Bryce is a Senior Fellow at The New Zealand Initiative, and also the Director of the Wellington-based economic consultancy firm Capital Economics. Prior to setting this up in 1997 he was a Director of, and shareholder in, First NZ Capital. Before moving into investment banking in 1985, he worked in the New Zealand Treasury, reaching the position of Director. Bryce holds a PhD in economics from the University of Canterbury and was a Harkness Fellow at Harvard University. He is a Fellow of the Law and Economics Association of New Zealand.
Bryce is available for comment on fiscal issues, our poverty, inequality and welfare research. He also has a strong background in public policy analysis including monetary policy, capital markets research and microeconomic advisory work.
Bryce was made an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit in the 2025 New Year's honours for his significant contributions to public policy formation and economic research, spanning his influential work at Treasury during New Zealand's major economic reforms and his extensive research on fiscal discipline and regulatory quality.
Phone: +64 4 499 0790
How seriously does our Reserve Bank take monetary policy? There should be no doubt that it takes it very seriously indeed. Read more
Budget 2023 is an election year budget. Many voters want to be fed (bigger) hand-outs. Read more
The Auditor-General is deeply concerned “about a lack of transparency and accountability over the spending of public money”. On 14 November, he took the extraordinary step of writing to Parliament's Speaker, Adrian Rurawhe and the chairs of two select committees about the problem. Read more
This morning’s newspapers carried a full-page open letter from 42,576 signatories pointing out how undemocratic is one aspect of the Government’s three waters legislation. The Government’s Bill confiscates local communities’ investment in water assets without compensation, and wrecks their future governance. Read more
We at the New Zealand Initiative are aware of an ill-founded view that we are somewhat critical of our much-beloved government. Of course, this “alternative view” has no merit. Read more
Victoria University's Associate Professor Martien Lubberink specialises in banking regulation. In Newsroom, Prof Lubberink warns of unintended consequences of setting extra taxes on current bank profits. Read more
The next incoming government will need to do its policy thinking beforehand if it is to tackle the current policy mess effectively. It will face serious problems in housing, health, education, social welfare, and environmental and planning laws, just to mention the biggest areas. Read more
In 2020, my report, Pharmac: The right prescription? for the New Zealand Initiative found much to compliment in Pharmac’s pursuit of its statutory duty to obtain the best reasonably achievable health outcomes for eligible people from pharmaceuticals within the subsidy budget. Read more
Accurate diagnosis is vital in medicine. Patients want better outcomes. Read more
Are Māori dying earlier because they are Māori? Do Māori lead less healthy lives because they are being discriminated against? Read more
Are Māori dying earlier because they are Māori? Do Māori lead less healthy lives because they are being discriminated against? Read more
Wellington (Tuesday, 30 August 2022) – Fiction over fact is the basis for the Ministry of Health’s (MOH) new policies, research by think tank The New Zealand Initiative reveals. The fact that neither the Government nor the MOH could produce objective data to support their claims that systemic racism is significantly to blame for poor Māori health outcomes is the most alarming revelation in the Initiative’s new report, Every life is worth the same – The case for equal treatment. Read more
Taxpayers commonly work hard to earn the money that governments take in taxes. Knowing the effort sacrificed they naturally want governments to spend that money wisely and well. Read more
Claims the Government can't back up claims systemic racism is to blame for poor Māori health outcomes. Think tank the New Zealand Initiative's, latest report argues health funding should be assigned regardless of race. Read more
An op-ed published by Dr. Bryce Wilkinson from the NZ Initiative has come out. It essentially is rebutting what many have been saying in that New Zealand’s inflation rate is a result of deliberate Reserve Bank decisions back in 2020 to save jobs and the economy at the expense of inflation. Read more