These are strange times, even for economists. Fearmongers are urging governments to pump up their spending in order to maintain economic activity. Read more

Alan Duff’s latest book – A Conversation with My Country: Where we have come from. Where we can go. Read more

We cannot vouch for the authenticity of the following conversation that mysteriously arrived in my Inbox. The sender’s name was Dante, surely a fake. Read more

The Organisation for Economic Corporation and Development’s latest economic survey of New Zealand was published last week. I always read these surveys with a somewhat jaundiced eye. Read more

There is too much critical tosh in the public domain these days about GDP (gross domestic product). GDP is being criticised because it does not measure wellbeing. Read more

A Radio New Zealand journalist reported in the last fortnight that other top economists privately shared Eric Crampton’s publicly expressed concerns over Treasury’s economic capability. Yesterday, Treasury’s former deputy chief economist went public on the malaise in the organisation. Read more

The government has largely put the KiwiBuild and capital gains tax fiascos behind it. Next headed for the cold storage might be the recommendations of its Fair Pay Agreement working group. Read more

Remember former finance minister Steven Joyce’s claim that Labour’s fiscal plan for its 2017 general election campaign had an $11.7 billion “hole”? Back then, Labour intended to spend $572 billion in the five years to 2021-22. Read more

Oscar Wilde once quipped that a cynic was “a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing”. That saying has since migrated to refer to economists. Read more

Wellington Mayor Justin Lester says NZ Bus is up to 40 drivers short, with up to 30 cancelled services a day. He now wants the Transport Minister to help improve local bus services. Read more

The government is hyping Budget 2019 as a world-leading “Wellbeing Budget”. The December 2018 Budget Policy Statement proclaims the government’s key focus on improving the wellbeing and living standards of New Zealanders. Read more

In the mid‐1980s, New Zealand was forced into a major economic restructuring. Those adjustments were particularly significant for the traded goods sector, since export subsidies and import barriers were largely eliminated. Read more