Social Credit ideas have a long history in New Zealand. The originator, Major Douglas, even visited New Zealand in 1934 and testified to a parliamentary committee. The ideas influenced Labour in particular in the 1930s, and some who later played very prominent roles in National. We got our very own political party – the Social Credit Political League – in 1954 and from time to time Social Credit did very well in the polls (and under FPP even managed four MPs at the different times from the 1960s to the 1980s). I recall a time – perhaps 1980 – when Social Credit briefly polled ahead of Labour. There had been an entire Royal Commission in the 1950s, mostly intended to debunk them, but they weren’t deterred – as a young economist at the Reserve Bank, a fair amount of my time was spent responding to letters, to us or the…
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