Written By: - Date published: 2:01 pm, April 1st, 2008 - 92 comments
Categories: national, workers' rights -
Tags: national, workers' rights
Now this is rich. National, the party that gave New Zealand its low wage economy, is running the line that the trans-Tasman wage gap is “Labour’s legacy”. You’d think such a shameless rewriting of history would be laughed off in a second, but it seems in the age of the memory hole even senior political journalists can be fooled.
So let’s get a few things straight. When National entered government in 1990 the wage gap was 18.9%. By the time they were kicked out in 1999, the wage gap had increased to 28.4% – a whopping 50% increase over nine years. Under Labour the wage gap has not moved, despite the minerals boom in Australia.
The reason for this is simple. National’s policy on wages was deliberately designed to remove minimum employment conditions, restrict the ability of workers to bargain for higher wages, let the minimum wage fall behind inflation and use high unemployment as a lever to put a lid on wage increases. The catchcry then, as now, was ‘flexibility’, a term that gave bosses the power to ‘reduce labour costs’ by cutting your pay and gave you the right to go to bed at night not knowing if you’d have a job in the morning.
As a result, most Kiwis’ average weekly earnings dropped or stagnated under National – by 1999 incomes had risen by just 0.3% after inflation. By comparison, eight years after Labour became government average weekly earnings have increased by 9.3% – more than thirty times National’s increase.
The real reason for the wage gap is clear – National’s attack on New Zealand wages.
So when National says Labour caused the wage gap, they’re lying. When they say it can be solved by tax cuts, they’re lying. And when they say they’ll close the wage gap if given a chance, just remember they’re hoping to do so with the very same policies that caused the wage gap to expand in the first place.
Facebook
Twitter
Scoopit!
Yes they may have opposed certain schemes
National wanted to abolish these schemes and hey, they had to pay for their tax cuts somehow. If they’d kept WFF (unlikely) it would have been something else that got the chop – health spending for example. They certainly wouldn’t have had the money to pay for Kiwisaver Mark II or a variety of other programmes, even if they changed their minds about them.
See, the actual schemes they end up cutting aren’t the point, I was just using examples. The point is that tax cuts mean a cut in social spending, they’re not free money like National paints them. Therefore issuing figures of ‘after tax incomes’ and pretending everyone is richer is only telling half the story.
CUT THE CRAP—– wages will go up when employers pay higher wages…q.e.d.
Dave, certainly there’s been extra tax revenue as rising incomes have pushed more people into the top tax bracket, and I’m not against the idea of an adjustment for fiscal drag. I’m not sure what your point is though – what’s any of this got to do with the trans-Tasman wage gap?
The point is Tane, that people dont spend their tax money. It goes to the Government. The money people spend is based on their take home pay – which is why I asked if you could do a graph on take home pay showingthe gap between the take home pay that aussies get and what we get.
For someone who is rather busy, and hasnt got time to do a graph, youre doing a lot of comments today. Are you on sick leave or something?
Dave, you don’t seem to understand what the social wage is. Have a read through the thread and get back to me.
And how I schedule my workload is my own business. Keep making personal attacks and I’ll ban you for a month.
I think National’s concern is that diverting income to recycle it as a social wage is far less efficient in delivering improvements than just allowing people to keep more of their own money and decide how best to prioritise it in teh same way as you are best placed to schedule your workload.
is there any evidence the social wage is more effective than private wages in delivering outcomes for individuals?
Tane,
Im well aware on what the social wage is, it has got higher and higher with no economic benefit. had it had more econmic benefit it could have increased wages – which of course would have increased the tax take.
Given that I am not making personal attacks, why the threats?
Im well aware on what the social wage is, it has got higher and higher with no economic benefit.
ie, you in fact have no idea what the social wage is.
The social wage is usually taken to mean the social expenditure of government and underpins economic policy. The social dividend is a central component.
So social expenditure has gone down?
Insider- National certainly claims it’s less efficient. Have they got any good research to back up that claim? They haven’t been able to point out any good policies to make the public sector more efficient without cutting services or dictating what people can research or what films get public funding. They haven’t made any convincing announcements on how the private sector would be more efficient, especially after previous sell-offs of social enterprises failed spectacularly, and after their gutting of the public sector tanked our economy in the 1990s.
In America, they don’t base their healthcare system off a social wage. This is one of the biggest demands that American people actively push on their politicians- they call it “universal healthcare.” Are they wrong to want it? Surely by your reasoning it ought to be less efficient, even despite the fact that health insurers base their businesses on trying not to pay their clients what they owe them.
When Ronald Reagan was U.S. president he never tried to privatise the C.A.B. because even he wouldnt trust private enterprise on that one. Private capital only goes where it can make a profit and the only way it can make a profit is to cut costs, raise prices and lower quality and standards. It is very EFFICIENT at doing that.
http://www.wastewatch.co.nz
Yes – the USA’s healthcare system. Costs 3x more than ours, isn’t as good and only reaches 5/6 of the population.
Would I be correct in guessing you are using median wage figures and not average wage figures?
I wonder if you have the figures for the lower and upper quartiles as well?
Combining your data with DPF’s data would suggest a pretty clear picture of low and middle income workers stagnating under national and increasing under labour. While high income earners increasing fasting under national.
Everyone have a read of DPF’s rebuttal.
At least he is explaining how he reached his conclusion and where he got his figures from.
It looks like the Standard’s attempt to regurgitate EPMU and Beehive spin on wage comparisons just doesn’t ring true. The Standard hasn’t come up with any evidence to back their claims: instead they have two pretty graphs, unsourced, without any referential data.
DPF just nailed you guys. Reporting before-tax incomes, without taking inflation into account, is just plain dishonest.
What I like about Davey’s so-called rebuttal is his offer to review the Standard’s data for them. It’s like he thinks people want the DPF big-tick of approval! After the statistical sophism he’s displayed in the past he really is kidding? Surely? Or maybe he really thinks he is that important…
Come to think of it there is considerable doubt about the facts behind many of Davey’s posts. Perhaps he can email me his evidence for issues such as where he runs curia from – I’ll be happy to try and work out why there is a disconnect for him.
no figures or sources yet….nailed by farrar
Robinsod… stop faffing about and give us the sources. Nobody is falling for your stalling tactics.
Razorlight- the post says these are after-inflation figures.
Robinsod stop faffing about and give us the sources. Nobody is falling for your stalling tactics.
Clint – I don’t have the source data because I’m not part of the standard. What are you going to do next demand answers from Russel Brown over a NRT post? Nice one fool.
Hi Clint, I’ve provided the figures to DPF. They originate from Treasury and have been in use for more than a month – see http://www.thestandard.org.nz/?p=1182
By the way, you still photoshopping Helen Clark’s head onto transexuals, or have you decided to grow up?
The Standard doesn’t like to admit that the only source they’ve got is the ninth floor of the beehive: the graph was prepared by them, and the spin-doctor authors of the Standard don’t have the statistical analysis to back it up, because they’ve had other people in government do it for them
[Tane: The source data was provided by Trevor Mallard's office to unions and a range of journalists, that's how we got hold of it. The actual data was prepared by Treasury. I've actually been looking for this ever since it was first brought up in Parliament more than a month ago, it's actually quite old. But that's beside the point - continue making baseless allegations and I'll ban you, as per our policy]
Okay then.
How long does it take for a new government to affect the economy? Unemployment, wages, prices, interest rates, currency. How long does it take before the impact of the policies of the previous guys gets swamped by the impact of the new guys?
18 months? 3 years?
Perhaps we should base it on how long the new guys blame the old guys for everything bad. For Labour would that be 5 or 6 years? In fact, you Unionists are doing it right now, blaming what National did 15 years ago for the wage gap now.
Anyone that seriously tries to argue that Labour had an impact from the start of their first term is retarded. If you are going to make that argument, gtfor.
So what do we see from the middle of Nationals time in power? Around 1996. We see an upturn right? And if we do the fair thing and attribute to National the stats in the first year or two (or three) of Labours “Reign of Error”©, we can see a definite trend.
Labour have continued to reap the rewards of the tough decisions National had to make in their previous term in power.
Labour have done “feel-good” things like increase the minimum wage [which may simply cause a small increase in welfare today for a large increase in umemployment in the future] but the hard yards were done way back before they took power.
Labour have had every opportunity to make the changes you think are necessary to close the gap with Australia. Even if they cannot do it today, they can set it up for the future. But there is nothing coming out of the Labour camp to indicate that they even consider this a real priority.
If they dont know how to do it, they are incompetent and not worthy to lead. If they do know and aren’t doing it because it is too hard, then they are too weak to lead.
You can glossy it up as much as you like, but the standard at The Standard is still Everything Bad is because of National, Everything Good is because of Labour. (EBNEGL)
PS. Doesnt kiwiblogblog have a complete emotional breakdown whenever DPF presents a chart without the Y-axis starting at zero?
God forbid you release the information in an excel file so that everyone other than Labours poodles in the unions and the media can use it and scrutinise it.
I thought we were supposed to be looking at median incomes?
The graph is a bit misleading – in that it is designed to exaggerate the differences. Show the zero on the y axis!
God forbid you release the information in an excel file so that everyone other than Labours poodles in the unions and the media can use it and scrutinise it.
God forbid you ever just shut the fuck up instead of being contrarian trolls. Tell you what fools, how about you go over to Davey’s and dog him for his stats and then your whining might be taken a bit more seriously here. In fact you should ask DPF why he’s not releasing the data ‘cos he’s got it.
I notice none of you have taken the chance to ask Jeanette Fitzsimons a question on the interview the leaders thread and I know why: it’s ‘cos you’re moronic trolls who couldn’t pony up with a real argument if your pathetic little lives depend on it (unless of course it was provided to you by the National Party research unit via Farrar’s excuse for a blog). Here’s a tip boys: fuck off until you’ve got a clue.
RS – point of order – no need for this kind of post.
“God forbid you ever just shut the fuck up instead of being contrarian trolls.”
Thanks for taking Trevor Mallards balls out of your mouth long enough to contribute Robinsod.
Your opinion has been noted and laughed at.
“(unless of course it was provided to you by the National Party research unit via Farrar’s excuse for a blog)”
What was it Tane said about baseless accusations and banning? Oh, I get it, you only enforce the rules against people you disagree with.
Some more Standard “policy”,
“What we’re not prepared to accept are personal attacks, or tone or language that has the effect of excluding others.”
Pull your fucking head in guys, if you dont ban Robinsod for THAT worthless post, then why the fuck should anyone else follow your bullshit rules?
As for the data, pardon me if I dont give you a free pass. Shady “inside” information provided by a Labour politician to his attack dogs doesn’t automatically pass the sniff test for some reason.
What is the data exactly? Treasury may have put it together, but how did they do that? Are there any potential biases in the data? What did Mallard ask for? Shit! We dont even know what he got!
The first post got stuck in moderation, I assume it is a language thing, so I have ****ed the ***king ***t out of this post to see if it makes it through.
Feel free to delete the other one if you like.
“God forbid you ever just shut the f**k up instead of being contrarian trolls.”
Thanks for taking Trevor Mallards balls out of your mouth long enough to contribute, Robinsod.
Your opinion has been noted and laughed at.
“(unless of course it was provided to you by the National Party research unit via Farrar’s excuse for a blog)”
What was it Tane said about baseless accusations and banning? Oh, I get it, you only enforce the rules against people you disagree with.
Some more Standard “policy”,
“What we’re not prepared to accept are personal attacks, or tone or language that has the effect of excluding others.”
Pull your f**king head in guys, if you dont ban Robinsod for THAT worthless post, then why the f**k should anyone else follow your bulls**t rules?
As for the data, pardon me if I dont give you a free pass. Shady “inside” information provided by a Labour politician to his attack dogs doesn’t automatically pass the sniff test for some reason.
What is the data exactly? Treasury may have put it together, but how did they do that? Are there any potential biases in the data? What did Mallard ask for? S**t! We dont even know what he got!
So Kimble all you’ve got is a lame attempt to come back at me and a dull repetition of your last snide and meaningless argument?
You’ve got nothing but knee-jerk opposition mate, but thanks for proving my last point. I’ve read your stuff on KB, Kimble and you don’t seem to be able to offer anything of value over there either. In fact it strikes me you are a total waste of space.
Tell me, do you actually have any ideas of your own or is your entire life dedicated to malignantly deriding the ideas of others like some kind of ideological cancer?
Oh and while I’m asking questions, is your off-line life as meaningless as your commenting and if so how do you justify your breath to yourself? Parasite.
Tane, point of order again. Do we need the ilk of Robinsod here? He brings the tone of the blog down to the gutter. Can you tell him to piss off and go somewhere else.
How about all you jokers stopping putting each other down and debate substantively?
It would be good to have some decent questions from rightwingers for Fitzsimmons. Keep them pithy and as one-piece questions, and remember that questions aren’t an opportunity to tirade but it is possible to still ask tricky ones.
All I’m doing is using robust language to express my displeasure and contempt for rightwing fools who come here only to snipe and whinge without offering sound argument or useful information. Here’s a tip Tones – I offer both regularly. If even those of my “ilk” can do it why can’t these fools? Come to think of it “Tony” I don’t believe I’ve ever seen you post before – are you a sockpuppet?
IrishBill says: last chance ‘Sod and then it’s a week.