Kia-ora
New Zealand's National Government has legislated yesterday to follow the USA with the failed Charter School experiment.
Charter schools are simply a means to break the last vestige of trade union rights and to give the private sector access to tax dollars spent on education.
The private sector that is so good at education that most private schools had to be bailed out by tax payers.
Note; that despite all the tax payer dollars and effort poured into charter schools in the USA, 83% do not do any better than State schools. The majority do worse. Given the poor performance of State schooling in the USA generally that is not a recommendation. (Stanford University Study)
Why follow the disaster that is schooling and health in the USA.
We will see a few initial Potemkin charter schools do well, then the poor results of others will be buried.
They will not have any better results than resourcing State schools properly, to use already proven programs to reduce the tail. Successful programs such as remedial reading and Teacher aids in every classroom are being starved of funds so the Government can fund ideological nightmares such as charter schools.
If NACT was serious about bringing up educational achievement they would be working on reducing child poverty and funding extra help at early primary level for those falling behind, instead of gifting the private sector money out of education funding.
If the private sector are so good at education why don't they start their own schools. Wait! they did. We are paying to bail them out right now!
Friday, August 3, 2012
Friday, July 27, 2012
Agenda for today.
Kia-ora
It was an accountant who told me once, "do not put an accountant in charge, they know the cost of everything, and the value of nothing".
Then they act surprised when their skilled staff head for Australia, their customers head elsewhere and their business tanks.
The same logic has now been applied to the whole country.
NZ has a whole generation of managers, cannot call them leaders, who have no vision apart from cutting staff, costs and services.
It was an accountant who told me once, "do not put an accountant in charge, they know the cost of everything, and the value of nothing".
Then they act surprised when their skilled staff head for Australia, their customers head elsewhere and their business tanks.
The same logic has now been applied to the whole country.
Monday, June 18, 2012
On New Zealand's Retirement Income. Pension.
Kia-ora
The finance industry have been creaming their pants, for a return to the halcyon days, before the tax rebates were removed from superannuation savings. When they got to play with our money for free, and the negative returns and high charges were ignored, because of tax payer subsidies.
Egged on by the neo-liberals who prefer the elderly, the unemployed and the sick to starve in the streets, as an incentive to scare working people into accepting starvation wages, while they continue to get 17% increases in wealth, the finance industry is dreaming of getting more of their sticky hands on our wealth, with private super funds.
Since the 70's they have been constant in the meme that we cannot afford super. A meme that has been driven entirely by the self interest of those, who are too wealthy to need super and too mean to pay taxes, and a greedy finance industry.
Unfortunately, it is true, that if you repeat bullshit often enough, even those who should know better come to believe it.
We cannot afford super is code for, "we should leave our elderly to beg on the streets". So that wealthy people can pay less tax and the finance industry can again lose our savings for us.
In fact the idea that State super is unaffordable is crap from the same people that cry TINA and reckon that all social insurance is unaffordable.
If they win with super, they will just start on other social wages.
In reality it is much more affordable than the finance company bailouts, which would be necessary with private super.
.
"So, in 2050, we're projected to be paying only 1% of GDP more in superannuation than we were paying in 1990. Quelle horreur! This is not a difference to be terrified of, and it is easily manageable with a modest increase in taxation, either now or in the future (though that perhaps is exactly what those pushing for change are frightened of: higher taxes)".
Intergenerational theft is another piece of oft repeated stupidity.
"Do we really want to return to the days when most elderly people were totally impoverished when their working lives ended".
Super has always been paid for by current production. However you finingle it financially, whether through current taxation or savings, it still comes from the production of the current generation.
If we want to keep super affordable we should tax the current generation to invest in a sustainable future. Invest in energy, housing, education and other infrastructure so that we can keep all our people. Not in financial ponzi schemes which will fall over in the next GFC.
""Because our kids can’t afford to buy houses, we bought houses for them to live in using the equity from our house, and now all our money is tied up in mortgages. At the same time, we’re supporting our parents in their old age.
That’s how life is and always has been, for most of us. Our parents worked to give us a decent start in life, and we worked hard so our kids could have a fair go. We’re looking after our parents in their old age. We hope we’ll be looked after in our old age.
What about this is “intergenerational theft”?""
But. We can avoid the whole concept of retirement, intergenerational fairness and all the other sticking points by accepting that everyone in our society is entitled to a liveable share in the society they and their ancestors have built up.
Whether you call it a Universal income, Guaranteed minimum income (GMI) or a personal shareholder payment it is the same thing.
Replace all welfare, social insurance and pensions with a GMI.
We also get to solve many other problems such as child poverty, the unfairness of a present welfare system, and making our society more sustainable, at the same time.
http://www.sott.net/articles/show/235840-A-Town-Without-Poverty-Canada-s-Guaranteed-Income-Experiment
""Initially, the Mincome program was conceived as a labour market experiment. The government wanted to know what would happen if everybody in town received a guaranteed income, and specifically, they wanted to know whether people would still work.
It turns out they did.
Only two segments of Dauphin's labour force worked less as a result of Mincome - new mothers and teenagers. Mothers with newborns stopped working because they wanted to stay at home longer with their babies. And teenagers worked less because they weren't under as much pressure to support their families.
The end result was that they spent more time at school and more teenagers graduated. Those who continued to work were given more opportunities to choose what type of work they did"".
http://thestandard.org.nz/key-on-the-nation/comment-page-1/#comment-483385 The best way to deal with any problem is to eliminate it at root. The best way to deal with ‘retirement’ as a problem is to eliminate the entire concept. No I’m not being extreme.
The simple answer is a Universal Income""
""In fact super has been so effective in removing poverty amongst the elderly it should be extended to everyone in the form of a guaranteed minimum income. There is no excuse for having people with inadequate food and housing in a country which is capable of supplying an excess of both internally"".
Wednesday, June 13, 2012
Tuesday, June 5, 2012
Money and Debt. Explained by a 12 year old.
Kia-ora
A 12 year old Girl explains what economists will not.
Funny how a 12 year old can have a much better and clearer idea than all those university educated economists.
Or maybe they do, but know they will not be paid for questioning the current paradigm.
Note; New Zealand's Government, in the 30's, extracted New Zealand from the great depression, well before most others, by issuing Government money for public works and stimulus.
A 12 year old Girl explains what economists will not.
Funny how a 12 year old can have a much better and clearer idea than all those university educated economists.
Or maybe they do, but know they will not be paid for questioning the current paradigm.
Note; New Zealand's Government, in the 30's, extracted New Zealand from the great depression, well before most others, by issuing Government money for public works and stimulus.
Sunday, June 3, 2012
Poverty in New Zealand.
Kia-ora
One of the biggest indictments of our current economic dogma is the number of people, in the worlds richest nations, living in poverty.
What comes first is POVERTY.
Poverty is what makes “breeding” for a living seem like a good option.
Poverty is what causes all the poor outcomes to the children of teenage mums.
Poverty is what causes people to be caught in a trap of continuing poverty.
We are never going to solve problems caused by poverty by making people poorer.
Social security and minimum wages that are so low, there is almost no chance of climbing out of the poverty trap, causes the problems.
Abatement rates for those earning a bit of money while on social security are higher than those for millionaires.
A two tier education system is going to make escape from poverty even harder.
Low wages are not even good capitalism. “Businesses that cannot meet the costs of the resources they use should be allowed to fail, so others can make better use of the resources/labour”.
Every business paying low wages means there is little demand. Hurting all business.
“You should pay your workers fairly because they are the source of your wealth” Adam Smith.
Three decades of Neo-Liberal meanness is coming back to bite us. And the right want to make the victims lives harder.
A guaranteed minimum income, national super, has succeeded in practically eliminating poverty in the over 65′s. Less than 3% live in poverty, and that most likely is self inflicted.
If we are serious in eliminating poverty amongst children, 20% living in poverty, we would extend the GMI idea, that has been so successful with the elderly, to young people.
One of the biggest indictments of our current economic dogma is the number of people, in the worlds richest nations, living in poverty.
What comes first is POVERTY.
Poverty is what makes “breeding” for a living seem like a good option.
Poverty is what causes all the poor outcomes to the children of teenage mums.
Poverty is what causes people to be caught in a trap of continuing poverty.
We are never going to solve problems caused by poverty by making people poorer.
Social security and minimum wages that are so low, there is almost no chance of climbing out of the poverty trap, causes the problems.
Abatement rates for those earning a bit of money while on social security are higher than those for millionaires.
A two tier education system is going to make escape from poverty even harder.
Low wages are not even good capitalism. “Businesses that cannot meet the costs of the resources they use should be allowed to fail, so others can make better use of the resources/labour”.
Every business paying low wages means there is little demand. Hurting all business.
“You should pay your workers fairly because they are the source of your wealth” Adam Smith.
Three decades of Neo-Liberal meanness is coming back to bite us. And the right want to make the victims lives harder.
A guaranteed minimum income, national super, has succeeded in practically eliminating poverty in the over 65′s. Less than 3% live in poverty, and that most likely is self inflicted.
If we are serious in eliminating poverty amongst children, 20% living in poverty, we would extend the GMI idea, that has been so successful with the elderly, to young people.
Saturday, June 2, 2012
Police Assault Protesters in New Zealand.
Kia Ora
Recent protests, against Government policy, by Students in Auckland were greeted by an overwhelming and aggressive police presence.
New Zealand Police have just made it clear they consider there is no right to protest, if it “inconveniences” anyone.
In fact the students were going about their lawful business. PROTESTING IS STILL LEGAL IN NZ.
The police obstructed members of the public and assaulted them. WHILE THEY WERE GOING ABOUT LAWFUL BUSINESS.
Just like police in the UK.
Of course knowing you are likely to be violently assaulted by police, if you protest, has rather a dampening effect on free speech.
No doubt that is what is intended by the police overreaction.
Practicing for when the population finally realises, like the Greeks, how much they have been lied to and exploited.
How long before we see the other repressive actions of an authoritarian dictatorship, to legitimate dissent, here. Like the "kettling" in the UK.
Recent protests, against Government policy, by Students in Auckland were greeted by an overwhelming and aggressive police presence.
New Zealand Police have just made it clear they consider there is no right to protest, if it “inconveniences” anyone.
In fact the students were going about their lawful business. PROTESTING IS STILL LEGAL IN NZ.
The police obstructed members of the public and assaulted them. WHILE THEY WERE GOING ABOUT LAWFUL BUSINESS.
Just like police in the UK.
Of course knowing you are likely to be violently assaulted by police, if you protest, has rather a dampening effect on free speech.
No doubt that is what is intended by the police overreaction.
Practicing for when the population finally realises, like the Greeks, how much they have been lied to and exploited.
How long before we see the other repressive actions of an authoritarian dictatorship, to legitimate dissent, here. Like the "kettling" in the UK.
Friday, June 1, 2012
On Austerity
Kia-ora
It was an accountant who told me once, "do not put an accountant in charge, they know the cost of everything, and the value of nothing".
Then they act surprised when their skilled staff head for Australia, their customers head elsewhere and their business tanks.
The same logic has now been applied to the whole country.
NZ, and much of the rest of the world, has a whole generation of managers, cannot call them leaders, who have no vision apart from cutting staff, costs and services.
It was an accountant who told me once, "do not put an accountant in charge, they know the cost of everything, and the value of nothing".
Then they act surprised when their skilled staff head for Australia, their customers head elsewhere and their business tanks.
The same logic has now been applied to the whole country.
Saturday, May 26, 2012
House Price Inflation
Kia-ora
House price Inflation
It is a conventional economics axiom that increasing the money supply without a concomitant increase in production causes inflation.
In the last thirtyfive years we have had low inflation in wages.
Essentials, including land , and thence housing and farm prices, have gone up many times the rate of wage rises.
Land inflation is driven by private Banking's incentive to print money. The more money they supply the more interest they can make.
Unfortunately, there is also a strong natural incentive to lend only on solid security, such as land and buildings.
Banks know better than anyone the inherent insecurity and instability of financial instruments, including shares.
Mortgage law in most Western countries favours lending on land. Unlike other investments, or lending, if the value of the security, land, goes down, the borrower is still liable for the full amount of the loan and interest. The bank is indemnified against loss.
For example, in New Zealand, the bank has priority over all other creditors, including contractors.
Lending on business and other assets does not offer the same security. The bank has to wait in line with other creditors and, normally, cannot continue claims in excess of their proportion of the sale.
Banks, while reluctant to risk their own money, are happy to risk small savers investments. Our pension funds, bank deposits and savings.
These schemes, whether shares, derivatives, hedge funds or other financial instruments are designed so that banks can gamble with our money. Win or lose they always get a cut.
De-regulation of banking has removed almost all constraints on lending and the amount of wealth banks can take.
Loses come out of our pensions and other savings. Or, if they really stuff it up, taxpayers are expected to borrow more from them to pay for it. "The bailout".
The total monetary value of financial instruments and debt is now so great that a crash, or super inflation, is inevitable if it is ever fully spent on real production.
Does anyone really think that infinitely compounding interest is possible in a world with finite resources.
While we lose our savings, houses and farms, bankers still get richer.
Given the difficulty in obtaining bank finance without land as security, favourable tax treatments (in Western countries for banks, homeowners, landowners and farmers ), incentives for banks to avoid risks inherent in other investment (The inevitable crash of Banker's ponzi schemes and the likely devaluation of currency denominated investments) it is not surprising that investors prefer land.
The Chinese Government buying up land worldwide with US dollars, before they become worthless, is only a minor example.
Hence land prices rising much faster than wages.
Our economy, along with most other Western economies has been skewed, towards speculation in existing assets, by banks following their own self interest. The "invisible hand" has failed
Sunday, April 22, 2012
What is Neo-Liberalism?
Kia-ora
What is Neo-Liberalism.
Neo-Liberalism is a moral and intellectual justification for greed.
A way for those few who accumulate wealth, by impoverishing many, to justify themselves, and keep those they are stealing from docile and compliant.
This purpose for centuries has been fulfilled by religion.
We still see echo's of the religious attitudes. The idea that the poor are poor because of personal defects, American exceptionalism, the banker who reckons, "God wanted me to be rich", Ayn Rands "wealth creators".
Neo-liberals outwardly believe in small Government, minimal regulation, taxation and social security, individual freedom and responsibility and the primacy of the market in fostering economic efficiency.
In fact their leaders and intellectuals believe in anything which enables them to accumulate wealth at the expense of the rest of us.
Neo-Liberalism would be more appropriately called Neo-conservatism. It is an attempt to return to pre-enlightenment times when the idea of "each is born into their proper place" was undisputed.
Neo-Liberalism has become common usage, unfortunately we are stuck with it.
Neo-Liberalism itself has all the characteristics of blind belief and faith inherent in religion.
Despite its only success being in making a very few people wealthier, millions of people, including most politicians, blindly adhere to the faith.
'It doesn't seem to matter that they NEVER get it right. It doesn't seem to matter they are promoting economic theories that are junk. But unlike Ring's quackery, the quackery of neoliberalism is treated with reverence, it is ascribed legitimacy'.
"The first of these shifts was the Great Depression or, more precisely, the feckless response of both American mainstream political parties to the economic collapse that followed the 1929 stock market crash. In the crucial first years after the crash, Democrats and Republicans alike embraced exactly the same policies they are embracing in today’s economic troubles, with exactly the same lack of success, and showed exactly the same unwillingness to abandon failed policies in the face of economic disaster. Then as now, the federal government launched a program to bail out big banks and corporations—it was called the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in those days—and pumped dizzying amounts of money into the upper end of the economy in the belief, real or feigned, that the money would work its way down the pyramid, which of course it didn’t do. Then as now, politicians used the shibboleth of a balanced budget to demand austerity for everybody but the rich, and cut exactly those programs which could have helped families caught by hard times. Then as now, things got worse while the media insisted that they were getting better, and the mounting evidence that policies weren’t working was treated as proof that the same policies had to be pursued even more forcefully." (John Micheal Greer).
"The first of these shifts was the Great Depression or, more precisely, the feckless response of both American mainstream political parties to the economic collapse that followed the 1929 stock market crash. In the crucial first years after the crash, Democrats and Republicans alike embraced exactly the same policies they are embracing in today’s economic troubles, with exactly the same lack of success, and showed exactly the same unwillingness to abandon failed policies in the face of economic disaster. Then as now, the federal government launched a program to bail out big banks and corporations—it was called the Reconstruction Finance Corporation in those days—and pumped dizzying amounts of money into the upper end of the economy in the belief, real or feigned, that the money would work its way down the pyramid, which of course it didn’t do. Then as now, politicians used the shibboleth of a balanced budget to demand austerity for everybody but the rich, and cut exactly those programs which could have helped families caught by hard times. Then as now, things got worse while the media insisted that they were getting better, and the mounting evidence that policies weren’t working was treated as proof that the same policies had to be pursued even more forcefully." (John Micheal Greer).
Their Apostles are Adam Smith, Ayn Rand, Von Mises, the Austrian, and Freidman, the Chicago, schools of economics.
Adam Smith's "invisible hand" is often quoted. Adam Smith's "you should pay your workers fairly because they are the source of your wealth" and "tax capital and land instead of workers and entrepreneurs" is, of course, ignored.
Von Mises and Freidman advocate a totally unregulated market and a Government as one adherent famously said, "that you could drown in a bathtub". Except for police and military to protect their wealth, of course! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grover_Norquist
Ayn Rand considered the owners of capital "wealth creators" although she had to live off the real wealth creators, the rest of us, towards the end of her life.
http://www.alternet.org/story/154153/how_the_1_destroys_jobs_and_the_real_heroes_are_everyday_people
"So before we consider having another trickle-downer in the White House, let’s talk about the failure of this idea and why if you want to see a real job creator, you should look in the mirror".
In fact they support their own freedom to make money regardless of social, environmental or economic effects. At the same time restricting individual freedom to protest, or co-operate to challenge their primacy.
Supporters do not seem to see the conflict between saying they support individual freedom while at the same time restricting the majorities individual freedom to withdraw their labour or protest. These freedoms are restricted, often violently.
"Let’s recap. You’re rich, and you want to stay that way. So, to protect your ticket; to safeguard your $50 million prize; you need to find a way to eliminate, or at least minimise, the threats posed by taxes, unions, and democracy. What’s your strategy?
Essentially, there’s only one winning strategy. It requires you to convince all those who are not wealthy that whatever status and security they do enjoy is the result of your own superior imagination, risk-taking and skill. You have to paint yourself and your fellow millionaires and billionaires as a “wealth creators” and, more importantly, “job creators”. You have to convince your fellow citizens that any attempt to restrict or redistribute your wealth will not only put their jobs at risk, but that society as a whole will become poorer.
If you can convince people of these things, then they will, perfectly democratically, eliminate wealth taxes, truncate workers’ rights, and reconfigure their entire political system to favour the tiny minority fortunate enough to hold the multi-million-dollar winning tickets"
Neo-Liberalism. Like all religions, is a way for the already wealthy to delude everyone else from rebelling, so they can keep their "winning ticket".
While many followers of religions have the best of intentions, their leaders have no such illusions. The intent is to keep wealth and/or power.
The overall effect of Neo-Liberal economics is to "privatise profits while socialising the losses".
Hugely increasing inequality and economic and social dysfunction.
Country after country adopts Neo-Liberal economics and rapidly goes downhill even by Neo-Liberalism's own measures such as GDP. And we still believe it is the solution!
Compare Argentina and the BRIC countries to the Anglo Saxon countries that are slavishly following the Neo-Liberal religion.
Truly voodoo economics.
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“Never ascribe to malice that which can adequately be explained by incompetence.”
― Napoleon Bonaparte
Generally I have a somewhat optimistic view of humanity. I gave New Zealand's National Government the benefit of doubt, by ascribing their sheer lunacy to incompetence.
However, even politicians cannot be that incompetent.
Trashing a top class education system, trashing WINZ, trashing ACC. Not to mention trashing NZ as an egalitarian society and causing a recession to deepen with idiot policy like public service layoffs and tax cuts for Hawaii holidays.
It is malice.
http://www.alternet.org/rights/155484/ehrenreich%3A_how_corporations_and_local_governments_rob_the_poor_blind
“wage theft nets employers at least $100 billion a year and possibly twice that. As for the profits extracted by the lending industry, Gary Rivlin, who wrote Broke USA: From Pawnshops to Poverty, Inc. — How the Working Poor Became Big Business, says the poor pay an effective surcharge of about $30 billion a year for the financial products they consume and more than twice that if you include subprime credit cards, subprime auto loans, and subprime mortgages.”
http://www.alternet.org/story/153858/5_biggest_lies_about_the_right-wing_corporate-backed_war_on_our_schools/?page=entire
“They want to dismantle public education altogether and run schools as businesses, judged as “successes” or “failures” based on abstract data taken from high-stakes standardized test scores.”
“The right are so envious of the poor, they want to take what little the poor have left”.
Our neo-liberals see how much wealth has been stolen by their counterparts in the USA and they want to repeat the process here.
They see tax payer dollars going into schools, Social insurance and infrastructure.
Even though they do not pay taxes themselves, their money is in trusts, untaxed capital gains or offshore shelters, they are trying to find a way of increasing their cut, of taxes WE PAY.
We forget, at our peril, why neo-liberalism is so popular among the wealth stealers.
Because it works for them!