A report by the New Zealand Initiative shows that the state is a very expensive landlord: Why does the government need to continue owning or managing more than 77,000 housing units, given its poor track record in this area, especially when state assistance can be provided without extensive government ownership? And why does it not […]
State very expensive landlord
State very expensive landlord
17 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of bureaucracy, industrial organisation, law and economics, politics - New Zealand, property rights, Public Choice, public economics, urban economics
Ten Modest Proposals to End the Gender Pay Gap
17 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, discrimination, economics of crime, economics of education, gender, human capital, labour economics, labour supply, law and economics, occupational choice, politics - USA Tags: gender wage gap
An anonymous Swiftian guest essay
Ten Modest Proposals to End the Gender Pay Gap
Middle East ceasefire is widely celebrated – but Peters notes that the pro-Palestine protesters have been silent
15 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in defence economics, laws of war, liberalism, Marxist economics, politics - New Zealand, politics - USA, war and peace Tags: Gaza Strip, Israel, Middle-East politics, regressive left, useful idiots, war against terror
Bob Edlin writes – Come in Chloe and your fellow champions of Palestinian statehood and tell us what you think of happenings in the Middle East in recent days. There was widespread celebration – not only in Israel and Gaza but around the world – of news of a cease-fire and that the hostages taken […]
Middle East ceasefire is widely celebrated – but Peters notes that the pro-Palestine protesters have been silent
How to refute accusations of dictatorial behaviour
13 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
A former vice-president of your party (and son of one of your MPs) says your party is run like a dictatorship. When this accusation is put to the co-leaders, the male co-leader refuses to answer and heads off. He sees the female co-leader is not following him and may be about to answer the question, […]
How to refute accusations of dictatorial behaviour
The supply side of media bias
12 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, econometerics, industrial organisation, politics - USA, survivor principle Tags: media bias
In my ECONS102 class, we cover economic explanations for media bias. Drawing on past research from Matthew Gentzkow and others, we demonstrate that there are demand-side explanations (media bias arises because of a bias in the preferences of the news-consuming public) and supply-side explanations (media bias arises because media firms segment the market, and focus…
The supply side of media bias
World Bank Reduces Emissions, Not Poverty
12 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in defence economics, economics of bureaucracy, economics of climate change, energy economics, environmental economics, environmentalism, global warming, politics - USA, Public Choice Tags: climate alarmism
The World Bank and other Western institutions retreat from fossil fuel finance has created a significant geopolitical opportunity for China. China is willing to finance fossil fuel projects in Africa and the developing world and reap the strategic benefit of control of energy infrastructure in many countries.
World Bank Reduces Emissions, Not Poverty
More judicial activism
11 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of crime, law and economics, politics - New Zealand Tags: constitutional law, crime and punishment, law and order, political correctness, racial discrimination, regressive left
Roger Partridge writes: When Parliament says gang insignia “is forfeited to the Crown,” citizens are entitled to assume those words mean what they say. Yet on 11 August the District Court ruled otherwise. Judge Lance Rowe directed that a Mongrel Mob vest, seized under the Government’s new Gangs Act 2024 and forfeited following a guilty plea, should nevertheless […]
More judicial activism
Te Pāti Māori
10 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
Still the same entitled grifters breaking the rules and achieving nothing
Te Pāti Māori
We do actually have a transformational government
09 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economic growth, economics of regulation, law and economics, macroeconomics, politics - New Zealand, property rights
Governments of the left like to claim they are transformational, when they’re not. The Ardern Government achieved so little it was the opposite. They used wellbeing as a slogan, and did a couple of disastrous mergers. They spent a lot of money. To be fair the Clark Government did actually achieve some major stuff such […]
We do actually have a transformational government
University of Auckland set to make mandatory “indigeneity” courses optional, as students considered them a waste of time and money
08 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of education, politics - New Zealand
As I reported in September of last year, every entering student at New Zealand’s Auckland University was required to take an “indigeneity” course—and that includes prospective science majors. As I noted: . . . . at the University of Auckland—New Zealand’s most prestigious university—every student has to take a mandatory course related to indigenous knowledge, […]
University of Auckland set to make mandatory “indigeneity” courses optional, as students considered them a waste of time and money
University of Auckland set to make mandatory “indigeneity” courses optional, as students considered them a waste of time and money
08 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in economics of education, politics - New Zealand
Jerry Coyne writes – As I reported in September of last year, every entering student at New Zealand’s Auckland University was required to take an “indigeneity” course—and that includes prospective science majors. As I noted: . . . . at the University of Auckland—New Zealand’s most prestigious university—every student has to take a mandatory course […]
University of Auckland set to make mandatory “indigeneity” courses optional, as students considered them a waste of time and money
Claim: Renewable Australia will Have No Problem with Zero Generation Days
08 Oct 2025 1 Comment
in economics of climate change, energy economics, environmental economics, environmentalism, global warming, politics - Australia Tags: solar power, wind power
A new study suggests blackouts will only happen sometimes, if we build enough batteries and overcapacity, and a hydrogen export industry.
Claim: Renewable Australia will Have No Problem with Zero Generation Days
The impact of taxes and transfers on inequality in New Zealand
08 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in applied price theory, economics of education, human capital, labour economics, labour supply, politics - New Zealand, poverty and inequality
This week, my ECONS102 class covered inequality, and social security. Which is timely, because I have been meaning to blog about this Treasury Analytical Note from 2024, by Tod Wright and Hien Nguyen, for some time. Wright and Nguyen look at the distributional impact of taxes, transfers, and government spending (on healthcare and education).Importantly, they distinguish…
The impact of taxes and transfers on inequality in New Zealand
The unraveling of Obamacare?
06 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in health economics, politics - USA Tags: health insurance
Paul Krugman has a recent post defending the exchange subsidies and tax credits that the Republicans wish to cut, talking with Jonathan Cohn about the “premium apocalypse” (and here). Whether or not one agrees with Krugman normatively, the arguments if anything convince me that Obamacare probably is not financially or politically stable. To recap some […]
The unraveling of Obamacare?
Bill Maher’s New Rules
05 Oct 2025 Leave a comment
in discrimination, gender, politics - USA, television, TV shows
Bill Maher is on a winning streak with his 7-8-minute politics and comedy bits on his “Real Time” show. Here’s the one from yesterday, called “New Rule: Long Division”: This one’s about gender (he means “sex”), with Maher saying “Until the Democrats come to grips with that, they’ve not going to have much success winning […]
Bill Maher’s New Rules
Utopia, you are standing in it! 
Recent Comments