New Zealand is in a recession and we have been for two years now. Our per capita recession has surpassed the Great Financial Crisis in length after contracting for seven consecutive quarters.
I’m not a fan of GDP as the be-all-and-end-all economic figure, but a decline in our yearly economic activity by 0.5 per cent is a serious thing; even more so when you factor in that our per capita GDP has shrunk by a massive 2.7 per cent in that time. GDP encourages countries to import more economic units that can then increase the total money creation and spending power.
