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Oscar Wilde once suggested that “Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life”, but had he wanted to describe the business of art he would have probably turned to the science of economics. At face value, it would seem art and economics have very little in common, but upon second glance, the apparently fickle nature of the art market is well explained by economic rationale. Read more
Simon Cowan, at last weekend’s Liberty & Society conference, addressed the pressing issue of Australia’s ballooning federal expenditure and the huge economic and social impact this will have if spending isn’t curbed soon. The elephant in the room that Cowan, a research fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies, is referring to is Australia’s dwindling economic growth, an ageing population and the rapidly rising healthcare and pension costs associated with the demographic shift. Read more
It was both unsurprising but interesting to open the paper this week and see the proposed Otaki Expressway in the headlines again. Unsurprising because the NZ Transport Agency (NZTA) is currently having its resource consent heard for the proposed road, but interesting because of the way the NZTA lawyers are pitching the project. Read more
The idea of a living wage is not new. New Zealand’s Arbitration Court determined in November 1936 that a basic weekly wage of £3.16s for an adult male would be sufficient to maintain a husband, wife, and three children in a fair and reasonable standard of comfort. Read more
Wellington (4 September 2013): New Zealand has outperformed Australia on the latest Global Competitiveness Index for the first time, according to an annual report compiled by the World Economic Forum. New Zealand climbed five places from last year to come in at 18th on the overall ranking of global competitiveness, while Australia slipped one place to drop out of the top 20 for the first time with a score of 21. Read more
One of the major downsides of the 2008 financial crisis has been the re-emergence of ‘macro-prudential’ regulation. This sort of regulation, hoping to limit systemic risk in the banking sector, is currently fashionable but signals a return to the 1970s mentality of economic fine-tuning, albeit with different tools. Read more
When New Zealand First leader Winston Peters delivered his ‘Supercity of Sin’ speech last Friday, it was a frontal assault on Chinese migration. Despite his protestations that he and his party were not anti-China, or even anti-migration, the dog-whistling was all too clear. Read more
Early this week, the government announced a rather distasteful plan. In return for giving regulatory favours to the Sky City Casino in the form of more favourable gambling regulations, the casino will build a massive conference centre. Read more
This week, The New Zealand Initiative released its first report: New Zealand’s Global Links: Foreign Ownership and the Status of New Zealand’s Net International Investments. The report contains 84 tables of statistical information relating to New Zealand’s inwards and outwards investments, and is accompanied by a spreadsheet on the website. Read more
It is often the case that reports by the Ministry of Economic Development (and now its successor, the rather pretentiously named Ministry for Business, Employment, and Innovation or MBIE) recommend further government interference in economic activities in the name of ‘helping business.' The much-vaunted ‘business growth agenda’ of the government, which few people outside of Wellington have heard of, has suffered from this fate. So it is refreshing to see an interesting and useful report into regional economic development being released by the Ministry. Read more