The Economics of Decency by Tim Hazledine
"Thus, from my perspective, Muldoon and the more-market revolutionaries who overthrew him can be lumped together as purveyors of disruptive shocks to the body economic.
"What is really needed is some serious analysis about where we could go from here to reclaim sovereignty over our economic lives - as individuals, communities and as a nation.
Tim Hazledine, Professor of economics at Auckland University Chapter 1 of his latest book "Taking New Zealand Seriously, the Economics
of Decency" Harper Collins 1998
2. New Zealand’s
economic reform programme was A Failure
Previous assessments of New Zealand's post-1984 economic reform
programme have been optimistic about its overall success. This note challenges that optimism by drawing attention to what has happened to
real gross domestic product and income distribution since 1984. If New Zealand had continued to grow at the same rate as Australia, it would
have produced more than NZ$210 billion in extra output between 1985 and 1998. Over a similar period, the average per capita real income of the
bottom four deciles of New Zealand's income distribution fell by between three and nine per cent.
Dr Paul Dalziel, Department
of Economics, University of Canterbury
"Roger Kerr ( Business Round Table) suggests that we need to press on further with our conversion process if we are to ever achieve top performance and reach economic nirvana. That suggestion needs examination.
An address by Bryan Philpott, Professor of economics , Victoria University in Wellington
4. SHARING THE
NATIONAL CAKE IN POST REFORM NEW ZEALAND: INCOME INEQUALITY TRENDS IN
TERMS OF INCOME SOURCES
Overall, it is clearly evident that, while for the poorer 80% of the population, the share has steadily declined, for the richer 5 and 10 %,
the shares have markedly increased. Whereas most other OECD countries have also experienced income inequalities in the 1980s, New Zealand seems to have experienced a particularly strong rising tide of inequality. It transpires the New Zealand's economic reform programme over the
period 1984-96 saw the very rich becoming even richer, while the bulk of the rest of the population became poorer, in relative terms, with the poorest
faring the worst.
Srikanta Chatterjee and Nripesh Podder Professors of economics of Massey
University Palmerston North and University of New South Wales
FORMAT
The shortcomings of the decade-long reform do not come unexpected. In the submissions to the reforms, to the various consent applications for new power stations, and on the opinion pages of the press, many of the problems were anticipated - to no avail. Other countries, among them Germany, USA, Britain, Norway, and Australia, are also grappling with the reform of their electricity sectors, yet none of their Governments has displayed the incompetence and sheer arrogance of
New Zealand's.
Peter Kammler, businessman and spokesperson for POWER FOR OUR FUTURE
Information of the sell out of NZ assets to overseas interests.
FORMAT
The Electricity Reform Act 1998 was supposed to bring lower power prices through more competition in the industry. But the overwhelming effect of the legislation has been to set loose an astonishing and speculative auction for power companies.
Bill Rosenberg
Bryan Philpott, Emeritus Professor of Economics, Victoria University