Budget 2020: While the cost of Covid-19 means crown debt will increase dramatically, setting the right priorities means the economy can recover sooner. The government should have two priorities in this budget. First, and most importantly, the health system needs to be ready for the medium-to-long term changes that the pandemic has forced on the … Read more
We wanted to find out how schools were doing, irrespective of the privilege of their students. So we created a new measure to assess it, and we’re urging the Ministry of Education to pick it up, writes Eric Crampton of the New Zealand Initiative. If your school has strong NCEA results, is it because it’s … Read more
The government’s plan to avoid another ‘fiscal hole’ fiasco has an unlikely fan: the chief economist of the corporate think tank New Zealand Initiative. Eric Crampton explains what else it could do. Have you ever driven past one of those stores that mostly sells blinds but calls itself ‘Not Just Blinds’ and wondered whether they … Read more
Treasury has been haemorrhaging talented economists for years and the budget leaks were just the tip of the iceberg for a department in crisis, writes Eric Crampton of The New Zealand Initiative. If the Canterbury earthquakes taught us anything, it’s that the immediate response to a disaster is a very different thing from the rebuilding that … Read more
Economist Eric Crampton on the primary school maths and abuse of the official information act underpinning Shane Jones’ provincial growth fund. It seemed a simple enough question. It was, really. So why did it take more than two months to get an answer under the Official Information Act? On 5 February, MBIE’s head of the … Read more
If New Zealand is to crack the problems of unaffordable housing, the government must look seriously at how the better parts of America finance infrastructure, argues Eric Crampton, This seems about the worst possible month to be suggesting that anybody should try to emulate anything going on in America. The place seems to be going … Read more
On Tuesday, economist Eric Crampton argued that legislation to prohibit foreign property buyers will do nothing to alleviate the housing crisis. Today, he lays out all the other reasons why the ban makes no sense. Yesterday, I wrote about how New Zealand wound up with a ban on foreign homebuyers. I said the policy was … Read more
There is not a shred of evidence the prohibition on foreign property buyers will alleviate the housing crisis. It is populist, fear-based policy making, argues economist Eric Crampton. One of the things that think tank chief economists get to do is have a yarn with travelling delegations from international organisations checking in on how things … Read more
Here we come and we are analysing fiscal data, cheers Eric Crampton, as he lays out a compelling argument for an international economists’ regatta that will pump cash into the NZ economy. I know you’re going to be sceptical about this but hear me out. The 2021 Economist’s Cup should be held in Wellington. This … Read more
The government yesterday introduced a new winter energy payment for everyone over 65, no matter how well off they are. If Jacinda Ardern and Grant Robertson are serious about alleviating hardship in New Zealand, this is the very last group they should be splashing cash on, argues Eric Crampton. According to every existing assessment of … Read more
We conclude an epic essay from the New Zealand Initiative’s Eric Crampton, exploring what life is like in and out of New Zealand. Today: chapters seven and eight. Read chapters one and two here, chapters three and four here, chapter five here and chapter six here. Chapter 7: For your own good The way [the Nutri-Matic Machine] functioned was very interesting. … Read more
We continue serialising an epic essay from the New Zealand Initiative’s Eric Crampton, exploring what life is like in and out of New Zealand. Today: chapter five, on drinking. Read chapters one and two here, chapters three and four here and chapter five here. Chapter 6: Driving you to drink Trillian did a little research in the ship’s copy of … Read more
We continue serialising an epic essay from the New Zealand Initiative’s Eric Crampton, exploring what life is like in and out of New Zealand. Today: chapter five, on policing. Read chapters one and two here and chapters three and four here. Chapter 5: Policing “So are you going to come quietly,” shouted one of the cops again, “or … Read more
We continue serialising an epic essay from the New Zealand Initiative’s Eric Crampton, exploring what life is like in and out of New Zealand. Today: chapters three and four, covering tax and airport security. Read chapters one and two here. Chapter 3: A sense of proportion: The tax system “He’s spending a year dead for tax … Read more
Living in New Zealand and focusing on our very real social issues, it’s easy to forget that there are many things we do quite well. Or, to put it another way, that things are frequently a lot worse in other countries, even advanced prosperous ones. Over the next couple of weeks we serialise an epic … Read more
Budget 2017: We invited Eric Crampton to make the argument for a tax cut. Here he offers the case for a modest cut to reflect inflation, the case for a more substantial cut, and, for good measure, a dumb case Read all our Budget 2017 coverage here. There are a lot of dumb cases for … Read more
Some say the American billionaire isn’t welcome because of his backing for Trump – but that happened four years after he was granted citizenship. And should political support really be a litmus? Eric Crampton writes in defence of Citizen Thiel. Step into my time machine. It’s 2011. Peter Thiel is one of the world’s most … Read more
Earlier this year I wrote that a Donald Trump presidency wouldn’t be that bad. Today I’m a whole lot less cheerful, writes Eric Crampton. I expect a lot of kiwis will be tempted to see the Trump phenomenon through an income inequality lens. While rising income inequality is a myth in New Zealand, it isn’t in America. But … Read more
Did the Canadian experiment work? It is far too early to tell, and anybody claiming otherwise may be trying to sell you something, writes Eric Crampton There’s a reasonable consensus that not building enough houses, apartments, or terraced housing is at the root of Auckland’s lack-of-homes problem. And there’s further reasonable consensus that that’s primarily … Read more
There is good reason for reforming the student loan system, but the proposal to wipe debt for those who work in the regions doesn’t hold water, argues Eric Crampton. It’s hard to think of any problem solved by Labour’s proposed student loan policy that wouldn’t have better solutions. And I don’t think it is because … Read more
Yes, it is a crisis: a profound and persistent crisis, bedevilled by distractions. Economist Eric Crampton takes a deep breath and works his way through the factors. The word crisis gets thrown around a lot. New Zealand has managed to have several crises in alcohol use over the past decade, despite official statistics showing generally … Read more
In principle, a Universal Basic Income, as floated by the NZ Labour Party, sounds great. It’s once you start looking harder at implementation that things quickly become, well, messy, writes Eric Crampton. If you like a UBI, economist Kevin Milligan tells us you can choose two of the following three options. But only two. 1. … Read more
Eight reasons why a Trump presidency may not be as bad as you imagine. Don’t get me wrong: it could, and likely will, still all go horribly, horribly wrong. But a Trump Presidency is probably not going to be quite as bad as you probably think. And so, here’s a short list of reasons why … Read more
The New Zealand Initiative’s Head of Research Eric Crampton breaks down the depressing drug market economics which drive Walter White to murder and mayhem. // The most successful anti-methamphetamine campaign ever run in the United States came in 1995, resulting in a short-run tripling of the price of meth and a drop in purity from 90% … Read more