1991

Fiscal Chumps
December 17 has rolled around again and once more proved to be an exciting date on our annual political economic calendar. Yesterday saw the government acknowledge its fiscal plans for l99~92 have been blown asunder. The release of the Treasury’s three year projections, and the Reserve Bank’s two year forecasts have come hot on the heels of the private sector forecasts released over the ...
18 December 1991 - govt spending / budget - Gareth Morgan

Cullen and Hewson, Different Planets
The appointment last week of Michael Cullen as shadow Minister of Finance cements the difference in policy emphasis that New Zealanders are being offered now compared to Australians. Here both parties are into fiscal expansion, slowing the pace of economic reform and trying to avoid offending any more sector groups. In Australia the Liberal opposition has seized the policy initiative by ...
11 December 1991 - politics - Gareth Morgan

Of The Times
That the government’s fiscal policy is off track, no matter what the latest assurances are from the Minister of Finance, could be a source of financial market consternation and lead to an upward correction to interest rates. But the bond rate is now back down to the rate which prevailed prior to the announcement of the Wimps Super package on November 8. One explanation for this is that the ...
3 December 1991 - govt spending / budget - Gareth Morgan

Bringing Back the Birch
The Minister of Finance’s “balanced budget by 1993” is a dead duck, overtaken by government’s desire to stop offending special interest groups such as superannuitants. But as the sun sets on fiscal austerity and the budget inclines to largesse, we should anticipate the quality of analyses underlying the politicians’ expenditure initiatives of 1992 and beyond. First it’s necessary ...
27 November 1991 - govt spending / budget - Gareth Morgan

The Balance of Payments Not All Black
During their World Cup campaign All Black sagacity evaporated. This, rather than any lack of fitness or individual skills was apparent through all of their games. The strategic inadequacy was predominant in the back line. While the forwards were competitive, the backs time and again exposed themselves as incapable of beating the opposition, almost any opposition. That the poll of journalists ...
20 November 1991 - currency / b. of payments - Gareth Morgan

National: Something For Everyone
The massive landslide with which National won on Saturday confirms that their appeal is widely based. The relevant issue for the electorate’s medium term welfare will be whether National delivers a progression of the economic reform begun under Labour or whether they will be a government offering little progress beyond what has already been achieved It is doubtful that this ...
29 October 1991 - politics - Gareth Morgan

An Accord Or Simply Over A Barrel?
The Growth Agreement stitched together by the CTU and the Government was heralded as an overdue moderation of Rogernomics. Dispassionate examination suggests that it is little more than desperate cobbling by two parties of dissipating consequence. The Accord is belated recognition by CTU leaders that jobless figures will continue to soar, and by the government that fiscal largesse and events ...
22 October 1991 - labour market / jobs - Gareth Morgan

Why Housing’s Stuffed
Last week saw monetary policy eased followed by falls in retail rates. Rather than interpret this as sufficient stimulant to economic recovery, we would do better to recognise why monetary policy has been eased. In short, it’s because the economy’s so weak that the chances of the RB undershooting its inflation target are significant. In part this illustrates practical problems for monetary ...
30 September 1991 - housing / property - Gareth Morgan

Remuneration Reductions
Traditionally spring has been the season for much posturing by politicians employers and unions as they jostle for a position on where wages should go. Remember the tri-partite conferences and the need to compensate for inflation? Mike Moore’s Growth Agreement finally put paid to the idea that wages should be linked inexorably to inflation. Substantial progress has been achieved in ...
16 September 1991 - labour market / jobs - Gareth Morgan

The Good The Bad and The Muddled
In providing forceful forecasts of where the economy is likely to lurch economists with only one hand run the risk of being gunned down by people who are irked by hearing views that alarm them. We have been attacked on numerous occasions for passing comments that were regarded as giving too negative a view of the economy. Like all forecasting there is room for error. Unfortunately for ...
16 September 1991 - other - Gareth Morgan

Inflation - Curing an Addiction
Many people have decried the infatuation some have with achieving low inflation. There is no denying that taming our delinquent inflation performance has been a bitter battle prompting calls for less stringent targets, such as inflation at the rate of our trading partners. Let’s focus on our relative performance - against that of our trading partners. Japan currently has consumer price ...
16 September 1991 - money markets / policy - Gareth Morgan

Balancing Policy
The last week has seen serious cracks emerge in the government’s ability to continue the reform process. Health Minister Upton demonstrated an inability to effect supply process reform in that industry with his piteous “social insurance” concept. The critics correctly pasted it as little more than an extra tax to pay for an ever-avaricious public health system which, like any business requires ...
8 April 1991 - markets / regulation - Gareth Morgan

Ready For Recovery?
The release last. week of the December quarter’s Producers Price Index con firms inflation is running at very low levels in comparison to other economies. With the falls in oil prices yet to feed through, the probable falls in nominal wage rates that intensified domestic competitive conditions have been encouraging and the Employment Contracts Bill will facilitate, the prospects for very ...
10 March 1991 - industry policy - Gareth Morgan