Dear Mr English, I don't want a tax cut

[steve_t]

the reason we keep owing more and more is because the mp's keep giving themselves such fucking massive pay increases.
.

And that when we adopted MMP, 21 extra MP's got into parliament

[SPman]

LOL must spread rep....etc



You've got to be joking mate!! What business friendly media? They are virtually non-existent. Ok, Brian Fellow knows his stuff but most journalists are the fruit of arts degrees and have firmly-established leftish politics in their blood. In fact one of the common complaints regarding all branches of the media is how shallow and biased they are when it comes to economics.

The only thing the NZ media is left of, is Fox news!

[Winston001]

the reason we keep owing more and more is because the mp's keep giving themselves such fucking massive pay increases.
Bill to make the workplace a smokefree environment= 15 years to pass thru parliament.
Bill to give themselves a payrise of 15%= 2 hours to pass thru parliament.

I don't want to be unkind but this is the sort of ankle-deep thinking many kiwis suffer from. It springs from envy. Furthermore it personalises the issue introducing emotive reactions rather than rational discussion.

If our MPs were paid nothing it would not make a scrap of difference to NZs financial position. The govt needs to borrow $250 million per week.

[rainman]

* greed is good; it is better to have flourishing business activity than healthy, happy well-educated and well-adjusted citizens

Indeed, and radix malorum est cupiditas. All we get if we only chase money is strong corporations, and empty nation-states.

Agree 100% - a lot of people forget that - or need to travel a bit and see just how good we have it.

Is true - but with regard to the physical environment. But the economy ain't so hot, there isn't a diverse productive or high-tech sector, inequality is a problem (with its attendant social problems), and most of the good stuff is owned by people in other countries. And in the battle between our prisitine environment and polluting industry, industry seems to win rather regularly.

The NZ Govt decided to go into an expansionary fiscal policy stance during the recession and required debt to do that. Still does as its a growing economy.

We're not growing so strongly anyway. Wasn't Billy E just saying there might be 1% growth to 2017? Or was that just the bit magically attributed to the tax cuts?

the quality of life in NZ I think depends on your income , which I liken to a trail along a ridge line , you fall off that ridge and its very hard to climb back on and as pretty as NZ is , you cant feed your family by looking at the scenery...
Once you come off that little path of security, NZ is a BYATCH of a place to live. ( and it doesn't need to be ,and the reason I get so animated about things, Thanks america for nowt )

Very true. Which is why inequality and lost resilience (mostly through short term asset selling, and a too literal interpretation of Ricardo) is a big issue for us.

the reason we keep owing more and more is because the mp's keep giving themselves such fucking massive pay increases.

Not really, there aren't that many of them. In 2008 there were 26,710 people earning over $150k from salary and wages. There are only a few hundred MPs. They are part of the problem, but would you rather they were badly paid? (I'd prefer fewer of them but wouldn't trust the Nats or Labour not to gerrymander to their own benefit if the system was redesigned).

I don't actually have an issue with the top chunk of earners getting a reasonable multiple of the bottom chunk's average income. But a very good structural incentive to stopping the very wealthy from completely fucking over the rest is to constrain (tax rate is the best option here) the multiple between the two. Not so much that you remove incentive, or envy, not so little that those at the bottom fall too far behind and get demotivated. Otherwise all you do is create an economic system that selects for sociopaths. Who really needs more than a few hundred 'k each year, after all?

[Headbanger]

I don't want to be unkind but this is the sort of ankle-deep thinking many kiwis suffer from. It springs from envy. Furthermore it personalises the issue introducing emotive reactions rather than rational discussion.

If our MPs were paid nothing it would not make a scrap of difference to NZs financial position. The govt needs to borrow $250 million per week.

True enough, paying them only what they are worth wouldn't save us much, But if you want efficiency then you need it right through an organisation, If its rotten at the top then its rotten all the way through.

Pay cuts, reducing the amount of MP's, and forcing them to face the consequences of their fuckups would vastly improve their performance and would dictate the same applied to their portfolios.







Maybe.

[Brian d marge]

2 x 700 = 1400

mine is a single salary and we both spend a lot of time with our kids ( ie don't work all hours ) Try living on a task force green wage , or being in your middle forties and being restuctured !. all it takes usually is one event ( ie sickness ) and the whole lot will go to custard, been there done that , no fun , will not happen again

no thank you

And I most certainly agree with the last statement , most certainly , but if you need money it can bring out the unsavory in people , which is does ( funnily enough , a great book , Five families a Mexican case study is about Mexico's efforts to try and break the poverty cycle )

Stephen

[Brian d marge]

Snip

Very true. Which is why inequality and lost resilience (mostly through short term asset selling, and a too literal interpretation of Ricardo) is a big issue for us.


Dont blame Ricardo , he made great Cylinder heads !!!

Stephen

[davereid]

Indeed, and radix malorum est cupiditas. All we get if we only chase money is strong corporations, and empty nation-states. But the economy ain't so hot, there isn't a diverse productive or high-tech sector, inequality is a problem (with its attendant social problems), and most of the good stuff is owned by people in other countries. And in the battle between our prisitine environment and polluting industry, industry seems to win rather regularly.

OK, one at a time.

(1) All we get if we only chase money is strong corporations, and empty nation-states

Demonstrateably rubbish. The ability to fund all of the social things we (seem) to crave is completely reliant on money. No amount of wishing, good will or socialism will allow the residents of the third world to get paid a $200 a week community wage. Only money can provide these things.

The mistake is to assume that money, and social responsibility are mutually exclusive.

(2) But the economy ain't so hot, there isn't a diverse productive or high-tech sector

Actually there is. NZ has only 2- 2.5 million working people. We manage high technology food production which is the envy of the world. Its a mistake to assume that because it happens in the country, not in a city based factory or lab, that it's not high tech. The economy might be more productive if it was not constantly harassed by government. Additionally, traditional "High Tech" companies abound in New Zealand, particularly in the electronics industry, where we punch well above our weight.

(3) inequality is a problem (with its attendant social problems),

No its not a problem. Harden up. Some people fail. Its OK. The BEST we need to do is ensure they have a safety net. But we don't need to save them. The POOREST New Zealanders live lives much longer, warmer and better fed than the RICHEST New Zealanders of 200 years ago. That's a massive achievement. If they are not starving, and have access to healthcare, a generation of capitalism has achieved more that the previous 10,000 years of evolution and the rule of Kings.

(3) most of the good stuff is owned by people in other countries

200 years ago, actually only 150 years ago, New Zealanders lived in complete poverty, ate one another, and died at 30 years of age. FOREIGN INVESTMENT, mostly from Britain changed that in only 150 years. The idea that "others own it so its lost " is crap. I own my place, I'm a kiwi, but it still lost to the rest of New Zealand. Ya still can't come here. No difference if I lived in London. The point is that MONEY IS UNLIMITED. When an englishman invested in my land, I grew potatoes. He made heaps. I employed locals, a local man fixes my tractor, I buy fuel at the local gas station and pay local taxes. We are ALL better off. The fact that I send a 200 million dollar cheque to Lloyds every year is irrelevant, as we grew the money.

(4) And in the battle between our pristine environment and polluting industry, industry seems to win rather regularly.

Being alive is NOT SUSTAINABLE. Humans beings have a right to be here to, and that will change our environment. In fact that's what people do. Exploitation of resources is how we manage, its an asset not a liability. Id swap every rare frog in existence in the entire world, to keep millions of people warm and well fed.

[MikeL]

Being alive is NOT SUSTAINABLE. Humans beings have a right to be here to, and that will change our environment. In fact that's what people do. Exploitation of resources is how we manage, its an asset not a liability. Id swap every rare frog in existence in the entire world, to keep millions of people warm and well fed.

Hmmm...
1. Being alive is not sustainable. Individual lives, or the human race? The human race is doomed to extinction. We will continue to use up all the resources of the world until the last man or woman dies of starvation or disease. The possibility of mankind using reason and common sense to stabilise growth and use resources sustainably does not exist.
2. Human beings have a right to be here. God has ordained it. Or the laws of evolution have sanctioned it. Either way, it trumps any moral argument over responsibility to the rest of nature or the intellectual argument about sensible management of the planet.
3. Exploitation ... is an asset, not a liability. In the great accounting book of the ages, man's balance sheet will show a brief entry, all on one side.
4. Rare frog ... millions of people alive Maintaining the human population takes priority over every environmental question.
When we run out of planet to exploit we die. It will happen sooner or later. Better sooner than later; at least we can have a party in the meantime.

[cowpoos]

hardly surprising since the "workers" have been subsidising business for decades...

errr....no mate....Business's supply jobs to workers. How is it they subsidising business's??? [lol...this will be good!!]

[mashman]

errr....no mate....Business's supply jobs to workers. How is it they subsidising business's??? [lol...this will be good!!]

cut and paste from a few posts after ok, maybe subsidy is the wrong terminology for the pricing of materials/items/services that are sold cheaper to businesses than they are to "workers" i.e. joe public... hence we subsidise the short fall of business deals/rates... matter of perspective perhaps?

[cowpoos]

cut and paste from a few posts after ok, maybe subsidy is the wrong terminology for the pricing of materials/items/services that are sold cheaper to businesses than they are to "workers" i.e. joe public... hence we subsidise the short fall of business deals/rates... matter of perspective perhaps?

Nah...Business size purchases provide volume...and that needs to be priced accordingly...bigger the volume...larger the discount. Its not a case of subsidising...its a case of if you not compeditive to a large customer...you do have a customer!!

[mashman]

Nah...Business size purchases provide volume...and that needs to be priced accordingly...bigger the volume...larger the discount. Its not a case of subsidising...its a case of if you not compeditive to a large customer...you do have a customer!!

I understand that "bulk" users get a discount as their business uses guaranteed quantities of product x and that it's a "loyalty" discount... but that's not my perspective ...

[rainman]

(1) All we get if we only chase money is strong corporations, and empty nation-states
...

I can't answer these without going waaaaay off topic from the original post, but you have missed my point, provided a trivial or unrelated response/handwaving/strawmen, or are generally wrong (in my completely unhumble opinion, of course!) or all of these. I'll construct a proper response and post a blog or new thread, then link it here.

[MisterD]

The only thing the NZ media is left of, is Fox news!

Pull the other one, for verily it haveth bells on.