Turnoff
UPDATE: Thanks to commenter T-Rex for reversing the cartoon to show workers taking a disastrous right turn. Far too much time on your […]
Economy
workers’ rights
Sacked
In perhaps the most unsurprising announcement of the year, National has let slip it’s going to maintain its 90 day no rights policy, […]
The right incentives?
National tells us that, if we put the right incentives in place, people will work harder and their incomes will go up. National […]
Beyond the political showboating
Ok. Now that the political theatre is done maybe National and its allies would like to engage in proper debate on the freight […]
On Freedom
It is time for the Left to take back the language of freedom. At its heart freedom, power for the ordinary person, is what […]
Report shows incomes up, inequality down
The MSD’s Incomes Report provides a wealth of information. For instance, here’s how the mean and median household incomes have moved since 1982. […]
Question
Howcome when capital goes on strike over political issues it’s seen as a legitimate part of democracy, but if workers tried the same […]
Time to front up on ACC
Some excellent journalism by Vernon Small has revealed that Australian insurers expect National to privatise the ACC scheme and they see $200 million […]
Merrill Lynch: Nats will privatise ACC
It’s refreshing to see some proper investigative journalism in this morning’s Dominion Post, with a revelation from Vernon Small that while National continues […]
Bill to protect workers from labour-hire vultures
Labour, with the support of New Zealand First, has developed a bill based on Darien Fenton’s private members’ bill that will ensure tens […]
PSA broadens tax debate
It’s good to see the PSA broadening the public debate on tax cuts with a UMR poll showing the majority of Kiwis don’t […]
You call that policy? This is policy
National has released a brochure, laying out all its policies. They take up two A4 pages of double-spaced bullet points. That’s incredibly lightweight. […]
The grass isn’t greener across the ditch
The cornerstone of National’s ‘New Zealand sucks’ campaign is that Australia is much better (and we have to lower taxes and slash work […]
The headline you didn’t see
‘Unemployment benefits at record low.’ The number of people receiving the unemployment benefit has fallen to just 17,465. That’s the lowest number since […]
Act now to protect workers’ wages
Times are going to get harder for workers in the next few years. Unemployment is set […]
Creeping socialism in Australia
Kevin Rudd’s Labor government has begun the roll-back of John Howard’s unpopular WorkChoices legislation with ten new National Employment Standards aimed at providing […]
Slippery John’s “after-tax incomes” line
You’ll have noticed that Key only ever talks about increasing ‘after-tax incomes’. Even when he’s asked about wages for government employees, like doctors, […]
Facing up to peak oil
The Government’s independent report on petrol prices is bit of a sop to be the public, really. The world oil price is driving […]
Kremlinology: National on ACC
In most countries, accident insurance is big business. Insurers and lawyers make billions off premiums, claims, and court cases but many people don’t […]
The wage gap and the Nats’ crediblity gap
Remember when National was all about the wage gap, whinging about it every day? Heard them talk about it lately? The last mention […]
Notional Policy: Kiwisaver
Tracy Watkins reported yesterday that National’s weakening of the employer contribution to Kiwisaver may take a different path to the one we envisaged. […]
Gosche to retire
Mark Gosche has announced he will retire from politics at the election. Gosche has represented the people of Maungakiekie for 12 years and, […]
“pretty similar”
I noticed an interesting comment from Ferdinand in our Kiwisaver thread yesterday: I signed up to Kiwisaver based on the 4% employer contribution […]
Kremlinology: National and Kiwisaver
National’s refusal to say what it stands for is becoming so ridiculous we have resorted to the Cold War art of Kremlinology. Today, […]
National’s cruel hoax
Well the budget is out and across the country the public are looking at their tax cuts and asking “is that it?” and […]
Lazy academic calls Pacific Island workers lazy
Economist Greg Clydesdale has released a report in which he says Pacific Islanders are a drain on the New Zealand economy (exhibiting “significant […]
National still won’t say what they’d do
Seemingly content to coast along on the “time for a change” sentiment, the National Party are still refusing to offer any substantive details […]
Kremlinology: National on work rights
National’s refusal to say what it stands for is becoming so ridiculous we have resorted to the Cold War art of Kremlinology. Today, […]
On the distribution of income
See that line that says minimum wage? Nearly half of kiwis earn less than that. Seven months ago, that was me. I was […]
Junk pay
The last couple of episodes of Fair Go have rightly taken aim at a distribution company – Reachmedia – that rips off young kids by paying […]
Nats’ attack on union hits High Court
Today National will be explaining to the High Court why it wants the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union’s 50,000 members to be denied […]
Stop ANZ National’s race to the bottom
A few weeks back ANZ National announced that over the next 12-18 months they plan to export 400-500 New Zealand jobs to Bangalore. […]
Unemployment figures
Unemployment rose from 3.4% to 3.6% between the December and March quarters. The number of people employed fell 15,000 from 2,162,000 in the […]
Workers be careful, says Aussie Unionist
Sharan Burrow (President of Australian Council of Trade Unions) talked to Morning Report about the union experiences in Australia under a conservative government, […]
Wages up at record rate
The Labour Cost Index rose a record 3.4% for the March year. That means wages and salaries for doing the same job rose […]
I’ve got a solution, what’s the problem?
The junior doctors’ strike is a difficult issue. On the one hand, these are highly valuable workers whom we can’t afford to lose […]