Quick Hit — Political Intelligence — Nicola Willis — Economy — Taxes — National Party — Labour Party — Barbara Edmonds — NZ First — Election 2026 — NZ Politics
Quick Hit: Willis’s Better Books Came Partly Out of Your Trolley
Treasury has the deficit at $6.8 billion and next year within $0.8 billion of surplus. It says that is partly inflation lifting the tax take while spending allowances stay fixed, which is how Willis got there with no new taxes.
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Quick Hit: TPM’s Overhang Belongs in the Same Review
National and TPM both benefit from overhangs. The evidence about how they got there differs, but a serious review must examine both.
Quick Hit: The Fiscal Update in Numbers and Who Paid for the Better Books
The deficit is $3 billion for the quarter, $1.4 billion better than Treasury forecast. Treasury’s own pre-election update says part of the improvement comes from inflation lifting the tax take.
Quick Hit: Unemployment Hits 5.7% and Winston Saw It Coming
Unemployment is at 5.7%, 174,000 people are out of work and long-term joblessness is the highest since 1994. Winston Peters says he told National and ACT to delay their tax cuts.
Quick Hit: Where National’s 2023 Voters Went
RNZ-Reid Research shows only 56.9 per cent of National’s 2023 voters still back the party. ACT and NZ First now hold 18.4 per cent of them.
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Comedy Corne
Welcome to Politically Incorrect Comedy corner: the one place on The Good Oil where you are allowed to read and share naughty and offensive jokes that make us all laugh even though we are not supposed to. If you are offended by these kinds of jokes then please do not
Why the Narrative Is Wrong
CO₂ as the primary driver producing broadly uniform warming fails a straightforward test against the longest temperature series available. Something else is clearly at work.
What Do Babies Know, Anyway?
The brain is filing memories away from the start: it just forgets where they are.
Off the Rails
Sánchez has been in power for almost a decade – plenty of time, one might have thought, to improve a railway network fast approaching its 40th birthday.