Normally the ABC, like a lot of public broadcasters, tease you with a headline and end up concluding nothing so they can claim to be balanced.
Not so in this case. Gareth Hutchens is your author, and the headline is "Inflation has fallen in NZ and Aus - but which is faring better?"
It's always instructive to read specific comparisons, look at the wider picture, and crunch the numbers, and this piece does that.
Boy does it do that.
It starts with a clue - "New Zealand's economy is in recession. Australia's economy is not in recession."
He then involves the Reserve Bank. Our cash rate peaked at 5.5% while Australia's peaked at 4.35%.
In unemployment, New Zealand's got to 5.1% and is probably still climbing. Australia's is under 4%.
New Zealand's labour force hasn’t grown in the past 12 months. Australia's labour force has been consistently growing for the past 12 months.
In the past three years Australia's economy hasn’t recorded a single quarter of negative growth.
New Zealand's economy has three quarters of zero growth and three quarters of negative growth. We've just experienced six consecutive months of negative growth.
When it comes to the Reserve Bank the article points out the respective RB's pursued different approaches to employment, as regards their approach to inflation.
The approach, according to the Australian Reserve Bank, was to preserve as many of the jobs that have been created in recent years as they could.
Here's the last line in the article; "and thousands of Kiwis have revealed which strategy they prefer by buying a plane ticket to Australia".
I think most of us could have guessed all of this.
But put it in words, with stats and graphs and lay it bare and a more depressing, debilitating, deflating and anger-inducing set of numbers would be hard to find.
And those of us left have, and are, living through it.
Talk about stark.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
It's always instructive to read specific comparisons, look at the wider picture, and crunch the numbers, and this piece does that.
Boy does it do that.
It starts with a clue - "New Zealand's economy is in recession. Australia's economy is not in recession."
He then involves the Reserve Bank. Our cash rate peaked at 5.5% while Australia's peaked at 4.35%.
In unemployment, New Zealand's got to 5.1% and is probably still climbing. Australia's is under 4%.
New Zealand's labour force hasn’t grown in the past 12 months. Australia's labour force has been consistently growing for the past 12 months.
In the past three years Australia's economy hasn’t recorded a single quarter of negative growth.
New Zealand's economy has three quarters of zero growth and three quarters of negative growth. We've just experienced six consecutive months of negative growth.
When it comes to the Reserve Bank the article points out the respective RB's pursued different approaches to employment, as regards their approach to inflation.
The approach, according to the Australian Reserve Bank, was to preserve as many of the jobs that have been created in recent years as they could.
Here's the last line in the article; "and thousands of Kiwis have revealed which strategy they prefer by buying a plane ticket to Australia".
I think most of us could have guessed all of this.
But put it in words, with stats and graphs and lay it bare and a more depressing, debilitating, deflating and anger-inducing set of numbers would be hard to find.
And those of us left have, and are, living through it.
Talk about stark.
Mike Hosking is a New Zealand television and radio broadcaster. He currently hosts The Mike Hosking Breakfast show on NewstalkZB on weekday mornings - where this article was sourced.
5 comments:
Australia has always had a strong journalism profession. Producing exceptional people. John Pilger was one Rupert Murdoch senior another. New Zealand has never had such strength in the journalism trade.We produce top cartoonists our journalists ( despite a handful of notable exceptions) have always been woeful and weak and biased.
The Aussies are missing an opportunity for huge further GDP expansion. They should standardise an abbo language, set up a Commission to dream up many fold expansion, ,establish schools to teach it, use it extensively throughout all official communications and train up all msm presenters for random sprinkle use. The inefficiency created will increases paid work and further add to GDP.
From Australia, New Zealand appears as a scenic paradise — economically despressed and racially divided, and with no immediate prospect of improvement on either front.
What everyone seems to miss (especially the kiwis) in this great Oz Vs NZ Economic hand wringing is that the Australian Government, regardless of the side you choose, was originally established, and is still there today, to protect and pursue the interests of business. The people are an after thought & the people acknowledge & accept it.
In New Zealand the government exists for the people.
Which is why in Australia, when the Labour government (in coalition with their idiot greenies) endorses the opening of a new coal mine, there is a bit of handwringing in the media, maybe a bit of coverage about the protests, but not much else. And likewise when the Liberal's endorse the opening of a new coal mine.
When the govt changes between blue and red in Australia nothing really changes for most people. What changes is the relative strength and clout of the business lobby vs the union lobby.
Scott Morrison is what lost the election for the liberals last time - he was just such a turd that dyed in the wool liberals couldn't stand the sight of him at the helm any more - and they lost not to Labour but to the teals...basically modern day liberals who are mostly high flying women. (Because Australia truly is quite a sexist place to live and work, and especially be in government.)
So if NZ wishes it's economy to perform on a par with Australia & create genuine career opportunities for NZ's young people, and bring back the number 8 wire spirit that it is so well known for, but which has completely gone with the shut down of almost of NZs manufacturing and supporting industries, then it needs to do the following:
Get rid of the Maori seats from parliament and Maori electoral roll.
Lower business and corporate tax rates - not just for smaller businesses but large corporate employers such as miners, banks, oil industry, and especially the most important industry that we've yet to see any great movement on - NZ's non- existent Defence Industry.
Make it easy for people to open bank accounts, get a line of credit, invest in their ideas. (& no the rest of the world does not have NZ's ridiculous AML rules in place that place a choke hold on the flow of capital, the rest of the world does not have rules that outright prevent foreigners from buying local property).
It could go as far as Australia and stamp out the right to protest, arm the police, lock up domestic terrorists without fair cause.
But that is the cause of the wide chasm in performance between Australia and New Zealand's economies. Basically - you can't have your cake and eat it too.
Australia has had the good sense to use it's mineral resources to maintain it's economy.
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