Apparently that nice Mr. Key is less than enthusiastic about the economic recommendations for his former rival Don Brash. Gasp! Shock. Horror. Not. Without even looking at Brash’s recommendations I could have told you that they will be rejected out of hand by Key. The entire taskforce was never designed to produce any viable suggestion. [...]

I see that question time was filled with references to the UNDP Human Development Report on Human Mobility and Development and a book called The Spirit Level. No Right Turn and FrogBlog are also terribly excited about the report, as if inequality is the only thing that matters. They probably get this idea from the [...]

Colin Espiner blogs on the mess that is ACC today. For the most part I agree with what he has to say, but one particular sentence stood out. In the midst of a comment about the large increase of fees for motorcyclists (which is somehow “unfair” –  despite that fact that motorcyclists cost ACC far [...]

Economists are bouncing up and down with glee saying that the recession is over. I view all of this buoyancy with a great deal of skepticism, not it the least because few economists seemed to be able to predict the derivatives disaster that brought us to this pass. It would be nice if they are [...]

On Wednesday, Obama delivered his new plan for banking reforms. While the man may be conciliatory to the outside world, he certainly likes to pick fights inside his country. Just a few days after setting in motion healthcare plans that will be resisted by virtually every healthcare professional in the country, he now proposes a [...]

I note that Chrysler is filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy at long last. It should have done this months ago but managed to prolong the inevitable with lots of money from that nice Mr. Obama. In fact, Mr. Obama is so nice, he’s going to give them even more money while Chrysler in in Chapter 11. [...]

Garth George complains today about the apparent lack of action in the National government after a flurry of activity before the summer holidays. The Standard applauds this sentiment but for almost the exact opposite reasons to George. The Standard thinks this is because National does not know what it is doing. George is simply disappointed [...]

Every now and then you come across an op-ed piece that appears to be orbiting it’s own little planet, so wonderfully divorced from reality. There was such a piece the the Herald yesterday by Gehan Gunasekara who teaches commercial law at the University of Auckland’s Business School. I am hoping none of his students pay attention [...]

The Herald reported on Tuesday on a Ministry of Health survey that says there is a problem of high after-hours fees After hours patients charged up to $250. I would have posted on this earlier, but apparently my site had to “propagate its DNS” before it would work – sounds nasty Doctor’s fees are always [...]