Paul Krugman described behavioural economics as the most important innovation in the economics discipline for half a century.

Understanding its history helps understanding where it is going. The ideas which underpin Kiwisaver entered into the New Zealand political dialogue in the late 1960s when the Labour Party, then in ...

Apply the golden fiscal rule and invest prudently. A lender is greatly disadvantaged compared to a borrower. The borrower gets the cash immediately. In exchange, the lender gets a promise that the ...

The Minister of Health is one of the toughest jobs in Cabinet. In comparison, being Prime Minister or Minister of Finance is easy. Recovering from an emergency operation, unable to move with all the ...

We are facing difficult challenges from the likely rise in import prices. Many readers may find this week’s column difficult compared to the discussions they are familiar with. That is because it ...

We may regret we have not put enough effort into building resilience. I was wrong when I argued that the Muldoon Government should have hiked petrol tax to ration petrol when it ran short following ...

The turmoil in the world economy from Trump’s attack on Iran will delay New Zealand’s economic recovery. Back in 1993 I was perhaps the first to announce that the economy seemed to be in recovery. The ...

Industrial policy is once more on the agenda of many governments. There is a long history of Industrial Policies (IP) aimed at promoting a particular sector of an economy. When Henry VIII abandoned ...

It is more than a four-letter word exercise. In 1986, the government commissioned a review of science policy chaired by ex-Governor General David Beattie. Among the agencies it interviewed was the ...

We should follow the Golden Rule of Fiscal Management and not borrow for consumption in the medium run. Asymmetry is a crucial, but often ignored, feature of credit transactions. You would normally be ...

What are the economic and political implications if the New Zealand economy stagnates for five and more years? Prime Minister Christopher Luxon told Morning Report that ‘We've got the worst recession* ...