It’s a mark of just how bad things have got that both Labour and National are at last promising to do something about the supermarkets. Minor parties are offering interventions too, including state-owned shops.
A short opinion piece on how neoliberalism has affected the NZ economy in the late 20th C.
Vote anything but the main two parties. The two that are ostensibly our “choices” are structurally similar. It’s like they are treating us like two year olds: giving us “choices” which lead to the same desired outcome.
The opinion piece is correct on some things. The Dr Geoff Bertram interviews are really enlightening. At one point he talks about the law that prevented companies from charging unreasonable prices. That was undone during the “Rogernomics” neoliberal revolution and Bertram describes how economists tracked how prices soon grew to be unreasonable. I disagree that “competition” is a fundamental neoliberal policy.
Swarbrick has been focusing on “taxing wealth, not work” and was on Gary Stevenson’s show and then he was later on The Greens show. This is important because one of the main tenants of neoliberal policy has been preventing taxation on capital while instead taxing The Poors through things like income tax and GST. Gary seems to focused on Georgist policies and more evolutions of those policies like “All Taxes Come Out of Rent” (ATCOR). As a result, you can see the spirit of these ideas in Greens’ “A tax system for all of us”.
Opportunity has put forward their “Tax Reset” which is also a move towards taxing unproductive economic activity and alleviating the burden on working people. Their Land Value Tax and Citizens Income, a UBI, both come straight out of the late 19th century Georgism which seems to mirror some of the Māori ideals of stewardship over ownership; with a free market twist. This makes the ideas palatable even to classical Libertarians. Some countries believe that land is a public good and that private ownership of land is akin to slavery. This idea is called Land Value Capture (LVC).
ACT are not classical Libertarians, at least not in their current form. I’d venture to guess that Seymour was, at some point, a classical Libertarian. Unfortunately, their policies and positions present as an organisation that has received funding and guidance from “far right” organisations that have co-opted Libertarian movements around the world. Billionaires have noticed that, globally, neoliberal “centrist” parties are losing ground and have started funding the far-right. ACT now focus on divisive culture wars which is a direct departure from their otherwise single-focus of reducing government to an enforcement organ of contracts and private property (courts and jackboot thugs). ACT is not “Neoliberal” and they are not “Libertarian” in my view.
NZ First is not worth analysis. Peters is a peacock that will do anything to stay in power.
So, I would argue that Greens and Opportunity both have tax policies that directly attack the Neoliberal changes the article was referring to. I’d also say that the article is incorrect in linking competition to Neoliberalism. Competition is a fundamental tenant of Capitalism. Neoliberalism is based on the idea that “selfishness is good”. In an idea capitalist society, the state participates in “human rights” sectors: food, housing, clothing, and medicine; making these things universally available to people. The private sector can go above and beyond for people that have the money. This is the most successful model I have seen around the world. The state keeps the private sector in check by setting the baseline. The private sector keeps the state accountable by pushing the SoTA.
If you’ve got this far then please check out David Graeber, you can listen to his audio books on Spotify or listen to his talks on YouTube.
I might have got the wrong end of the article, but I thought the point of the article was that the state should play a much larger part in essentials. State run infrastructure, state housing, state run services, perhaps state run grocery stores.
While I support and agree with what you’re saying around how there are parties that are going for large scale change in ways that would benefit the country, I am not sure any are explicitly calling for what is talked about in the original post?
Interesting read. Again, it seems the solution is not being offered by any party 🤷
FTFY: “either party”
Vote anything but the main two parties. The two that are ostensibly our “choices” are structurally similar. It’s like they are treating us like two year olds: giving us “choices” which lead to the same desired outcome.
I don’t think any party is realistically offering a solution to the article’s highlighted points. Some better than others, sure.
The opinion piece is correct on some things. The Dr Geoff Bertram interviews are really enlightening. At one point he talks about the law that prevented companies from charging unreasonable prices. That was undone during the “Rogernomics” neoliberal revolution and Bertram describes how economists tracked how prices soon grew to be unreasonable. I disagree that “competition” is a fundamental neoliberal policy.
Swarbrick has been focusing on “taxing wealth, not work” and was on Gary Stevenson’s show and then he was later on The Greens show. This is important because one of the main tenants of neoliberal policy has been preventing taxation on capital while instead taxing The Poors through things like income tax and GST. Gary seems to focused on Georgist policies and more evolutions of those policies like “All Taxes Come Out of Rent” (ATCOR). As a result, you can see the spirit of these ideas in Greens’ “A tax system for all of us”.
Opportunity has put forward their “Tax Reset” which is also a move towards taxing unproductive economic activity and alleviating the burden on working people. Their Land Value Tax and Citizens Income, a UBI, both come straight out of the late 19th century Georgism which seems to mirror some of the Māori ideals of stewardship over ownership; with a free market twist. This makes the ideas palatable even to classical Libertarians. Some countries believe that land is a public good and that private ownership of land is akin to slavery. This idea is called Land Value Capture (LVC).
ACT are not classical Libertarians, at least not in their current form. I’d venture to guess that Seymour was, at some point, a classical Libertarian. Unfortunately, their policies and positions present as an organisation that has received funding and guidance from “far right” organisations that have co-opted Libertarian movements around the world. Billionaires have noticed that, globally, neoliberal “centrist” parties are losing ground and have started funding the far-right. ACT now focus on divisive culture wars which is a direct departure from their otherwise single-focus of reducing government to an enforcement organ of contracts and private property (courts and jackboot thugs). ACT is not “Neoliberal” and they are not “Libertarian” in my view.
NZ First is not worth analysis. Peters is a peacock that will do anything to stay in power.
So, I would argue that Greens and Opportunity both have tax policies that directly attack the Neoliberal changes the article was referring to. I’d also say that the article is incorrect in linking competition to Neoliberalism. Competition is a fundamental tenant of Capitalism. Neoliberalism is based on the idea that “selfishness is good”. In an idea capitalist society, the state participates in “human rights” sectors: food, housing, clothing, and medicine; making these things universally available to people. The private sector can go above and beyond for people that have the money. This is the most successful model I have seen around the world. The state keeps the private sector in check by setting the baseline. The private sector keeps the state accountable by pushing the SoTA.
If you’ve got this far then please check out David Graeber, you can listen to his audio books on Spotify or listen to his talks on YouTube.
I might have got the wrong end of the article, but I thought the point of the article was that the state should play a much larger part in essentials. State run infrastructure, state housing, state run services, perhaps state run grocery stores.
While I support and agree with what you’re saying around how there are parties that are going for large scale change in ways that would benefit the country, I am not sure any are explicitly calling for what is talked about in the original post?