A week just spent in the glittering, throbbing city-state metropolis that is Hong Kong, is a reminder that there is a lot more to this place than its stunning night-time skyline. Rolls Royce cars and Ferraris adorn its streets, perhaps to an uncomfortable degree from an egalitarian Kiwi perspective, yet labour-intensive, bespoke suits are still much cheaper than in New Zealand.

There is much food for thought about the similarities between Hong Kong and New Zealand, and for that matter Singapore and Ireland.

New Zealand, Ireland, Singapore and Hong Kong SAR all have small populations on a world scale, ranging from 4.5 million for New Zealand to 7.2 million for Hong Kong.

All four have a heritage of sound English common law and institutions. All four have depended on foreign trade to benefit from economies of scale.

All four have done well economically, although the other three have outstripped New Zealand according to the World Bank's GDP per capita purchasing power parity measure. It ranked New Zealand in 26th in the world in 2012, Ireland 11th, Hong Kong 9th and Singapore 5th. 

Inwards foreign investment has played a major role in the economic development of each country, but perhaps less so for New Zealand.

The World Economic Forum's 2014-15 Global Competitiveness Index, that was released last week, ranked all four among the top 10 in the world for the prevalence of foreign ownership. New Zealand was ranked 9th, behind the other three.

The same survey ranked all four countries towards the top end of the world for the degree to which FDI is a major source of new technologies. Ireland topped the world on this measure, but this time, New Zealand was ranked third out of each of these four countries, surpassing Hong Kong by one place at 22nd.

However, surveyed executives ranked New Zealand's rules affecting inwards FDI only 56th in the world.  In contrast, Ireland, Singapore and Hong Kong (in that order) were deemed to have the world's most FDI friendly rules.

This woeful ranking should not surprise readers of The New Zealand Initiative's recent reports pin-pointing the strong anti-investment bias in New Zealand's Overseas Investment Act 2005.

So it was encouraging to read this week that the ACT party, for one, has recognised the importance for New Zealanders' wellbeing of greater freedom to access foreign capital, know-how, technology, and offshore markets. Its calls for the abolition of the Overseas Investment Office and further deregulation of incoming foreign investment warrant constructive public debate.