It is said that our first minister of regional development – in the early 1970s – claimed that he wanted all our regions to have above average incomes. Duh! You would expect that there would be some variation in regional incomes. They are probably not large (partly because ours is a small country). They are not measured but we do have estimates of per capita regional domestic production (similar to GDP) which in March Year Ending 2022 ranged from 17 percent above average for the Wellington Region to 34 percent below for Northland. Because of income tax and social security benefits, the income range will be narrower. (Another factor which narrows the income range is that some of the profits of a region will go elsewhere; for instance Taranaki does well on the GDP measure but much of its profits from its hydrocarbon resources do not stay in the province.)
