"[NZ] Governments of both the left and right invested heavily in public infrastructure such as water, roading and power networks from the 1940s to early 1970s, paid for with sharply higher income taxes, land taxes and estate duties. Government investment as a share of GDP ranged from 10-15% over that period and income tax rates were over 50% for many."

#BernardHickey, 2024

https://thekaka.substack.com/p/is-28-per-year-population-growth

Bernard called it back in March;

"Chris Hipkins has fallen into the classic trap of treating the government budget like a household budget."

#BernardHickey

https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/14-03-2023/this-is-the-rainy-day-weve-been-saving-for

#NZPolitics #Election2023 #HandbagEconomics

Asked if he thinks the reserve status of the US dollar is in jeopardy, Bernard Hickey's reply is as cool as ice:

"No."

Why not?

"Because the US has more aircraft carrier groups than China."

https://theworkinggroup.podbean.com/e/the-working-group-with-ruth-richardson-bernard-hickey-and-damien-grant/

Unlike the monetarist zombies, he knows that as long as everyone believes that the US state can back the value of its currency in global markets - by force if necessary - their magic checkbook (to use Rob Newman's analogy) will keep working.

#BernardHickey

"We left that land before the irrigation technology came along and it was irrigated to within an inch of its life. That land is now polluted and the rivers and the lakes downstream from it, in Galatea, are polluted. But the value of the land has risen sharply, because of the number of milk solids it produces."

#BernardHickey, 10 March 2023

https://thespinoff.co.nz/podcasts/when-the-facts-change

#podcasts #economics #farming #dairy #pollution #environment #WhenTheFactsChange

"... the politicians of both National and Labour understand how to win MMP elections. They know there are more swinging median voters who own homes in suburbs and provincial towns than there are non-car-driving renters in the big cities. That won’t change until the electoral demographics change, which would require more than 500,000 non-voting young renters to vote, and for several hundred thousand older swinging voters to not vote."

#BernardHickey

https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/09-03-2023/how-a-rogue-survey-over-public-transport-funding-reveals-a-stark-generational-divide

#NZPolitics

"... global capitalism ... [is] in danger of destroying itself from the inside out ... as the economy grows, those who own all the assets get more and more, those who don't get poorer and poorer, and as a result growth slows as the machine grinds to a halt. And the key to stopping this doom loop lies in addressing inequality and productivity."

- #BernardHickey, When the Facts Change #podcast

https://rss.acast.com/when-the-facts-change

#GlobalCapitalism #DoomLoop #inequality #TheSpinoff