Counting our collective coin

Written By: - Date published: 1:44 pm, March 18th, 2008 - 9 comments
Categories: economy, tax - Tags: ,

coincountingbank.jpgCheck out this groovy little gadget. You put your money in the slot and it gets counted, with the power of ‘digital’! Maybe we could all chip in and get one for the IRD.

Seriously though, quite a cock-up on the IRD’s behalf, using the wrong figures so tax revenue was undercounted by $600 million for the Half-year Economic and Fiscal Update. The mistake made it appear the Crown was running an operating deficit when it wasn’t. This caused concern in government and business that the economy was rapidly slowing, causing the tax intake might be so much lower than expected, and this lower confidence might have already had real economic effects.

The fact that there was no real explanation for the tax intake being so much lower than expected and yet the error in the figures wasn’t found is worrying. Calling for heads to roll is always a bit a of hollow, knee-jerk reaction but IRD will need to conduct a thorough investigation of how such a major mistake got into the final accounts and make necessary changes.

9 comments on “Counting our collective coin ”

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  1. Phil 1
    18 March 2008 at 2:21 pm

    “Bank error in your favour. Collect $600 million dollars and advance to GO”

  2. Daveo 2
    18 March 2008 at 3:10 pm

    Phil: that’s awesome.

  3. higherstandard 3
    18 March 2008 at 3:15 pm

    Perhaps the persons responsible could be the first to be ‘frozen’ under a National led coalition.

  4. Daveo 4
    18 March 2008 at 3:17 pm

    You mean less staff at IRD and Treasury HS? Because that’s going to help fix the problem how?

  5. Matthew Pilott 5
    18 March 2008 at 3:51 pm

    Weren’t the news reports at the time saying there was a $3.1b paper loss in fund assets, and tax take $700m shorter than predicted.

    So their predictions were more accurate than their actual count!! 😛

    Baby cheeses.

  6. big bruv 6
    18 March 2008 at 4:22 pm

    This is hilarious, the same public service that the socialists were defending last week as vital for good government are the same bunch of fools who make a mistake like this.

  7. big bruv 7
    18 March 2008 at 4:25 pm

    Given that there is now a surplus can any of you explain why Cullen said this “The first stage of tax cuts would be unlikely to be affected”

    That sounds a lot like a back down on tax cuts to me, we all know that Cullen has no intention of giving hard working middle class Kiwi’s any of their money back and this statement from Cullen proves it.

    Cullen has lied once over tax cuts, he will do the same again.

  8. higherstandard 8
    18 March 2008 at 5:17 pm

    Daveo

    If you can’t figure out how having the incompetent person/s responsible for this removed from being able to repeat their cock ups is going to solve the problem I not sure how I could explain it to you.

  9. Murray 9
    18 March 2008 at 10:47 pm

    I’m glad they found the cash, I think I’m due a small refund this year

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