Eric is the Chief Economist at The New Zealand Initiative. With the Initiative, he has worked in policy areas ranging from freshwater management to policy for earthquake preparedness, and from local government to technology policy. He has recently focused on policy related to Covid-19 response. He served as Lecturer and Senior Lecturer in Economics at the Department of Economics & Finance at the University of Canterbury from 2003 through 2014.
Eric’s columns and commentary appear regularly in New Zealand’s major media outlets, as well as on his blog, Offsetting Behaviour. He can also be found on Twitter at @ericcrampton .
Submission: Transforming Recycling - Container Return Scheme (2022)
Submission: Wellington Council on the Draft Economic Wellbeing Strategy (2022)
Submission: Managing exotic afforestation incentives (2022)
Submission: The market study into residential building supplies preliminary issues paper (2022)
Submission: Issues raised at the consultation conference on the Commission's market study into the retail grocery sector draft report (2021)
Submission: Resource management enabling housing supply and other matters Amendment Bill (2021)
Submission: Covid-19 public health response Amendment Bill (no 2) (2021)
Research Note: Safer arrivals and the path to 2022 (2021)
Submission: The market study into the retail grocery sector draft report (2021)
Fording the rapids: Charting a course to fresher water (2021)
Submission: Proposals for a smokefree Aotearoa 2025 action plan (2021)
Submission: Inquiry into congestion pricing in Auckland (2021)
Policy Point: A risky place to do business (2021)
Roadmap for Recovery: Briefing to the Incoming Government (2020)
Submission: Smokefree environments and regulated products Act 1990: Proposals for regulations (2021)
Democracy in the Dark (2020)
Research Note: Safe Arrivals (2020)
Policy Point: Open for minds: export education and recovery (2020)
Submission: Smokefree environments and regulated products (vaping) Amendment Bill (2020)
Policy Point: Stay on Target (2020)
Research Note: Effective Treatment: Public policy prescription for a pandemic (2020)
Policy Point: Time to process (2020)
Scroll down to read the rest of Eric's work.
Phone: +64 4 499 0790
In Douglas Adams’s classic Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series, Wonko the Sane realised that the world had gone mad. He had seen the instructions on the side of a packet of toothpicks. Read more
We all know the old joke that an economist would look for his keys under a lamp post not because that’s where he’d dropped them, but because that’s where the light is. But sometimes new lamp posts add the necessary extra bit of illumination. Read more
Today could see another historic milestone for the New Zealand economy. Unemployment is expected to fall from its current level of 3.2 percent, which is already the lowest since records began. Read more
In 2010, the National-led government launched a rather substantial experiment. Auckland City’s smaller councils were forced to amalgamate into a supercity structure. Read more
It isn’t crazy to claim that New Zealand’s school system lacks ambition. Or, if it is, our shop has been crazy for a while. Read more
Belief that interest should be reinstated on student loans to allow learners to borrow more while studying. One economist says because the Government is subsidising the interest costs of student borrowing, it's up against lending constraints. Read more
Director of Economics for the Infrastructure Commission, Peter Nunns, talks to Eric Crampton, Chief Economist for The New Zealand Initiative, about his research on the size and scope of local government, as well as funding and financing mechanisms. For more, please read the Infrastructure Commission’s report, authored by Peter Nunns and Nadine Dodge, “Does size matter? The impact of local government structure on cost efficiency.” Read the podcast transcript here. Read more
Budget 2022 allocated just over $2.5 million a year, over four years, to the Customs Service to help it stop cigarette smuggling. I wonder whether it will be enough. Read more
A long queue of people form a circle. Each has a coin purse slung over a shoulder. Read more
If there were no better way of solving the problem, one could forgive how central government has approached water infrastructure reform. Some councils have done a very poor job in maintaining their pipes. Read more
On Sunday, the government announced an extension of the petrol excise and Road User Charge holiday, as well as half-price public transport, until the end of the year. The Beehive’s press release said that the move would reduce headline inflation by 0.5 percentage points. Read more
Dr Eric Crampton and Christopher Snowdon, Head of Lifestyle Economics at the Institute of Economic Affairs, discuss New Zealand's change in legislation for vaping products. To listen to our latest podcasts, please subscribe to The New Zealand Initiative podcast on iTunes, Spotify or The Podcast App. Read more
As an exemplar of the purest form of Kiwi anti-growth, anti-development orientation, it is hard to beat. If New Zealand doesn’t beat this particular habit, it is very hard to be optimistic about anything other than emigration. Read more
Eric Crampton discusses with Tova O'Brien on Today FM whether we should ban single use plastic bottles and phase them out with the rest of single use plastics. Read more
The economists descended on Wellington last week. Or, at least, many shuffled their way from the Ministries over to Victoria University to meet with academics from across the country for the annual three-day conference of the New Zealand Association of Economists. Read more