Grasping the chance to do it better.
While CGT might have been a one-way ticket to oblivion for this government, the original problems that the Minister of Finance asked the TWG 2019 to address have not gone away. These are housing unaffordability and increased inequality, both of which are highly damaging to New Zealand’s future stability and prosperity.
Read More →Paying too much to keep us warm?
The Winter Energy Payment (WEP) provides older people extra income to keep warm during the winter. It sounds kind, but is it a glaring example of wasteful expenditure and poor allocation of scarce resources?
Read More →Of course, the left wants a capital gains tax…
There is an old 4 bed room house in Epsom I drive past that has been left to deteriorate, uninsulated, mouldy and damp, rusty roof and leaking gutters set in overgrown unkempt grounds. It was sold to an overseas owner five years ago it now belongs to another overseas owner who paid $500,000 more for it and has it in the hands of a letting agency. Rent has come down by $80 a week to $915 a week after it was empty for months. It is not alone, there are many other examples throughout Auckland.
Read More →MUST READ: Dr Susan St John – Justice delayed is democracy’s undoing
Individuals arguing their case for justice have been caught up in Kafkaesque-like experiences at WINZ, MSD, ACC and IRD, where unresponsive officials impose anachronistic rules and laws made for a different time and era. For those who don’t cave in at this point, there may be appeals to the Benefit Review Committee, the Social Security Appeals Authority, and then the daunting prospect of higher courts. Some disappear for years in the labyrinth of the Office of Human Rights Proceedings (OHRP) and the Human Rights Review tribunal (HRRT). While getting to a hearing in the HRRT can take years, after the hearing an actual decision can take many more years and even then, a finding of unlawful discrimination does not bind the Crown to reform the laws.
Read More →Will the Tax Working Group actually address housing inequality?
Inequality is a number one issue for Western countries like the US, UK Australia and New Zealand. It not the same as the poverty issue. The growth in extreme income and wealth differences has gathered momentum as tax-free gains accumulated at the top end compound asset values, while disadvantage and debt compound negatively at the bottom end. The fortunes of the top and the bottom are inextricably linked. To begin to reverse the growing wealth divide, policy must address the balance sheets of both.
Read More →The Listener is manipulating NZers over retirement
The latest Listener (Nov 10) proclaims “Fresh moves to raise the age of super to 67”. I like the Listener but this article is at best misleading.
Read More →Time for KiwiSaver default providers to smarten up?
ANZ New Zealand has posted a record net profit after tax of nearly $2 billion. That’s a 12 percent increase on last year’s profit. ANZ is the country’s biggest home and business lender as well as the biggest KiwiSaver provider. New Zealand’s Financial Markets Authority review of banking practices is expected shortly.
Read More →MUST READ: Dobbing in is a frightful blot on the face of a failed welfare system
The latest statistics on dobbing in highlighted by Radio NZ this week should send a shudder down the spines of every thinking person in New Zealand.
Read More →The Child Poverty Action Group rethinking welfare in the 21st century speech
let us acknowledge that it has been a long harsh winter for far too many children. The Families Package was too slow coming, and for the 140,000+ children below the very lowest 40% poverty line it has been a drop in the bucket. Without a longer-term goal of systemic reform, short term improvements can seem like tinkering and band aids. Or even worse, they may create the illusion the problems are solved.
Read More →Myths that hurt children
Blaming WFF for low wages is a bit like pointing to our high rate of suicide and blaming it on the existence of the mental health services. The true cause of low wages is found in casualised hours, precarious employment, automation, globalised labour markets and falling wage share of output due to loss of union power.
Read More →Working for families is a payment for children
The debate about WFF including Matthew Hooton’s extreme view that WFF is communism by stealth is full of sound, fury and little substance. Eric Crampton contributes a more academic approach to support the view that Working for Families is an employer subsidy.
Read More →Is Working For Families really ‘Communism by Stealth’?
Matthew Hooton (19th July, NZ Herald) trots out the tired old John Key scarecrow of ‘Communism by stealth’ to debunk Working for Families (WFF). Hooton even wants to blame WFF for the nurses’ strike and low productivity.
Read More →Policy changes to a festering sore are sadly in the far distance:
An injustice that is so obvious requires immediate action- not delay until some report is written by the very people that don’t want change and have just argued that very position in court.
Read More →Universal Super – No steps forward. Two steps back?
Better off people can simply save less in other funds if they are forced to contribute more, while the poor just get poorer. On retirement, low income workers may get little advantage from their forced saving as they will need a top-up to get just to the level of NZ Super.
Read More →We can help solve child poverty – here is one crucial way how
There is an ample supply of housing overall, but it is poorly distributed in terms of size and price. Increasingly large gains in house values are accruing for the already wealthy while the poorest households suffer excessive rents or lose housing access to housing altogether.
Read More →MUST READ: Does this budget turn the tide?
Let’s be clear, the family poverty inherited from the last decade of entrenched poor policies, sheer neglect or deliberate attacks on living standards won’t be fixed overnight. We get that. We know the PM has solving child poverty at her core, and her values and integrity are the best thing that has happened to children for a very, very long time. But CPAG is the critical friend and has to say the hard stuff on behalf of children.
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