Debt explained

7 comments on “Debt explained ”

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1. Colonial Viper 1

   27 April 2011 at 8:53 am

   The guy wearing the tax cut hat should be in a tuxedo, his limo, driver and cocktail waiting for him in the background.
2. Herodotus 2

   27 April 2011 at 9:29 am

   Tax cuts are valid, when there are substainable structural surpluses. I thought Michael Cullen once said this was the case. Anyway CV our tax system is now a means of attracting voters: decrease your tax and vote for me, or increase their tax so you can get more and vote for me !!!
   How when we have continual current account deficits can we in NZ continual our behaviour the way we have been. The consequence will be continual reduction in what we expect for our living standards. Be this in health, retirement entitlements, health etc
3. higherstandard 3

   27 April 2011 at 9:32 am

   In the current economic climate we should increase taxes and decrease spending.

   When the economy improves we can look at increasing spending and decreasing taxes, fairly simple stuff really
4. Colonial Viper 4

   27 April 2011 at 10:12 am

   I\’d argue that taxes provide the means, but the means to do what? Simply keeping the wheels turning? The fixation on taxes allows both major parties to dodge the obvious question – where are we going as a country, what kind of society do we want to build for the future?

   I ask myself, what is the vision and mission of this Government (or of the next Labour led Govt?) To close the gap? To increase the gap? To keep the gap? To go around the gap? To ignore the gap? Who knows.

   Basically herod. I figure you are right. Fiddle with stuff not to accomplish anything other than to get into power again. (And in National’s case do a few favours for a few mates along the way).

   *Sigh*

   HS – in this economic climate we should increase taxes and increase spending – to get money moving around the economy again instead of having a few people sit on mountains of wealth benefitting no one (not even themselves).

   And also look to discourage drains of funds overseas (funds which disappear largely via all the foreign owned corporations and banks which operate in NZ).
   • Herodotus 4.1

     27 April 2011 at 12:28 pm

     I am prepared for any response !!!!
     BUT – Nat did have an idea of changing the basis/mix of who and in what fashion taxes are paid. I personnally think that reducing direct PAYE tax was a good thing ( as too much of our tax take is sourced from this means) and by commencing to receive some contribution from those who escape tax from property speculation. There should be as mentioned by you deeper debates on many aspects of life. Should we promote owner/occupier or landlord/tennant relationships, and if owner then disincentivise the later, as one example. But please don\’t fiddel with tax just to get a vote or 2, as there are many wizzz kids who can find loopholoes to escape.
     CV many who had the mountains of $, now appear to have none e.g. Nigel McKenna, Terry Serepisos, and both Dave Hendersons to name a few. And they own the country unpaid taxes
5. Kevin Welsh 5

   27 April 2011 at 11:33 am

   “I ask myself, what is the vision and mission of this Government (or of the next Labour led Govt?) To close the gap? To increase the gap? To keep the gap? To go around the gap? To ignore the gap? Who knows”

   More a case of ‘mind the gap’ (London underground), CV.

   They know it’s there, they just don’t want to get to close to it in case they have to do something about it.
6. Andrew Kensington 6

   28 April 2011 at 12:09 am

   A tax on every financial transaction would be a good start. The current account deficit is largely a consequence of the amount we spend paying foreign corporations to run local services, Telecom being the most striking example of this phenomena. We should be taking a notable whack out of every dollar that leaves this country as a means of encouraging those foreign owners (and investors) to retrench the preponderance of those profits back into the NZ economy.

   Sooner or later New Zealanders are going to be forced to decide whether they want to continue as a subordinate subject of a decaying and increasingly impotent US corporate empire or an independent nation free of that coercive influence. It is disgusting watching the Australians prostrate themselves before their Washington bosses. As long as countries like New Zealand and Australia subordinate their socioeconomic systems to the economic fantasies of the Anglo/American neoliberal model we will continue to be debtor nations.

   Taxing New Zealand’s wealthiest and foreign financial capital till they squeal is the cleanest way to achieve political and economic independence.

   If they want to leave the country, then good riddance.

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