When you are in a hole, stop drilling. That must have been the Government’s motivation for stopping oil and gas exploration. Read more
Next week Parliament will have its first chance to debate Commerce Minister Kris Faafoi’s new Commerce Amendment Bill. If passed, the Bill will grant the Commission’s wish - and allow it to use its powers of compulsion to undertake ‘market studies’ into the state of competition in any market. Read more
Every Friday, regular Insights readers undoubtedly look forward to the Initiative’s take on public policy and current events. This week, however, I want to share something a bit personal. Read more
In Franz Kafka’s The Trial the chief cashier of a bank, Josef K, is unexpectedly arrested by two unidentified agents from an unspecified agency for an unspecified crime. At one level, The Trial is a satire of bureaucracy. Read more
The biggest lesson of 20th Century economics is that it is hard to get anything right if prices are wrong. It is high time that lesson were applied to transport. Read more
Could changes in 1989 to New Zealand’s tax treatment of retirement savings plausibly explain a significant portion of the subsequent sharp rise in New Zealand house prices? Andrew Coleman made the case that it could to a LEANZ audience in Wellington this week. Read more
Memo to: FSB Spy Class 2018, Moscow (New Zealand posting) From: Chief Instructor Disguise Subject: Discoverability Comrades, For spies it is best not to be discovered. Discovery is never helpful. Read more
Humpty Dumpty would have fun with the Policy Targets Agreement (PTA) between Finance Minister Grant Robertson and the new governor of the Reserve Bank, Adrian Orr: “When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean – neither more nor less.” “The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.” “The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master – that’s all.” The world of monetary economics is not quite as colourful as the characters in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass. However, the governor may find himself in the role of Humpty Dumpty when interpreting his political directives. Read more
There is an old saying that when you are in a battle with yourself and you win, you still lose. Perhaps the same thing can be said of our housing shortage. Read more
This week, the Reserve Bank finally got a new Governor. Adrian Orr, formerly chief executive of the Super Fund, replaced caretaker-governor Grant Spencer. Read more
If you are as lucky as me and found yourself watching Parliament at 9pm on Tuesday night, you would have seen the debate on the Government’s proposed regional fuel tax legislation. The legislation will allow Auckland initially, and other regions later, to tax petrol and diesel up to 10 cents per litre for transport projects. Read more
New Zealand’s republicans have a point. There is a nefarious foreign influence dictating too much in New Zealand. Read more
Few countries run as much on informal relationships as New Zealand. It is both due to our small size and our aversion to hierarchies. Read more
Loyal readers of the Initiative’s work will know there are more than a few problems with New Zealand’s secondary school qualification. As Briar Lipson’s report released earlier this month showed, the system makes it rather too easy for students to be directed through ‘safe’ pathways to qualifications of little quality. Read more
Perhaps it is a product of New Zealand’s geographic isolation, which creates concern not to be left behind. But since moving here from England my education hogwash-o-meter has been reading unusually high. Read more
