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
It used to be the case that the question of firing of public sector chiefs never even came up. Senior civil servants would themselves tender their resignations for catastrophic failures, and Ministers could accept or reject those resignations as appropriate. Read more
There are a lot of promising initiatives in the coalition Government's first "Wellbeing" Budget. But delivering on that promise requires closing a currently open loop in the wellbeing policy process. Read more
The Wellbeing Budget came in the government’s proclaimed year of delivery. But whether this budget will deliver the wellbeing outcomes everyone has been led to expect is a bit up in the air. Read more
As teachers prepare to leave the classroom on strike, The New Zealand Initiative proposes a potential solution to the seemingly impossible impasse. Dr Eric Crampton argues in his Policy Point Biting education bullets that Minister Hipkins is in a thoroughly unenviable position. Read more
Being an economist is great. But there is a downside. Read more
Professor Gary Libecap is something of a god in economics. In a prior life, I would tell my undergraduate students about the pantheon of the Econ Gods. Read more
New Zealand’s freshwater management is in need of a refresh. The kinds of systems that work for allocating and managing water when water is abundant are not the systems that work when water becomes increasingly scarce. Read more
Everyone knows the old joke about the traveller who, on asking directions to a better place, is told he shouldn’t have started from here. But stepping back from it a little, we always start from here. Read more
Last October, Minister for the Environment David Parker announced a two-year agenda for an improved freshwater management system. Following on from an election campaign in which freshwater management featured prominently, the announcement should not have come as a surprise. Read more
New Zealand deserves far better water management. Scores of newspaper articles and rigorous reports lay out the problems in the current system. Read more
Eric Frykberg discusses our new report Refreshing Water in the Rural News update on Radio New Zealand. Author Eric Crampton explains why a cap-and-trade system (similar to the Emissions Trading Scheme) would give New Zealand a real chance to substantially improve the sustainability of our rivers and aquifers. Read more
Dr Eric Crampton speaks to Ngati Porou radio about his report, Refreshing Water, saying we believe our research provides a tool that will help Minister Parker, and the Government, achieve their goals of improving freshwater in New Zealand as outlined in the Essential Freshwater programme.
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Chief Economist Eric Crampton shares his thoughts on the cannabis referendum, and legalisation, with Mike Yardley on Newstalk ZB.
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It’s too easy for bad statistics to influence policy. About a decade ago, BERL added up every dollar spent by heavier drinkers, counted some other costs twice, and claimed that alcohol use cost New Zealand $4.8 billion per year. Read more
Eric Crampton shares on Radio New Zealand his thoughts on the government's recent decision not to pursue a capital gains tax. Read more