Economy
Hooton Says Government Megalomania Needs Nipping in the Bud
Many commenters have expressed dismay at the rapid expansion of the socialist state in New Zealand, and the government not wasting a crisis to drive through ideological changes to our economy. Matthew Hooton writes at the NZ Herald: There are early signs of megalomania in the Government’s economic response
We Are Heading for Trouble
Something didn’t seem quite right about the government’s address to the nation on Wednesday. Here we had deputy prime minister, Winston Peters, telling us how the Ministry of Health had asked the government to shut the borders to everyone, including Kiwis. I was surprised to hear him say
The Economics of Freedom
I have written in The BFD recently about the decline of western Anglosphere nations through the twentieth century and into the twenty-first. And that how, through a collapse in confidence, and also in morality, we have meekly accepted the suspension in civil liberties deemed by governments to be ‘necessary’ under
Dump the Resource Management Act
Frank Newman nzcpr.com If the government wants to get New Zealand working it should get rid of the Resource Management Act (RMA). Even one of its architects, Geoffrey Palmer, has said it’s broken. It is and has been for quite some time, which is why it’s so
Backlash Brewing
Bob Jones, in a recent article on The BFD, had this to say: It’s a sorry scene ahead of us and I say again, by election-time the Jacinda lustre will be replaced by despair and anger with the obvious electoral outcome. I agree wholeheartedly. The backlash has already started.
The Virus War and Its Aftermath
Sir Bob Jones nopunchespulled.com Everywhere the war analogy is used re the fight against coronavirus. Probably within a year we’ll have a vaccine. But all about us will be economic devastation, record unemployment and despair. History says that will induce two political consequences. One, as is evidently already
What Y2K and COVID-19 Have in Common
Justin Knight For anyone too young to remember Y2K, it was a very expensive non-event invented by IT charlatans to scare the world into paying them a significant amount of money to fix precisely nothing. The argument went that when the year 1999 ticked over to 2000, all the computers
Satirical Image of the Day
If you enjoyed this BFD Satirical image please consider sharing it with your friends.
The Sun Is Still Shining, but I Fear That Storms Are on the Way
LionRed The author is based in the UK at the moment (ex-pat Kiwi) and travels the world as a consultant in developing countries working on business development. As a result, he is totally cynical about NGOs, the UN and WHO etc. He is regularly exposed to contact with governments and
18-Wheeler Crashes the Economy
According to the Slang Dictionary an 18-wheeler is a colloquial name for a semitrailer truck with 18 total wheels, and by extension, any large truck. It is an American term as here in New Zealand our High Productivity trucks (the ones with the yellow ‘H’) typically have nine axles and
Should We Go For Helicopter Money?
Many of you will have heard how the government is considering giving every adult $1500 and every child $500 to stimulate the economy. This is a bold proposal. For a start, it is likely to cost somewhere between $12 billion and $15 billion, so it is not an insignificant sum.
Foodbank Usage Quadruples
It is interesting how, now that we have a Labour government, the reports on people living in their cars have completely dried up, and yet the housing crisis is worse than ever. Now, with the government’s generous wage subsidy package, we could all be forgiven for thinking that Jacinda
Weekly Economic Update – 24 April 2020
The Treasury The Dashboard will provide a regular snapshot of economic conditions as they are developing. High-frequency indicators show that economic activity continues to run at much lower levels than normal under Alert Level 4. New Zealand will move to Alert Level 3 from 28 April, where it will remain