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After missing my chance to meet Scarlett Johansson last year, I was distraught and confused over the weekend as I read the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment’s (MBIE) findings and conclusion on film subsidies in New Zealand. In three reviews commissioned by MBIE, the reports concluded that without the film subsidies (New Zealand Screen Production Grants), the New Zealand film industry would disappear. Read more

"One of the uses of history is to free us of a falsely imagined past”, the late American legal scholar Robert Bork once wrote. One might add that another use is the prevention of repeat mistakes. Read more

This seems about the worst possible month to be suggesting that anybody should try to emulate anything going on in America. The place seems to be going mad in ways no longer funny to laugh at from very far away. Read more

Last week a long-standing geologist friend chewed my ear about the government’s irresponsible ban on new offshore oil and gas exploration. I call it irresponsible because on the evidence no meaningful consideration was given to the interests of New Zealanders. Read more

A couple of years ago we got the lads together and set off on a South Island road trip. It was a great opportunity to get away from the rat race and show some of my North Island mates around the South Island. Read more

Almost a decade ago, I published an opinion piece that called for the abolition of what was then the G8, the group of the seven largest industrial nations and Russia. After the dramatic conclusion of last weekend’s G7 summit in Canada, we may be a step closer towards this goal. Read more

Have you noticed how often the disembodied “we” word is used to justify policy action in government today? A stray document that reached our inbox this week may explain why. Read more

Dilbert creator Scott Adams likened knowing a bit of economics to having a mild superpower. High among economists’ mild superpowers is the ability to use formal mathematics to define what words mean. Read more

George Orwell would have had fun with the terms of reference of the Government’s Fair Pay Agreement Working Group. Practically none of these terms can be taken at their literal value, starting with the stated purpose. Read more