Written By: - Date published: 6:46 am, July 30th, 2008 - 43 comments
Categories: labour, national, wages, workers' rights -
Tags:
The essential debate in New Zealand politics (and all capitalist economies) is between Right and Left over how big a share of the economy’s production should go to the workers who produce it (ie wages, salaries) and how much should go to the capitalists who invested in the means of production (ie dividends, interest). The default position, since the capitalist owns the revenue of production and gets to do the division, is that the capitalist gets the lion’s share but workers’ rights – the right to organise into unions, the right to a minimum wage etc – give workers the power to win a larger share off the capitalist. Labour and the Left’s policy is to extend these work rights – high minimum wage, more bargaining power for unions etc. National’s policies are the opposite – they don’t raise the minimum wage meaning inflation makes it worth less and their policies weaken the power of unions.
The simple and intended result of these policies is that when the Left is in power not only do wages go up they go up as a % of GDP, and when National is in power, not only do wages go down, they go down as a % of GDP.
(source)
National tells us they will boost growth and boost wages. Their record suggest otherwise, not only have the Labour-led Governments out-performed National on GDP growth, they’ve also increased the share of GDP that goes to workers.
Some people would have you believe that ‘the old Left-Right divide is over’. That’s bollocks. And it’s bollocks coming from National because they don’t want you to know that a vote for National is a vote for weaker work rights, that a vote for National is a vote for a smaller slice of the cake.
Facebook
Twitter
Scoopit!
RedLogix
I understand your argument but the same can be said for almost all MP’s. There is not many in that house that do not follow the Party line and shelve some of their core beliefs to make themselves more electable. That may be a right wing capitalist or a loony lefty. They are all front men for a party that has to moderate extreme views to become electable. Clark, Cullen, Key, Brash, you name them, they all do it. Hyde and some of those Green people are the few who stick to their core beliefs and dont compromise them.
So even if Key is shelving some of his beliefs it does not mean his government will be the same as the one in the 1990′s. It simply does not make sence.
Even if National had been in power since 1999, they would have evolved with time.
SP’s argument that John Key’s goverment will mirror Bolgers is in my opinion absurd and based on nothing but a strange hatred for the right and more specifically National.
“But isn’t that the purpose of right-wing economics? To provide the justifications for selfishness and greed, and how oppression and poverty are “the natural order’, and bugger the empirical evidence?”
Absolute gold. I/S, do you not understand that these people you are attacking may actually believe that what they are trying to do is in the best interest of society as a whole? Even the people in the ACT party say the things they do because they think it is best for society as a whole – you might not believe it but its true!
I discuss economic policies in the way I do because I genuinely believe that they are the best way to help people – not because I want the greedy and selfish to “win the game of life”.
Expecting the government to account for all injustices is not realistic – by doing so they will simply create injustices of their own. The government does have a role to improve outcomes. However, the best way they can do this is by helping to provide a situation where individuals can trade freely and fairly – does this point of view make me a bastion of selfishness and greed?
these people you are attacking may actually believe that what they are trying to do is in the best interest of society as a whole? Even the people in the ACT party say the things they do because they think it is best for society as a whole
Agreed. Really do.
“However, the best way they can do this is by helping to provide a situation where individuals can trade freely and fairly,“
This a bit sneaky, and I assume not deliberate.
The bolded word is where the whole debate is hiding. Innit?
I mean if I decide that the most fair system, that promoted freedom most efficiently, was one where a certain bookie owned the entire world, some might consider that selfish. Bastards.
“This a bit sneaky, and I assume not deliberate.
The bolded word is where the whole debate is hiding. Innit?”
It was deliberate – as without mentioning fairness my claim wouldn’t be able to be applied to anything practical. However, you are exactly right that it is the whole reason for debate, and can explain the whole difference in the way we view what is “selfish” behaviour.
That is why ACT, National, Labour, and the Greens can all support separate policies but still believe they are doing what is best for the nation – because they believe different things are fair.
Now fairness is an interesting thing – ultimately, I don’t know what is fair, which is why I place so much value on transparent elections where society can state what it believes is fair.
As an economist I believe that we can achieve “fair” outcomes in any sense of the word as long as we redistribute and then allow voluntary trade. The reason economists love the idea of voluntary trade so much is because we realise that we don’t know what people want, and by allowing them to trade they can “reveal” this information to us. Now there may be situations where the barriers to trade are too much, as so regulation would be better – if this case is provided for me then I will accept it.
I guess I should define what I think selfish is. A selfish politician will try to get into parliament solely to benefit themselves, rather than as a way to improve society. I’m not happy that I/S believe that politicians on the left want to improve society while ones on the right don’t – they just have a different view of what a fairness entails. Calling them selfish for this is disingenious.
I wish that the separate ends of the political spectrum would work to find out what they have in common, rather than constantly attacking each other on ideology – I’m sick of both sides treating the other side as stupid or selfish
“I’m sick of both sides treating the other side as stupid or selfish”
Fair enough
Bloody humans.
“Fair enough
Bloody humans.”
Razorlight,
Your argument is that we cannot judge the performance of the next (Key) National govt on the performance of the last (Bolger/Shipley) National govt.
You make the analogy of difference between the Clark Labour govt vs the Lange/Douglas Labour govt. I think that’s a disingenious analogy.
Between the 4th and 5th Labour Govt parts of the 4th Labor govt left Labour and set up their own organisation (ACT) which they then turned into a party, and we saw Labour make major public disavowals of the reformist approach the 4th Labour govt had taken. We see nothing similar regards the last and possibly-next National govts.
Brash pushed National to the right, Key appears to be pushing it back towards the more centre-right approach Bolger took. So Key & English appearto be inheritors of Bolger’s National party.
But there’s another party to this. Given the lack of firm policy details from National, who really knows. Until they start issuing real detailed policies all we can do is assume they’re a National Party and compare them to what National govts have done before. Maybe they’re the party of Bolger. Maybe they’re the party of Brash. Or maybe they’re the party of Mickey Mouse.
Yah I finally got the data
damn computer has been a pain 
I’ve noticed that you are using compensation of employees from the national accounts as the wage and salary figure. I’m not sure this is appropriate – shouldn’t you be using the wage and salary data?
Compensation of employees uses GROSS wage and salary information (so includes tax) and also includes other compulsory levies and the such. In a sense, it is more of a measure of the cost of an employee than on the return an employee gets from working.
Still its an interesting graph, keep up the data stuff