Eric Crampton is Chief Economist with the New Zealand Initiative.
He applies an economist’s lens to a broad range of policy areas, from devolution and housing policy to student loans and environmental policy. He served on Minister Twyford’s Urban Land Markets Research Group and on Minister Bishop’s Housing Economic Advisory Group.
Most recently, he has been looking at devolution to First Nations in Canada.
He is a regular columnist with Stuff and with Newsroom; his economic and policy commentary appears across most media outlets. He can also be found on Twitter at @ericcrampton.
Phone: +64 4 499 0790
I’m not a fan of paternalism but in one area it has its place: education. Students should be able to choose from a range of disciplines to find the one that best suits their inclinations, interests and future career ambitions. Read more
I don't think there has ever been a better time to pull out Homer Simpson's term "crisitunity". As everyone knows, the Chinese character for crisis combines danger with opportunity - hence crisitunity. Read more
Australia National University’s Dr George Barker suggested this week that New Zealand could do well by strengthening its copyright legislation. He warned against the fair dealing exceptions that have crept into the law and asked, “Why not have copyright law like property law – i.e. Read more
It’s always a bit tough reporting on the New Zealand Economics Association annual conference. Not because the papers are filled with opaque mathematical theory, or because speakers were less than lucid – neither of those are true, for the most part. Read more
Dr Eric Crampton on RadioLIVE: Should organ donors be paid? Read more
Everybody knows that inequality has been rising in New Zealand since the reforms of the 1980s. We know this because the media and politicians tell us so. Read more
For my sins in generally supporting consumer choice in food consumption, and in interests of fostering healthy debate, the Agencies for Nutrition Action invited me to argue with the Morgan Foundation’s Geoff Simmons on the merits of fat taxes and food regulation at his annual conference in Auckland a few weeks ago. The nutritionists put on an excellent conference. Read more
Chris Berg last week made a compelling case against the tyranny of experts. In large part, I sympathise with him. Read more
Dr Eric Crampton discussing inequality measures against media mentions in New Zealand from 2001-2014. Read more
The rationales of individual freedom and personal responsibility with Eric Crampton, head of research at The New Zealand Initiative... experimentation in policy - with social impact bonds. Read more
New Zealand schoolkids' performance on international maths tests leaves a bit to be desired. Both the Programme for International Student Assessment test (PISA) and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), the two main global benchmarks, show declining scores. Read more
The Fiscal Responsibility Act forces government to pay attention to its expenditures. But what about the cases where government instead compels you to do the spending on its behalf? Read more
The best case we can make for the Reserve Bank’s latest round of loan-to-value home mortgage regulations (LVRs) is not particularly compelling. Or, at least, it requires stretching our understanding of the bank’s prudential regulation mandate a bit farther than I’d like. Read more
Growing up in Canada, I often heard that profiting from illness was just wrong. Canada’s public health system generally banned private medicine. Read more
The idea of letting children as young as five vote on the flag referendum has been brought up in Parliament. Michael Gibson proposed the idea over a heated debate during public hearings. Read more