The inevitable power of capital to get its way is clearly working it's magic... we are late to the western table, but clearly wealth is inexorably turning citizens into just workers and consumers, not part of the political consideration. For the benifit of the elite..
Nz in the 1950s and '60s had many faults.. but it did have high taxes and a high degree of egalatarianism.
Great idea re time for different voices to be given prominence. It's a bit rich business expressing concern over a socially divided community when there appears to be little recognition of the impact that concentrating power and wealth and the subsequent loss of social mobility has on that division. It suggests The Mood of the Boardroom is becoming a bit of an echo chamber. They need to get out more.
Even Business NZ started to realise in 2017 that entrenched inequality can foment Trumpist populism. (See page 6, bottom graph with question: "Are the economic and social conditions that have led to Brexit, Trump and the rise of the right in Europe becoming an increasing issue in New Zealand?")
"The structural shortfall in public services arises from an awkward truth of British politics: we want to pay American taxes and expect European services. Truss’s champions splutter that the UK tax burden is the highest for 70 years. True, but Britons still pay significantly less tax than most of those Europeans who enjoy more generous services."
While agreeing the the way that direction of regulations are starting to swing far to far each time we have a change of pollical leaning I'm not convinced that extending the term is the best approach.
What we need is a shake up of the way parliament and government is structured.
MMP has allowed for the representation in parliament to come reasonably close to the pollical wishes of the electorate, but because of the 5% threshold in generally means that approx 10% of the electorate does not have representation. I believe this can be overcome, not by lowering the threshold, although I do think it should be lowered, but by modifying of version of MMP to also incorporate STV. In other words, if your first choice party fails to cross the 5% threshold then your second choice party gets your vote until all unrepresented votes are either discarded because none of your choice made the threshold or there are no more votes left to count.
The second problem is the winner takes all type of approach, at least between the two main parties.
First I would suggest that parties declare that they will be coalition partners, but would still maintain their separate identities.
Once the final make up of parliament is know, the largest party, or agreed coalition partners, would be declared the treasury party or coalition.
Next the make up of cabinet would be done by taking from each party's list the highest ranking members in proportion to the list vote results. This will then force government and hence cabinet to debate in a more balance way all proposed legislation and (hopefully) prevent the current forcing through of legislation without real debate.
Interesting list, but I don't see anything about significantly reducing energy costs, unless that's bundled under infrastructure. Of even more concern though is talk about "pivoting", but to what? How is NZ going to turn itself around to make decent a living when clearly what we're producing now is hardly enough to keep the lights on? I find the lack of innovative ideas quite disheartening.
Beyond the idea that we need to be more like China for its low-cost non-union labour force. Or Australia with hectares of expendable land. Or being a military outpost for a superpower.
Depressing with only a few flickers of light.
Thanks for the article.
The inevitable power of capital to get its way is clearly working it's magic... we are late to the western table, but clearly wealth is inexorably turning citizens into just workers and consumers, not part of the political consideration. For the benifit of the elite..
Nz in the 1950s and '60s had many faults.. but it did have high taxes and a high degree of egalatarianism.
Great idea re time for different voices to be given prominence. It's a bit rich business expressing concern over a socially divided community when there appears to be little recognition of the impact that concentrating power and wealth and the subsequent loss of social mobility has on that division. It suggests The Mood of the Boardroom is becoming a bit of an echo chamber. They need to get out more.
Even Business NZ started to realise in 2017 that entrenched inequality can foment Trumpist populism. (See page 6, bottom graph with question: "Are the economic and social conditions that have led to Brexit, Trump and the rise of the right in Europe becoming an increasing issue in New Zealand?")
https://www.businessnz.org.nz/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Deloitte-BusinessNZ-Election-Survey-2017.pdf
Business - we want more infrastructure and more education
Also business - we don't want to pay for any of it.
NZ in a nutshell
"The structural shortfall in public services arises from an awkward truth of British politics: we want to pay American taxes and expect European services. Truss’s champions splutter that the UK tax burden is the highest for 70 years. True, but Britons still pay significantly less tax than most of those Europeans who enjoy more generous services."
https://www.ft.com/content/d10d0415-31f4-48ca-9a13-aa709d9437b4
Roll on the Mood of the Staff Room.
Interesting that there is some awareness that business needs some social cohesion. Better not do more Rogernomics then.
While agreeing the the way that direction of regulations are starting to swing far to far each time we have a change of pollical leaning I'm not convinced that extending the term is the best approach.
What we need is a shake up of the way parliament and government is structured.
MMP has allowed for the representation in parliament to come reasonably close to the pollical wishes of the electorate, but because of the 5% threshold in generally means that approx 10% of the electorate does not have representation. I believe this can be overcome, not by lowering the threshold, although I do think it should be lowered, but by modifying of version of MMP to also incorporate STV. In other words, if your first choice party fails to cross the 5% threshold then your second choice party gets your vote until all unrepresented votes are either discarded because none of your choice made the threshold or there are no more votes left to count.
The second problem is the winner takes all type of approach, at least between the two main parties.
First I would suggest that parties declare that they will be coalition partners, but would still maintain their separate identities.
Once the final make up of parliament is know, the largest party, or agreed coalition partners, would be declared the treasury party or coalition.
Next the make up of cabinet would be done by taking from each party's list the highest ranking members in proportion to the list vote results. This will then force government and hence cabinet to debate in a more balance way all proposed legislation and (hopefully) prevent the current forcing through of legislation without real debate.
https://open.substack.com/pub/heininger/p/the-unraveling-of-american-hegemony?r=16lm0&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web
Interesting list, but I don't see anything about significantly reducing energy costs, unless that's bundled under infrastructure. Of even more concern though is talk about "pivoting", but to what? How is NZ going to turn itself around to make decent a living when clearly what we're producing now is hardly enough to keep the lights on? I find the lack of innovative ideas quite disheartening.
Beyond the idea that we need to be more like China for its low-cost non-union labour force. Or Australia with hectares of expendable land. Or being a military outpost for a superpower.