High unemployment helps Nats keep wages down

21 comments on “High unemployment helps Nats keep wages down ”

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1. tc 1

   11 March 2010 at 9:37 am

   Yup their masterplan working nicely……Frontline means outsourcing probably and I think Australia has about a 1 in 6 public servant ratio so we’re really catching up eh Clown.

   More of the same from the party who only have a few clubs in their bag…..pro-business, anti union/beneficiary, reward the well off…whatdaya mean there’s more clubs than that ? Social justice/balanced distribution/paying attention to decades of research and proven outcomes….never heard of those ?
2. blinded by the right 2

   11 March 2010 at 9:42 am

   Going back to your first couple of paragraphs about money being salted away for a rainy day. This is what we all thought we had too, until a few months before the last election when it turned out the cupboard was bare.
   • Bright Red 2.1

     11 March 2010 at 9:52 am

     we had salted money away for a rainy day. The government had net assets for the first time in a hundred years because it had paid down debt and put money away.

     Labour had also maintained healthy structural surpluses, so when the bad times hit it wasn’t a deficit on top of a deficit (like the US).

     Treasury has a little piece on this – how a healthy fiscal balance going into the recession was key to countries getting through ok. http://treasury.govt.nz/economy/mei/feb10/03.htm

     bit of information always helps, eh blindy?
   • lprent 2.2

     11 March 2010 at 12:03 pm

     FFS blinded. Labour finally managed to pay down the government debt to the minimum levels only in 2007 fiscal year. You expect surpluses in the following year, with a global recession underway. The forecast first real balance sheet surplus (ie after killing all non-operational debt) for 2008 was spent on frigging tax-cuts. When the recession hit hard, the surplus dissipated with a reduction in expected government revenue.

     You really are a frigging optimist with no understanding of anything outside of your wallet, and unreasonable expectations of everyone else supporting you with infrastructure and services you don’t want to pay for. You think short-term…. Ummm describes the usual right mentality
3. gitmo 3

   11 March 2010 at 9:49 am

   “Norway has a strong budget balance thanks to its revenues from oil and gas. It also has a huge sovereign wealth fund in which some of the receipts from the country’s fossil-fuel exports are kept for the benefit of future generations.

   So when the Government needed to boost the economy this year, it had the means to do so without having to cut public budgets or increase taxes.

   “The fund has allowed Norway to have an expansionary fiscal policy,” says Espen Moen, economics professor at the Norwegian School of Management. “It can stimulate demand by spending, without fear of higher taxes, because it is so big.”

   Moen also points out that Norway is not as dependent on exporting industries: “We export oil and gas, but even though oil prices have fallen since last summer, production is at full capacity.”

   Surely this is why we need to at least consider prospecting for and then utilising our mineral and fossil fuel potential ?
   • RedLogix 3.1

     11 March 2010 at 9:53 am

     Surely this is why we need to at least consider prospecting for and then utilising our mineral and fossil fuel potential ?

     By overseas companies who will pocket the profits. Any royalties will just get pissed away in tax cuts … and there’ll nothing to show for it but sodding great holes in the ground.
   • Pascal's bookie 3.2

     11 March 2010 at 9:54 am

     Who says we shouldn’t?

     Or do you think that all of our mineral resources are in schedule 4 protected areas? It’s exploring those that people are objecting to.
     • gitmo 3.2.1

       11 March 2010 at 12:24 pm

       See the comment by RL – this is a typical kneeJERK reaction.
       • Pascal's bookie 3.2.1.1

         11 March 2010 at 12:35 pm

         Firstly, if you want a Norway type situation then Red is right. We won’t get there by selling the mineral rights to foreign miners.

         Secondly, how does that justify prospecting in schedule 4?

         If you want bullshit knee jerkism, ‘drill baby drill’ takes some beating.
4. RedLogix 4

   11 March 2010 at 9:51 am

   Thoughtful and well argued as usual Marty… but the shorter version goes like this… these Nats represent the interests of the predatory classes who need a nice stock of desperate prey to feed upon.
5. TightyRighty 5

   11 March 2010 at 9:56 am

   you’re really starting to believe your own bullshit aren’t you? the nats know that lower unemploymnt means higher prosperity. do you really think they are just sitting in ivory towers scheming how to keep the general population enslaved?
   • Lanthanide 5.1

     11 March 2010 at 9:59 am

     Based on their actions, yes.
   • Bored 5.2

     11 March 2010 at 10:22 am

     Hey Tighty, thats a bit of pot calling the kettle black. The concept of lower unemployment being desirable because then everybody gets prosperous is both laudable and laughable. As an employer I will always try and keep as much of the margin as possible, its the way we employers work. You might also have noticed that it is possible (as demonstrated by USA stats) to have extreme wealth alongside very low wages and high unemployment. I dont need to listen any lefty arguments about wages to know how the whole thing works, nor do I need to listen to any spurious right wing apologist nonsense.
   • Daveo 5.3

     11 March 2010 at 10:28 am

     It’s basic political economy.

     – Businesses want to keep wages down in order to make larger profits. It’s not about businesses being immoral, it’s about businesses working as they’re designed to in a capitalist system.

     – National, as the party of business and free market capitalism, is obviously hugely influenced by what business wants. They come from business, their funding comes from business, much of their policy is written by business, and their rhetoric is the same as business’.

     – In order to get elected, National needs to say they stand for the interests of working people, including higher wages. Even if it’s not their intention.

     – Hence the disconnect between National’s rhetoric and reality.
6. Clarke 6

   11 March 2010 at 12:02 pm

   Unfortunately full employment was a policy goal that was largely abandoned by both National and Labour in the 1980s, despite the evidence that poverty is a direct precursor of the crime that both parties seem obsessed with. As a result, we’re now one of the least equitable societies on earth, and we regularly consign hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders to being less than full members of society.

   If there was a genuine Left in New Zealand politics then it would be advocating for full employment to be one of the core functions of government.
   • Jum 6.1

     15 March 2010 at 12:39 pm

     Clarke, I will then assume that you voted for Clark and Cullen who were doing just that until the greed for tax cuts got in the way of the New Zealand psyche of a fair go for all. Enter the NActMs, exit the reducing unemployment.

     John, I am fairly relaxed, I am confident, I would love to see wages drop, Key is fulfilling his goal.

     And now the carefully leaked tax cut talk that will have greedy NZers foaming at the mouth.
7. Peter Cresswell 7

   11 March 2010 at 12:02 pm

   Or for a more accurate headline:

   “High wages help keep unemployment up</b?"
   • Peter Cresswell 7.1

     11 March 2010 at 12:04 pm

     Oops. Sorry. Munted the bold tag. :-/
     • felix 7.1.1

       11 March 2010 at 12:11 pm

       And the humour. And the reasoning. And the reading of the post beyond the headline.

       Oh well, one day Peter…
   • Clarke 7.2

     11 March 2010 at 12:38 pm

     If high wages kept unemployment up, then ipso facto low wages would result in low unemployment. And like all good linear relationships, the lower wages went then the lower unemployment would become, until it reached zero.

     If your hypothesis was actually true – as distinct from being a right-wing troll – then how come the unemployment and under-employment rate in India is actually higher than NZ< despite their average wage being so much lower? Care to explain?
8. Quoth the Raven 8

   11 March 2010 at 8:55 pm

   According to the Norway post:

   Unemployment in Norway is expected to rise further, according to new prognoses from the Norwegian Central Bank, DnB NOR Markets and Statistics Norway (SSB), from 2.8 per cent at present to 5.5 of the total work force in 2011.

   However, compared to other European countries, this is still low: In neighbouring Sweden the unemployment rate is already well above 10 per cent, according to Aftenposten.

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