Rogernomics

[TonyB]

I notice that both parties are staying away from that issue.

The biggest problem is that labour wont hand the carbon credits over to the companies that are actually earning them. So effectively they have taken away the incentive to modernise. Most companies would easily upgrade their equipment and invest in clean technology, if they could then sell their carbon credits (even back to the government) in order to pay for it. Thats the standard 'economics' way of doing it.

I wonder why National isn't making more of a fuss about it- it really is a huge cockup...

They also won't give carbon credits to landowners or investors with forest plantations- keeping that for themselves they are. But no doubt when you chop them down you'll have to pay some sort of penalty. Kiwi's need to learn not to put up with this shit! Look how powerful the French farmers are politically- park a few hundred tractors on the main highways and suddenly their problems go away...

[Lou Girardin]

I don't think crime and social ills can be attributed to our surrent system of economy though.
Thats likley to have more to do with government policies and a variety of other issues.

Oue economy is Govt policy.
We are coming out of the trough slowly but the huge amount of joblessness in prior years has cost us dearly.
It's the old saying, the devil makes work for idle hands. Working people have less inclination to steal, burgle etc.

[chickenfunkstar]

Now It was me,,
who complained about Rogernomics ,,, for a good reason .,,,,NO other country as far as I know has/did what NZ has done with the speed at which it did,
Austrialia has done similar reforms at a lot slower pacer , NZ in terms of economic growth hasnt been outstanding ( compared with OECD mates ..we are more along the lines of Hungry ,,, ,,,in other words After Kregler dumped NZ money causing devaluation ,,etc ,,if we had weathered that devaluation, which i believe we would have,and the freeing up of the markets was taken slowly ..more along the lines of Aussie...the important thing here is the time and education the bring people up to speed
The other thing was they used ( as far as I know completely untried theory straight out of the neo classic text book ),,,
The end result is that there is a large under class thet has been created ...

( on a percentage of income basis I will need to bring in aprox 600 -700 a week to have the same level/standard of living as I do now ..exple our electricity bill during peak time is 0.024 percent of my monthly wage ...
There is a graph called the Phillips curve which show that there is a relationship between inflation ( I think) and crime ,,, and it stands to reason ..if you pull 330 a week taskforce green , and you want the new playstation ....well If your scruples havent been instilled by good Parenting OR Peer group ( dodgy mates) then .....how are you going to get the playstation ....
The price of goods in the shops and the availability certainly has inproved , though a low wage economy has its draw backs ,,,
To be honest my family are debating what to do ...on the one had I want my son to have the freedom I had ,,,( ripping around paddocks on a err older bike lets just say !!!) but on the other hand financially we are saving andd can afford to buy the things we like ,,,, The health care is good and readily available ,,and the schools are good ( untill high school then I have BIG issues ) trouble is I live in the worlds biggest carpark ...

So , my next step needs to be planned very carefully ,,, and the problem is what gets me uo in the morning is playing around with bikes ,,,,any one have any good ideas on how to become rich through bikes???

Stephen
Now I didnt study economics ,,,( the wife drip feeds me my pocket money ,,which shows the grasp I have on the subject ) so those who have please feel free to jump in

I agree that the Roger Douglas and his crew should of introduced the reforms more slowly to give people more time to adjust.
I'm not sure how it has contributed to crime and social ills though.

I bet the vast majority of people are better off post Douglas.
There's still a reasonable amount of protection for people who work in some of the lower paying jobs (like me), such as minimum wage, unemployment insurance, etc.
Nearly everyone wants things that they can't afford.
There's always people who will be willing to steal such things.

The phillips curve is a short run trade off between inflation and unemployment. It doesn't always hold anyway (USA in the 1970's, high inflation and unemployment)

If we continued under a planned economy I think that nearly everyone would be less wealthy.

Sorry if i've missed your point. I wasn't entirly sure what you were trying to say in the above post.

[chickenfunkstar]

Oue economy is Govt policy.
We are coming out of the trough slowly but the huge amount of joblessness in prior years has cost us dearly.
It's the old saying, the devil makes work for idle hands. Working people have less inclination to steal, burgle etc.

You're right, but I'm not sure exactly how much crime you can attribute directly to unemployment.
I'm not sure that crime will dramatically reduce now that unemployment is at the lowest level its been for years.

[Winston001]

The Lange Labour government were like a breath of fresh air after years of Muldoon's heavy handed management. The reforms were startling but needed. Unfortunately they were also unbalanced.

In one single year NZ farmers had their subsidies removed. But manufacturers continued to be protected by trade tarrifs until the late 1990s. Good farmers went down with the bad. It was savage.

The argument against the Chicago School of Economics (locally Rogernomics) approach was that all our competitors used subsidies and trade barriers. And this is still true today. Frankly it is a miracle that agriculture has survived let alone bloomed in NZ.

But slowly those barriers are disappearing. We tend to overlook the fact that there are plenty of nations worse off than NZ. South American and African farmers can't sell their cotton for above a pittance because the good ol' USA subsidises its farmers way above the world price. Thus these rich Americans can produce all the cotton they like for nothing because their government pays them to keep doing it.

That is what GATT is all about and gradually trade restrictions are being removed. We just happened to be first aboard. First among Western countries that is. Third World nations don't have the luxury of subsidies.

[Hitcher]

Instead of indulging in sloganeering (e.g. "Rogernomics", "Muldoonism") take a look at what polcy decisions were actually made and why.

The sooner people grow up and realise that we should be focused on baking a larger economic cake rather than becoming anally fixated on "fairly" allocating the crumbs of what we currently call an economy, the better off everybody should be.

[Skyryder]

Free markets aren't that free. For example; the US steel industry, the US grain producers, most of the EU primary producers, Australian Apple growers.
Like the Kyoto protocol, we thought that if we led, others would follow.
The trouble was that the rest of the world viewed us as lab rats. Noted the price paid and declined to do the same. Now we are scratching for market access anywhere we can get it. The wonder is that we have done as well as we have. But the price we've paid is plain in our crime and social ills.
Australia has had greater growth without half the pain.
If Rogernomics was attractive, ACT wouldn't be on the verge of oblivion.

Ditto. Will say no more as I entirely agree.

Skyryder

[Skyryder]

The Lange Labour government were like a breath of fresh air after years of Muldoon's heavy handed management. The reforms were startling but needed. Unfortunately they were also unbalanced.

In one single year NZ farmers had their subsidies removed. But manufacturers continued to be protected by trade tarrifs until the late 1990s. Good farmers went down with the bad. It was savage.

The argument against the Chicago School of Economics (locally Rogernomics) approach was that all our competitors used subsidies and trade barriers. And this is still true today. Frankly it is a miracle that agriculture has survived let alone bloomed in NZ.

But slowly those barriers are disappearing. We tend to overlook the fact that there are plenty of nations worse off than NZ. South American and African farmers can't sell their cotton for above a pittance because the good ol' USA subsidises its farmers way above the world price. Thus these rich Americans can produce all the cotton they like for nothing because their government pays them to keep doing it.

That is what GATT is all about and gradually trade restrictions are being removed. We just happened to be first aboard. First among Western countries that is. Third World nations don't have the luxury of subsidies.

Third world nations don't have luxeries period.

One of the problems with New Zealand is that both the of the Lange Governments and National that followed put other countries interests head of our own. And that my friends is not my opinion but that of an American economist who was sitting next to me on my flight home from the states shortly after GW Bush was 'apponted' to his first Presidency. You have only to look at the policies of the Buisness Round Table to figure that out. And it was these guys that both Labour and National 'listened' too when forming economic policy.

Skyryder

[Skyryder]

I bet the vast majority of people are better off post Douglas.
There's still a reasonable amount of protection for people who work in some of the lower paying jobs (like me), such as minimum wage, unemployment insurance, etc.

Yes people are better off but it has noting to do with post Rodgernomics but more to do with the time factor and the cumilation wealth.

The protection that you speak of is encompessed in the Employment Relations Act 2000. Prior to that there was the Employment Contracts Act. In this 'enlightned' piece of social progress you were paid the lowest rate that management dictated by way of an indavidual contract. The Employment Contracts Act was designed to break up the bargaining power of the collective workforce.

Skyryder

[DingDong]

Rodger Douglas had a great idea that basicly should have raised the tax of the wealthy and reduce the tax of the average Joe, The PM of the time David L (as I understand it) decided to alter the plan of the expert and root the whole basis of the idea... Mr Douglas had a raw deal and has been prosecuted ever since.

It not rogernomics... it's Davids fuck up

As I understand it... but I not too bright anyway

[TwoSeven]

One of the benefits of free trade is that it takes out the industries that are least competitive and REPLACES them with more competitive ones.

It is important to remember that initially you do get unemployment as untrained staff are layed off, then retrained, relocated and reemployed in more benificial employment. You have to remember that it does take time.

If that wasnt true, then we wouldnt have one of the lowest unemployment rates ever along with the most open trade barriers ever.

One of the reasons why i'm looking forward to the free trade with china. We get the selection of their cheap muck (which helps us poor folks) and we get to sell our expensive stuff back (there are more rich people in china than there are people in new zealand).

[Skyryder]

Rodger Douglas had a great idea that basicly should have raised the tax of the wealthy and reduce the tax of the average Joe, The PM of the time David L (as I understand it) decided to alter the plan of the expert and root the whole basis of the idea... Mr Douglas had a raw deal and has been prosecuted ever since.

It not rogernomics... it's Davids fuck up

As I understand it... but I not too bright anyway

Wrong Wayn. The Labour Party caucus works through by way of the democratic process. In other words policy of the party is delivered by the caucus majority. Douglas had the majority of votes for his reforms by way of Prebble, Moore, Clarke, Caygill etc. In the later stages of the fifth Labour Government Lange was many times presented with a fait accompli. He had lost control of his caucus.

Act has never suggested raising the tax of the wealthy.

Skyryder

[geoffm]

The reforms were needed, but th eimplementation left a bit to be desired. Both the speed and the manner that it all happened was flawed, IMO. I suspect the reason was to get them in place before the next election, or the Labour caucus of the time got cold feet.
THings like donating Telecom to the Americans, who screwed NZers over for $700m per year, without any maintenance, and this is ongooing now. Ditto for the railways. Fay and Richwhite made a lot of money at the time - you have to wonder about kickbacks.
The railways employed 20,000 people in 1984, and were losing money hand over fist. It was a good place to retire at 20. They cust staff to 6000 within a few years. On the other hand, they had great apprentice training, and we are paying for the loss of this, and other apprentice schemes now.
Muldoon, IMO, was one of the biggest political disasters in NZ history. His think Big schemes cost billions (back when a billion was a lot of money) for no return. Many were mothballed or given away. One of the best examples was the natural gas to gasoline plant in Motonui - it wasted 97% of the gas and cost billions. Now we have run out of gas in the maui field due to this sort of wastage. It would have made much more sense, and cost 1% of the price to give everyone in NZ a free CNG kit. NZ used to be the world leader in CNG and LPG car conversions - all that has gone now.

Rogernomics is much maligned, with some reason, but only Jim Anderton would want to go back to 1984.
Geoff

[MikeL]

I bet the vast majority of people are better off post Douglas.

They think they are, because they can buy cheap Japanese cars and video recorders and DVD players, and eat out every night of the week, and fly to Sydney for weekend shopping, and send their friends text messages and photos and videos on their cellphones, and pretend that they are living the same lifestyle as people in Southern California or the Gold Coast or Tuscany...
And they never stop to think that staying until after 9 pm at the office every night and spending an hour commuting to work and needing two full-time incomes and having to put off having children and having monthly mortgage commitments that would save a thousand African children from starvation for a year might be too high a price to pay, or that their electricity and telephone bills and bank fees don't have to be that high, except that dividends need to be paid out, and more often than not to people living thousands of miles away who don't give a damn about this country except for their financial investment in it. And that a properly-resourced tax-payer funded health and education system might actually work out cheaper in the long run than private schools and health insurance even though taxes would have to rise. And that while they have been beguiled and distracted with the flood of glittering goodies from China and Japan at bargain prices, the real wealth of this country - the land, the originality and self-sufficiency of its people, and the uniqueness of an unspoiled environment - have been quietly stolen from under their noses.
Better off?? Yeah, right...

[TwoSeven]

Muldoon, IMO, was one of the biggest political disasters in NZ history. His think Big schemes cost billions (back when a billion was a lot of money) for no return.

Not quite true.

No short term gain. Pretty much all of the projects are doing well in the long term.

What actually cost muldoon money was that NZ borrowed from overseas (at reasonably cheap rates) to cover the costs. Then there was a recession/war/somethinglikethat and the interest rates went up causing the country to nearly go bankrupt.

The problem was that tarrifs and protectionism was so high that we couldnt import anything and our goods cost so much, no-one would buy them. When the oil crisis highlighted our dependancy on foreign goods, the muldoon government decided to invest in internal infrastructure.

However, it must be understood that productivity in NZ was almost zero at that time. You had railways investing millions on stuff they couldnt and didnt use - including labour that did nothing. You had state forestry buying hardware that sat idle, factories producing goods no-one wanted etc.