Wellington (25 January 2018): New Zealand is still under-prepared for the next big earthquake or major disaster. That is a central finding of a research report, Recipe for disaster: Building policy on shaky ground, launched by The New Zealand Initiative. Read more
Our new report, Recipe for disaster: Building policy on shaky ground says New Zealand is still under-prepared for the next big earthquake. Authors Bryce Wilkinson and Eric Crampton have reviewed the policy response to the Canterbury earthquakes. Read more
On Newstalk ZB, Eric Crampton discusses our latest report, Recipe for disaster. He says New Zealand still hasn't fixed the policy problems that slowed Christchurch's rebuild and remains under-prepared for another big quake. Read more
The last time I wrote for Interest about the road toll was in October. At the time, Police were predicting 60 further deaths for 2017. Read more
Eric Crampton features on 1News discussing his new report, Recipe for Disaster, and the lessons that the government can learn from the response to the Christchurch earthquakes.
Read Recipe for Disaster here: http://bit.ly/2ncQJGz Read more
To say the new Minister of Fisheries, Stuart Nash, inherited some fisheries management problems is an understatement. The Ministry for Primary Industries and its predecessors have failed to grapple with the misreporting of commercial catch, discarding of unwanted bycatch and the high grading of targeted catch. Read more
Wellington (16 January 2018): The New Zealand Initiative is concerned that sugar tax advocates are misleading the public by pretending to punish manufacturers rather than consumers. Responding to renewed calls for a sugar tax, policy analyst Jenesa Jeram says there are still no grounds for introducing such a tax in New Zealand. Read more
Wellington (16 January 2018): The New Zealand Initiative's Sam Warburton says that Jordan Williams of the Taxpayers’ Union has overlooked bigger problems in transport funding in his claim that the National Land Transport Fund be limited only to roads. “Apart from the contribution public transport can make to alleviating congestion, what Mr Williams’ argument misses is that much National Land Transport Fund expenditure is matched almost dollar-for-dollar by ratepayers,” said Warburton. Read more
The call for a sugar tax has been strengthened by a new study of New Zealand's soft drinks which shows they contain more sugar than in other countries. Responding to renewed calls for a sugar tax, Jenesa Jeram discusses on Newstalk ZB there are still no grounds for introducing such a tax in New Zealand. Read more
On Monday 4 December we launched our third report on how we can improve the recreational fishing experience. The panel discussion included Dr Randall Bess (author of the report), Hon. Read more
Recreational fishing in New Zealand’s marine waters is one of the few remaining free-of-charge public goods available to everyone. However, managing fisheries is not costless. Read more
Watching the first weeks of the new Parliament, it is difficult not to get confused. On the one hand, we see a government that stumbles its way through the parliamentary machinery. Read more
The Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) admitted errors in its report on the economic benefits of hosting the America's Cup in Auckland. Its initial cost-to-benefit ratio estimate was between 1.8 and 1.2, meaning benefits would outweigh cost by between 80 and 20 percent. Read more
Wellington (21 December 2017): The New Zealand Initiative welcomes today’s correction by the Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE) to its previous estimates of the economic benefits of hosting the America’s Cup. On 22 November 2017, MBIE released the results of its cost-benefit analysis. Read more
The government has launched a new $22.5 million plan to keep motorists safer on rural highways. Sam Warburton speaks with Mike Hosking about this plan. Read more