A fairer 9 day fortnight
National’s 9-day fortnight will save only 2-3% of the jobs that are expected to be lost in the recession. It’s a trifling investment […]
Economy
economy
Key’s to-do list
Cutting through the spin on ACC
We’ve heard a lot of panicky comments in the last few weeks about a ‘cost blowout’ at ACC. We’re told there is $22 […]
Daily show vs CNBC
Last week, Jon Stewart poked fun at the media who cheer-led the housing and stockmarket bubbles and are now blaming the people who […]
Brief thoughts on the 9 day fortnight
The 9 day fortnight scheme has finally been announced but I’ve got a few questions: Why do the taxpayer and the worker have […]
No free trade deal
The Obama administration has halted free trade talks with New Zealand. On one hand free trade is simply increased freedom of capital and […]
Gordon Campbell states the obvious
Gordon Campbell has been having fun pointing the finger at Treasury in “How Treasury put us on the hook to finance companies“. Essentially […]
Explaining the recession
The EPMU have released a short film on youtube explaining the recession and their response to it. It features Brian Easton, Gareth Morgan, […]
Worth a thousand words
Helps if it’s pointing the right way, too. Great work Adders.
Softening up
A few points on the ACC issue and one on Kiwirail. Nick Smith says that, with assets of $10 and liabilities of $21 […]
Speculation laffs
The Atlases shrug, ‘I dunno’
In the Dom yesterday, Hollow man star Richard Long was full of praise for the Key’s PR team, who managed the Jobs Summit. […]
Key writes off Sealord jobs
Despite making sound profits Sealord are laying off 180 workers in Nelson. They claim the move is part of restructuring and that there […]
Funny because it’s true
This has to be the funniest political cartoon I’ve seen in some time, and it’s true too. The innovation we need has to […]
You’ve got to know to understand (and be able to talk about it)
In the greatest economic crisis in a lifetime, we remain the only country in the world whose government has done nothing to try […]
Granny’s little fit
The crazy right-wing antics of today’s Herald would be funny if it wasn’t for the fact it’s the main paper in New Zealand’s […]
No, you leave YOUR ideology at the door
There’s all this rubbish at the moment about people moving beyond ideology. At the Jobs Summit, attendees were harangued to ‘leave your ideology […]
Re: cycle
According to Stuff: “Another idea on the table [at the Jobs Summit] is a $50 million cycleway built the length of the country. […]
The cost of doing (next to) nothing
Bill English is holding the country’s purse like an old woman on the subway. Far from doing what every other country is doing, injecting […]
Views from the Job Summit
– “Very clear that this is all about showing a consensus behind Key. That’s the mood among my colleagues. Seen some unionists about, […]
Herald: “we’ll dig our way out of this hole”
The Herald is again demonstrating its economic ignorance with its call for spending cuts in today’s editorial: Something has to give. If National […]
What’s Bill planning?
Yesterday, Finance Minister Bill English made a big deal over the loss the New Zealand Superannuation Fund incurred last year. When you don’t […]
Brian Easton’s DL talk now online
For those of you who missed Brian Easton’s recent talk on the recession at Drinking Liberally Wgtn (or just couldn’t hear over the […]
Don’t kill the Cullen Fund
Michael Littlewood has made a career of advocating superannuation privatisation and is part of an international organisation called Pension Reforms dedicated to the […]
Being stupid on the economy
Brian Fallow has some extraordinarily good analysis of the economic situation in his piece today. Here’s some important passages (and my, unfortunately, extensive […]
Sleight of hand
We’ve been saying for some time that the $9 billion of fiscal stimulus that the Government claims it is putting into the economy […]
Fueling the PR machine ain’t cheap
Just like petrol prices, the cost of fueling National’s PR machine is on the rise. Tracy Watkins reports that “National has employed 18 […]
That’s strange
An hour ago No Right Turn posted a piece citing what was apparently a Ministry of Social Development press release, which he says was “confirmation that […]
“We are all socialists now”
“We are all socialists now”, or so says the cover of the latest Newsweek. And to be fair, you’ve got to start wondering […]
Why do dummies lead our national debates?
Why does the Business Roundtable employ an economic illiterate to represent them to the public and argue their corner on macroeconomics? Here’s some […]
You’ve got to know to ask the questions that matter
When I heard Shell is looking at selling its service stations in NZ and its shares in Fulton Hogan, my initial thought was […]
Faking it
It’s a bit late but I thought I’d draw people’s attention to the work Pundit’s Tim Watkin has been doing on the government’s […]
Do they know its credit crunch time?
Great video for the real victims of this recession, the ‘smartest men in the room’ who cocked everything up, the money-men. Bleed the […]
Wake up, Bill
Bill English is living in a dream, and he may create a nightmare for the rest of us. Last week, he said the […]
Sugar rush
John Key and Tracey Watkins have both (completely by coincidence) said we must avoid responding to the recession with a ‘sugar rush’ of […]
What we should be doing
As IrishBill has said, National’s so-called ‘kick-start’ is pretty underwhelming – bringing forward a few more roads and a bigger bridge so that […]