multi-national’s do pay their share? And would the public actually prefer a tax rise (and decent housing/ health / education) rather than a tax cut?
Oil prospecting on the shores of Lake Te Anau?
The Nats are buying another fight with NZ’s nature lovers. Last time they tried something like this 50,000 marched in Auckland and they were forced to back down.
Climate Change and Us
3 major environmental reports today – the OECD says our economy is beyond environmental limits; a cross party group of MPs sponsor research into the way to net zero emissions; and the World Meteorological Organisation has a stark look at continued climate change.
OECD: NZ growth model reaching its environmental limits
New Zealand is about to reach the limits of growth.
Living Economies Expo
“Imagine a country which respects the living planet; whose people enjoy fair land tenure, good housing, good health, wholesome food, a rewarding livelihood, free education, a compassionate justice system, and an adequate income: a country with an inclusive democracy grounded in vibrant communities.”
National’s water problem
The Government’s timid backdown on water charging is placing it in a very uncomfortable position.
NRT: “Too hard”
No Right Turn: “The real barrier to National … acting on this is because that “no-one owns water, first come, first served” policy disproportionately benefits one group and allows them to profiteer from a public resource while destroying its value to others. That group is farmers – and they donate to the National Party.”
Fix our tax law!
Multinationals exploit our tax laws to pay no tax in NZ. Matt Nippert has been doing great work on this, and his latest this weekend on Apple is a powerful example. Planned changes to our laws don’t go far enough. We need to fix this. What’s the downside? What’s the delay?
Sunday Book Club
What if our production methods were designed to produce health, beauty, and permanence?
Reducing substance abuse – what actually works
If, instead of macho posturing (like the “War on P”), we wanted to actually tackle substance abuse, we would be looking at what actually works. Interesting case study in Iceland.
TS Book Club this Sunday
We will be discussing Small is Beautiful – Economics as if People Mattered by E. F. Schumacher.
Murdoch on the tax-cut striptease (NSFW)
Dear Izzy
Married couple, increase after tax $8.36 a fortnight each or $4.18 each a week!!!!! Disposable Income, 0.5971428 each a day !!!! Goes up on April 1st, how the hell did they arrive at this sum?
I find out.
Free market efficiency in health – not
The idea of free market efficiency is not nearly as powerful or universal as its (often fanatical) proponents would have us believe. The sorry state of the USA’s health system is yet another compelling example of its limitations.
There are no surpluses
There are no surpluses in NZ right now, not in any real sense. There is only debt, negative externalities and deferred costs.
English flogging National’s one-trick pony
Never mind the record debt, the dropped contributions to the Cullen fund, the housing crisis, rising poverty, the deteriorating health system, the costs of quake rebuilds, the filthy water, the need to prepare for climate change – never mind all that, have an election bribe!
A tenant’s tale
“And when I saw that article in the NZ Herald this morning , in light of whats been happening to so many New Zealander family’s having to sleep in cars and the like over the past few years – I thought ”FUCK IT !!”… Im going to say something.”
Household debt
The IMF warns that our household debt is far too high, as desperate tenants start raiding the Kiwisaver accounts to pay the rent.
2040? The robots will have taken over
Bill English’s new super plan falls between 2 stools. The super cost crisis that he’s trying to summon up, is before 2040 if it exists. The solution was the Cullen Fund. By 2040 you’re just adding yet another Baby Boomer cost onto GenX and the millenials, and there’s going to be a shortage of jobs anyway, without adding 65 & 66 year-olds to our dole queues.
The gender pay gap – grandstanding but no action
A new report has some really interesting findings on the gender pay gap. Paula Bennett engaged in a bit of grandstanding, but it rings completely hollow given National’s history on the issue.
Happy International Women’s Day.
English a shambles
English isn’t going to be very happy when he opens the papers this morning.
English proposes raising age of super to 67 (eventually)
In what seems to have been a panicked reaction to a disastrous series of interviews, English has just announced that the age of eligibility for super will rise from 65 to 67, phased in from 2037.
NRT: The banality of evil
I/S at No Right Turn: “This is where National’s cuts and austerity have taken us: to a place where Corrections tortures and abuses people because it is the “cheapest” way of managing them.”
Social investment meets the surveillance state
First they came for the budgeting services. Now we know that every social service agency has to provide clients’ private personal data to […]
English puts super back on the line
In what was apparently a pretty dire interview on The Nation this morning, Bill English dropped one bombshell, possible changes in superannuation. For the record I think English is right on this. For a change.
The social damage wrought by homes as commoditites
A recent UN report highlights the waste of treating homes as commodities. It should sound awfully familiar in the NZ context.
Fancy a free holiday to NZ?
Apparently we are this desperate for IT workers. Probably not quite the angle they were looking for, but I guess it did get attention…
Two editorials on immigration
Two very contrasting opinion pieces on racism, housing, jobs, and the immigration debate.
English hammered on ‘druggies’ smear
English will be worried that he got hammered like this, when Key got away with all sorts of insults and lies. And if you think your fellow Kiwis are useless workers you’re doing it wrong.
The Nats’ new ‘swimmable’ rivers aren’t
Under the new standards we have up to a 1 in 6 risk of serious infection at the times that we actually swim in rivers, and Smith is trying to hide this fact by fudging around with year-long averages. David Parker’s analysis yesterday was bang on.
Off the track
Off the Track is the 10th State of the Nation report from The Salvation Army’s Social Policy and Parliamentary Unit. Many of the markers routinely analysed for the report currently suggest we are not heading in the best direction for New Zealand as a whole. The Auckland Fabians have a lecture by Alan Johnson on the report on Thursday in Auckland.
Homeless crisis hidden in plain sight
Bill blames the blowout in emergency housing grants on the “hidden homeless”. Hidden only from those who will not see. Hidden only from a government that deliberately chooses for political reasons not to collect the relevant data.
Bill’s bigoted drug reckons vs the evidence
Some folks Bill knows are telling him stuff and he’s basing immigration policy on it. The facts say otherwise. Bill English is full of shit and it’s time that more media called him on it.
Housing crisis what housing crisis
The Government’s estimate of the extent of the housing crisis has recently been shown to be totally out of touch and to add further pathos it is counting kiwi families urgently housed in motels in tourism statistics.
You can’t afford a house because of – plants!
I’m used to hearing some pretty pathetic excuses out of the National government. But this will really take some beating.