Media release: Lochinver Station decision shows OIA not fit for purpose

Wellington (17 September 2015): The New Zealand Initiative today said that Cabinet’s blocking of the Lochinver Farm sale to Shanghai Pengxin shows that the Overseas Investment Act (OIA) is not fit for purpose. The decision goes completely against NZ’s international reputation as a place to do business, but is unfortunately consistent with New Zealand’s poor OECD ranking for openness to foreign investment. Read more

17 September, 2015

Media release: Social service reform needs proper assessment

Wellington (15 September 2015): The New Zealand Initiative says the Productivity Commission’s final report on improving outcomes from social services underscores the need to constantly assess their effectiveness. Jenesa Jeram, a researcher at The New Zealand Initiative, said that the commission was right to note that there are many social services that continue to receive funding without proper assessment of their impact or cost-effectiveness. Read more

15 September, 2015

NIMBY hypocrisy

Do older Australians hate younger Australians? This is a question that some were left pondering after attending a recent presentation by John Daley of the Grattan Institute on the urbanisation challenge facing Australian cities. Read more

Interest.co.nz
14 September, 2015

The freedom to read

The final week of September will mark ‘Banned Books Week’, a celebration of the freedom to read and a challenge to literary censorship. It is certainly good timing: the New Zealand Film and Literature Board of Review’s decision to temporarily ban a novel is the first since the law was enacted 22 years ago. Read more

Khyaati Acharya
Insights Newsletter
11 September, 2015

Europe's refugee crisis could undo the EU

“At least Germany is getting some good press recently,” a friendly businessman just told me a few days ago. “That’s quite a change from what we have seen before.” What he was referring to was the European refugee crisis, in which the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel was suddenly regarded as humane, caring and compassionate -- and not as brutal, egotistic and authoritarian as in its dealings with Greece. Read more

Dr Oliver Hartwich
Business Spectator
10 September, 2015

Overhaul of Child, Youth and Family needs to be evidence-driven

After the recent review of Child, Youth and Family (CYF), the Office of the Children’s Commissioner (OCC) has come to the conclusion that the system is failing children on far too many fronts. In fact, the Children’s Commissioner goes as far as to doubt that children are better off in state care at all. Read more

Interest.co.nz
7 September, 2015

Some simple maths of organ donation

We this week released Elisabeth Prasad's report running some of the numbers on whether compensating live kidney donors makes sense. She finds that the typical kidney transplant saves the Ministry of Health on net about $125,000 over the longer term: dialysis is expensive. Read more

Dr Eric Crampton
The National Business Review
4 September, 2015

"A city is not a work of art"

Earlier this week, my colleague Jason Krupp discussed the consequences of overzealous urban planning. Drawing from a recent paper by urbanist Alain Bertaud, the premise is that too much planning control impedes the efficient functioning of cities, producing unintended and undesirable outcomes. Read more

Khyaati Acharya
Insights Newsletter
4 September, 2015

Stay in the loop: Subscribe to updates