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.
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NZX is the big winner among listed companies this year according to Bloomberg – its share price is 56% up on the year. Why? Asset sales. No wonder Weldon is smiling – He owns more than 6 million NZX shares. At least one happy Dad, already. And just on his mate John Key’s promise.
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.
See Small on Hager yesterday? He’s all like “of course I knew we’re working with US intelligence but I
didn’t tell you because, duh, it’s not important”. It was the same story with the Hollow Men and the secret tape revelations. Wonder what other “unimportant” stuff journos don’t tell us in the interests of maintaining access and being part of the elite.
Remember those thundering editorials and opinion pieces chastising Labour for focusing on trivia instead of the substantive issues?
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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.
Weekend social is for non political chat. What’s on for the weekend, gigs, film or book reviews, sports, or whatever. No politics, no […]
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.
National promised to get tough ‘undeserving’ state house tenants. (always someone to get tough on when maintaining the privileges of the elite) The first targets were 3 women and their kids, judged guilty by association with their partners who were charged with burglary (the charges were dropped). 2 years and $1m wasted and the government has given up.
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.
With echoes of 2002, Nicky Hager has delivered a potentially explosive book in the run up to a general election.
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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.
Spotted in an English pub. Check out the artist’s name.
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.
Fran O’Sullivan calls on the government to act on Christchurch. Good luck with that. This is not a government of action. It is the wrong government for these challenging times.
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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.
Some advice if you are planning on joining the many kiwi’s that have left the country to go to Australia since National made it their aspiration to do something about that migration trend. They certainly have massively increased the outflow – one of their few success stories. But where to go to in aussie?
The Nats say their ‘expectation’ is 30% of the assets they want privatise would go straight to foreigners. That’s just their lowside guess. More would be sold offshore by Kiwi buyers. Get $2b cash now from foreigners now. Lose $300m in returns year after year after year forever. And lose control of our future. Doesn’t add up.
Tracy Watkins admits today’s Fairfax poll is pretty out of whack but there’s no denying the trend has turned against Labour in the past few months. People back the policy. That’s not the problem. Labour will still be hoping to close up 5% or so in the campaign. On the positive side: what a result for the Greens!
Where National Standards is only the answer to “what keeps other countries from catching our education system?”
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Good human interest story in the DomPost today about the human costs of public service jobs cuts. A Wellington woman has written a […]
The estimate of the liability for costs of the Christchurch quakes has just been more than doubled. Thank goodness or the foresight of the first Labour government who set up the EQC in 1947.
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.
Rijab looks at how social media can be a useful tool for political parties but how it also needs to be used carefully, lest it come back to hurt you. Red Alert and Frogblog are very free, with MPs writing what they want and relatively loose moderation, whereas NationalMPs is insipid and tightly controlled – who has taken the smarter course?
Irene is yet another example of the significant increase in extreme weather that we’re seeing all around the globe. But this warning will be ignored like all the rest.
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I was going to do a post on the ACT party list. But then I realised that I just don’t care.
We know that our carbon pollution is damaging the climate – making the atmosphere warmer and less stable – but it also makes the sea more acidic. Ocean Acidification means the aquaculture industry could be in big trouble by the middle of the century, not to mention the rest of the fishing industry. But the government blithely ignores the problem.
