Mike Hosking reckons: Minimum wage increase will be terrible for everyone

Written By: - Date published: 9:55 am, April 9th, 2018 - 159 comments
Categories: class, cost of living, Economy, housing, minimum wage, poverty, spin, the praiseworthy and the pitiful, workers' rights, you couldn't make this shit up - Tags:

Like an obnoxious uncle who has drunk too much at Christmas Mike Hosking continues to loudly broadcast his reckons on all the things that are terrible with this country and with this Government. Like how they and Auckland Council want to stop him driving his maserati and will force him in the near future to live in an apartment with no windows and (gasp) no parking spaces for his cars. This is personal for him. There is no way he will let the Government take his car keys from him while he still draws breath.

He has lots of other reckons. His qualification for having all these reckons and saying them loudly is that he is a rich white male and so of course his reckons should all be listened to because they are right reckons.

And his basic reckon is that being rich is good and being poor is for losers.  This is why he is such a strong supporter of the free market.  It delivers the perfect result, at least as far as he is concerned.

Unsurprisingly he thinks that putting up the minimum wage is a very bad thing. In his latest reckons he said this:

Costs are market-driven, market and demand. The prices for something are based, or should be, on what the market can bear.

The Government coming in over the top of that equation and arbitrarily handing out instruction disrupts the markets. It brings an artificiality into it that the market might not be able to bear, and if it can’t, the only loser is the person out of work. Or worse, the owner out of business.

Further, the more cost you put into the market, the more inflationary it is. The higher the tax on petrol, the more literally everything costs because everything has a transport component to it.

And the more inflation you have, the higher interest rates go. And interest rates affect borrowing, both domestically for things like housing, and commercially for things like business.

Take that poor people.  The only reason you can’t afford to buy or even rent a house is because you took that last minimum wage increase.  It is ALL YOUR FAULT.

I don’t know why he just go full hog and advocate for no minimum wage and pure free market. Sure our grandmothers will then have to engage as slave labour so that we can compete with the third world but at least Hosking’s coffee will be cheaper. And the piece of information he does not seem to understand is that if the minimum wage goes up, and get ready because this is really significant, POOR PEOPLE WILL BE ABLE TO AFFORD TO BUY MORE COFFEE.  Why is it that poor people do not seem to enter into Hosking’s calculations except when they are supplying him with something.

But don’t take my word for it.  After all I am a compromised left wing hack.  But Treasury seems to think the same.  And Branko Martinec in the Spinoff recently read the research into the subject and came up with these comments:

In fact, the consensus among researchers has in recent decades shifted away from the once-thought conventional wisdom that a high minimum wage leads to closures and unemployment. The Ben Hurof these studies was completed in 2014 by two researchers who pored over more than 200 English-language scholarly and policy papers about the minimum wage, mostly published since 2000. They determined that “moderate increases in the minimum wage are a useful means of raising wages in the lower part of the wage distribution that has little or no effect on employment and hours”.

More than 600 economists have signed on to a statement that says “increases in the minimum wage have had little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labour market.” Even those you wouldn’t expect to endorse it have. The International Monetary Fund called for the US to raise its minimum wage in 2014. The same year, despite its original warnings in 1999, the Economist declared that “no-one who has studied the effects of Britain’s minimum wage now thinks it has raised unemployment,” and that partly because of this, “The Economist has changed its mind.”

Does that mean the minimum wage has no impact whatsoever on employment? Of course not; many studies show there is usually a small impact, typically on young jobseekers. There is also evidence that employers are responding to wage increases with increased automation. But employers are turning to automation regardless of how high the wage is, because it’s always going to be cheaper to hire an unthinking, unfeeling, tireless machine over a human being – even white-collar jobs are under threat.

…

A higher minimum wage doesn’t have to be a job- or economy-killer. It can and has been rolled out in numerous locations with none of the cataclysmic results that minimum wage opponents have been warning about for literally 80 years. If the sky hasn’t fallen yet, it probably isn’t going to.

So who are you going to believe?  Someone who thinks the Government wants to take all of our cars away?  Or scores of International academics and researchers including the IMF and the Economist and Treasury officials.

To those on the minimum wage.  Enjoy the increase.  You deserve it.

159 comments on “Mike Hosking reckons: Minimum wage increase will be terrible for everyone ”

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  1. Baba Yaga 1
    9 April 2018 at 10:11 am

    “A higher minimum wage doesn’t have to be a job- or economy-killer. ”

    Doesn’t HAVE to be, no. But certainly can be.

    http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/vital-teacher-aide-hours-may-be-cut-due-to-minimum-wage-rise/

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2015/02/03/proof-perfect-that-the-minimum-wage-costs-jobs/#30715e88771e

    http://www.afr.com/news/policy/industrial-relations/minimum-wage-rise-will-cost-jobs-say-experts-20170606-gwlo3n

    https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2017/07/02/las-minimum-wage-rises-yes-this-really-will-cost-jobs/#7433fe4b41f4

    Perhaps those researchers who pored over “scholarly and policy papers about the minimum wage” should get off their backsides and actually talk to employers and find out what has really happened.

    • Draco T Bastard 1.1
      9 April 2018 at 10:16 am

      The only job killers are the bludgers at the top – like Hosking. They’re a dead-weight loss to the economy.

      • JohnSelway 1.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 12:16 pm

        Being a highly paid broadcaster doesn’t make him a bludger.

        Doesn’t make him any less of a dick either.

        • Draco T Bastard 1.1.1.1
          9 April 2018 at 12:48 pm

          Being a highly paid broadcaster doesn’t make him a bludger.

          Yeah, actually, it does as he’s being paid far more than he’s worth.

          The problem of the rich goes beyond issues of how they get their money, to how they spend it. Their massive spending on luxuries distorts economies, diverting producers from providing goods and services for the more needy. It’s a waste of labour and scarce resources. In some cases, it makes things worse for those on low incomes, for example, by driving up house prices beyond their reach.

          Quote from Why we can’t afford the rich

          • dukeofurl 1.1.1.1.1
            9 April 2018 at 1:00 pm

            He doesnt think workers should get 4 weeks holiday yet himsealf gets 8 weeks plus.

            His on air time is 2 hrs per day, maybe another 2 hrs prep but he has multiple producers who do all the slog. Then there are others who produce and read out news segments.

          • Gosman 1.1.1.1.2
            9 April 2018 at 1:04 pm

            His employers obviously don’t think he is being paid too much.

            • dukeofurl 1.1.1.1.2.1
              9 April 2018 at 1:15 pm

              Well hes surely paid a lot more than his competitors at RNZ who have higher ratings.
              His real benefit is the advertisers like him and are willing to pay extra to play their ads on his segment.
              It cant be the numbers of listeners he has.

              • Gosman …
                9 April 2018 at 1:16 pm

                Yes . Can you think why that might be? I’ll give you a clue. One of those Employers doesn’t get private funding.

                • dukeofurl …
                  9 April 2018 at 1:53 pm

                  Ask Fletchers about paying huge money to a ‘top performer’ turned out.

                  What economic model are you referencing that says paying top dollar means top performance ?

                  Cant have being getting enough as his wife has had to ‘go back to work’, but not to worry as she was clearly the best of ‘all the other applicants’

                  • Tuppence Shrewsbury …
                    9 April 2018 at 4:18 pm

                    We could ask the same of government departments, they pay top dollar without even asking for top performance

            • Draco T Bastard 1.1.1.1.2.2
              9 April 2018 at 2:22 pm

              It’s not about what his employers think. It’s about economics and economically he’s paid too much. Anything more than enough to have a reasonable living standard is too much and is unsustainable.

          • JohnSelway 1.1.1.1.3
            9 April 2018 at 2:39 pm

            “Yeah, actually, it does as he’s being paid far more than he’s worth.”

            I think he is a cock but it isn’t mine or your business as to what his employer feel he is worth so no, earning a salary doesn’t make one a bludger

            • Draco T Bastard 1.1.1.1.3.1
              9 April 2018 at 7:59 pm

              Well, that’s just it – yes it is as we’re the ones coughing up the money to pay him.

          • Babayaga 1.1.1.1.4
            9 April 2018 at 10:59 pm

            You don’t get to determine what anyone else is worth. That’s up to his employers, and how they rate his performance. It must suck to be so bitter. How does it feel?

            • Draco T Bastard 1.1.1.1.4.1
              10 April 2018 at 2:42 am

              You don’t get to determine what anyone else is worth.

              In a functional society there would be no employers and everyone would have a say.

              Things is, we don’t have a functional society. We have one designed around theft and dictatorship.

              It must suck to be so bitter.

              It must suck too be so stupid that you can only use ad hominems because you lack any argument.

              • Babayaga …
                10 April 2018 at 9:17 am

                No employers? Not even the state?s. Perhaps you have a working nation in mind that you can point us to where this loopy idea of yours actually works.

                • Draco T Bastard …
                  10 April 2018 at 11:32 am

                  Typical RWNJ – demand a working example of a new idea so as to try and shut down the new idea.

                  So bloody stupid.

                  • Baba Yaga …
                    10 April 2018 at 11:54 am

                    So its a new idea, meaning you have no way of knowing whether it will work or not. Yet you describe this hypothetical, untried system as ‘functional’.

              • Tricledrown …
                10 April 2018 at 9:51 am

                DTB no employers you are a Fringe fanatic right up their with David Seymour.
                So where on earth has this utopian dream ever worked answer nowhere!
                Harnessing capitalism to work for the majority is the only pragmatic solution.
                You cannot undo nature’s survival instinct of competing.
                It’s built into our DNA, your competing with your outlying utopian idea thinking how many people are going to follow, less than 0.01% are interested in your pure Communist ideology.
                Why because it doesn’t work never will
                Because of Human “Nature”, Greed power selfishness cannot be wiped out.
                Hence all communist states end up being serfdoms the very thing they you claim you are trying to overcome!

                • Draco T Bastard …
                  10 April 2018 at 11:31 am

                  So where on earth has this utopian dream ever worked answer nowhere!

                  It certainly won’t work if we don’t try it.

                  Harnessing capitalism to work for the majority is the only pragmatic solution.

                  Always failing isn’t what I’d call pragmatic. Being pragmatic is doing what’s possible and capitalism is obviously, from 5000 years of experience, impossible.

                  It’s built into our DNA

                  1. No it’s not.
                  2. No amount of screeching it in our nature is going to change reality to suit the delusion that is capitalism.

                  Because of Human “Nature”, Greed power selfishness cannot be wiped out.

                  Yeah, actually, it can. There are examples of successful and sustainable societies where greed and selfishness were not accepted (Debt: The first 5000 years by David Graeber).

                  Hence all communist states end up being serfdoms the very thing they you claim you are trying to overcome!

                  This is what’s happened but it’s not written in stone that it must happen.

                • Anno1604 …
                  10 April 2018 at 12:21 pm

                  “Harnessing capitalism to work for the majority is the only pragmatic solution”

                  Its mildly better than the feudalism it replaced, other than that capatilisms superiority to any other economic/societal system is speculative really

        • Chris 1.1.1.2
          9 April 2018 at 1:48 pm

          It does make him a bludger if he’s unconsiounably overpaid.

          • dukeofurl 1.1.1.2.1
            9 April 2018 at 4:07 pm

            He has never in his life ‘built an audience’

            Paul Holmes was there from the beginning when news talk ZB was created, and the audience that existed was handed over to ‘The Hoick’

            he did the same for the evening TV show.
            When The Hoick was on Radio NZ, the audience was there before and after he left.

            Yes the The Hoick has the the gift of the gab, and those people are often rewarded handsomely, but hes never started from scratch and ‘made a show’.

            His real talent is to Kiss Up and Kick Down…….so…difficult.

        • barry 1.1.1.3
          9 April 2018 at 7:51 pm

          He is a bludger because he expects the poor to subsidise his lifestyle.
          He expects the barista to go without so he can have a cheap coffee.
          He expects the cleaner to go without so his employer can pay him more.

    • One Anonymous Bloke 1.2
      9 April 2018 at 10:18 am

      I see your Treasury Department, IMF, and peer-review, and raise you three opinion pieces that I agree with.

      So that’s that then 😆

    • adam 1.3
      9 April 2018 at 10:51 am

      Like the links from the Ideological hacks saying the usual lies and spin the Baba Yaga.

      Forbes, are a joke, spin doctors for wall street, and the harbingers of cupidity.

    • Ad 1.4
      9 April 2018 at 11:08 am

      Agree it can be.

      That to me is the sense of a mixed Reserve Bank target, agreed to only a fortnight ago with this government.

      We have had low inflation for nearly two decades now, and low headline unemployment for about six years, but still no sustained wage increases.

      So a minimum wage increase is what you have to do when the economy isn’t functioning to assist actual people.

      After all, if Jo and Joe Average aren’t getting more income and more control over that income, what ‘s the point?

      • Nic the NZer 1.4.1
        10 April 2018 at 8:21 am

        The new reserve bank targets are fine but i don’t see them making any real difference in practice (they match plenty of other countries more closely now).

        What will make more of a difference is who is actually appointed governor by the government. This would still be more relevant given the previous targets.

        The main take aways regarding the reserve bank and inflation should be,
        1) the reserve bank policy has bugger all impact on inflation (including house prices).
        2) use of monetary policy alone does not, and can not, result in full employment.
        3) the country should stop mostly relying on monetary policy to generate full employment, because it doesn’t work, and because this strategy often pushes the economy towards a state increased inequality.

    • mikes 1.5
      9 April 2018 at 12:10 pm

      Those links don’t prove anything.

      http://www.newstalkzb.co.nz/on-air/mike-hosking-breakfast/audio/vital-teacher-aide-hours-may-be-cut-due-to-minimum-wage-rise/
      – Just the PPSTA method of securing a bit more funding maybe. Regardless no actual proof of lost jobs.

      https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2015/02/03/proof-perfect-that-the-minimum-wage-costs-jobs/#30715e88771e
      = His proof perfect example is not a suitable example at all which anyone could discover with a little bit of research. His bio says he is an expert on a particular rare earth metal, not on anything else.

      http://www.afr.com/news/policy/industrial-relations/minimum-wage-rise-will-cost-jobs-say-experts-20170606-gwlo3n
      – “says experts?” The article linked to simply states “econmists say…..blah, blah”
      Does that mean all economists? Some economists? A couple of economists?
      Since when are economists experts in anything?

      https://www.forbes.com/sites/timworstall/2017/07/02/las-minimum-wage-rises-yes-this-really-will-cost-jobs/#7433fe4b41f4
      – Theory only, no proof whatsoever

      • dukeofurl 1.5.1
        9 April 2018 at 1:10 pm

        We do know the the reverse didnt happen either.

        During the depression wages were cut so it would boost employment was the theory.

      • Babayaga 1.5.2
        9 April 2018 at 11:03 pm

        Those links don’t prove aNything’

        Yes, actually they do. They prove that there is a counter narrative to Mickey’s.

        • Tricledrown 1.5.2.1
          10 April 2018 at 9:54 am

          Babayaga no fact’s equals a right wing propagandist.

          • Baba Yaga 1.5.2.1.1
            10 April 2018 at 11:25 am

            There are plenty of facts. There is considerable debate about the impact of increases in the minimum wage, and to present this as anything other than a healthy debate is simply dishonest.

            • Baba Yaga 1.5.2.1.1.1
              10 April 2018 at 11:51 am

              …a point this report (which actually supports shifts in the minimum wage) makes well…

              http://econofact.org/do-minimum-wages-really-kill-jobs

              • McFlock …
                10 April 2018 at 4:13 pm

                The existence of “debate” cuts both ways.

                In the absence of any demonstrable harm, why not pay workers more?

                • Baba Yaga …
                  10 April 2018 at 4:14 pm

                  I don’t disagree. But there isn’t an absence of evidence. There is debate.

                  • McFlock …
                    10 April 2018 at 4:21 pm

                    There’s lots of evidence, but your position seems to be that there’s no clear indication of what that evidence means. Some evidence suggests little or no positive effect on employment, some evidence suggests little or no negative effect on employment.

                    So no demonstrable harm. Otherwise there would be little, if any, debate. Like there are very few people who argue that a lungful of seawater is healthy rather than harmful.

                    But we do know that raising the minimum wage means recipients will have more money.

                    So in the absence of demonstrable harm, why not raise the minimum wage? It’s sure to help recipients, and if everyone’s opinion is reasonable and genuine then it’s just as likely to boost employment as it is to lower it.

                    • Baba Yaga …
                      10 April 2018 at 8:02 pm

                      “but your position seems to be that there’s no clear indication of what that evidence means.”
                      Not at all. There is evidence that increases in the minimum wage harm employment, there is evidence they don’t. That’s why there is a debate.

                      “Some evidence suggests little or no positive effect on employment, some evidence suggests little or no negative effect on employment.”
                      And some evidence suggests significant impact on employment.

                    • McFlock …
                      10 April 2018 at 8:59 pm

                      Both positive and negative.

                      You can’t have it both ways. Either there’s valid debate (in which case there’s no reason to keep wages at their current sub-living level), or increasing the minimum wage will demonstrably affect employment (in which case there’s a clear case to act or not act accordingly).

                      Cowering and doing nothing for fear of something that might happen regardless of what you do is a poor excuse to keep people poor.

        • Violet 1.5.2.2
          10 April 2018 at 6:08 pm

          Please address the issues raised. 1. Where is the proof of lost jobs? 2. Why is the reference to “expert” valid in this case? 3. Simple questions to which answers would give validity to your comment 4. Again, provide proof.

          • Baba Yaga 1.5.2.2.1
            10 April 2018 at 8:15 pm

            “1. Where is the proof of lost jobs?”
            That article didn’t claim there were lost jobs.

            ” 2. Why is the reference to “expert” valid in this case?”
            Who mentioned the term ‘expert’? Just read the content…don’t get all heated up because it is written by a white male.

            “3. Simple questions to which answers would give validity to your comment”
            What questions?

            ” 4. Again, provide proof.”
            Of what? Of the increase to the minimum wage in LA costing jobs? Read the article. Even the LA city officials say it will.

    • Sabine 1.6
      9 April 2018 at 12:17 pm

      What really happens is that we pay our staff the required Minimum Wage and get on with life.

      Cause we need our staff. And we like our staff. And we want our staff to do well, so…to summarize, we – mom and pop business owner – pay the required minimum wage, maybe even a few cent more, and get on with life and business.

      If you business closes because you have to pay a part timer/full timer 0.5$ more per hour then maybe your business has other issues.

      • dv 1.6.1
        9 April 2018 at 12:27 pm

        I am very happy to pay a bit more for coffee (etc) if it means the worker can feed/support their family.

        • The Fairy Godmother 1.6.1.1
          9 April 2018 at 12:36 pm

          And if you are a business owner yourself maybe that coffee worker will have some dollars to spend there.

          • Sacha 1.6.1.1.1
            9 April 2018 at 1:02 pm

            Workers are customers? Gasp!

          • Gosman 1.6.1.1.2
            9 April 2018 at 1:12 pm

            How many low wage workers spend a significant proportion of their incomes on Coffee?

            • dv 1.6.1.1.2.1
              9 April 2018 at 1:33 pm

              10

            • Sabine 1.6.1.1.2.2
              9 April 2018 at 2:14 pm

              it is not about the ‘significant’ amount that is spend on coffee.
              it is that sometimes someone on a low income can buy themselves or someone a coffee, or a nice slice of cake, or pay a nice dinner that is not served by MacDonald.
              but never let that get into your way of thinking. Right Mike 🙂

            • Andrea 1.6.1.1.2.3
              9 April 2018 at 3:37 pm

              If you want an answer to your question – ask Stats to go snooping or get WINZ to add it to their multipage compendium. Their snoots are in to most personal matters; why not this?

            • Tricledrown 1.6.1.1.2.4
              10 April 2018 at 10:03 am

              Goose man what would you know many low wage workers work long hrs and rely on coffee to keep going.

      • Babayaga 1.6.2
        9 April 2018 at 11:05 pm

        Good for you. I do the same, but then I guess you’re not one of those people who will potentially lose your job.

        • Sabine 1.6.2.1
          10 April 2018 at 1:36 pm

          No, I am the one who has staff and who pays min wage plus a few cents. I just have a business to loose.

          never mind dear, its all good.

          • Baba Yaga 1.6.2.1.1
            10 April 2018 at 2:32 pm

            “I am the one who has staff and who pays min wage plus a few cents. ”

            As I said, so do I. But there are people in jobs whose employers struggle to do that. If those businesses have ‘other issues’, as you claimed, then those jobs may well be lost. That was my point.

    • UncookedSelachimorpha 1.7
      9 April 2018 at 1:57 pm

      Strange – all those links are from right-wing propaganda sites.

  2. Draco T Bastard 2
    9 April 2018 at 10:15 am

    I don’t know why he just go full hog and advocate for no minimum wage and pure free market.

    The spelling is Hogg.

    The thing about Hosking’s reckons is that he truly doesn’t understand that people down the income bracket need to be able to afford to live and that the minimum wage, as it is, just doesn’t allow that. Instead he looks at wages as a cost that impacts his profits from his bludging shareholding. Although I doubt he does much of that – he’s probably far more into the speculation of buying and selling shares adding absolutely no value but makes him richer. That added cost has to come out of the wages of the poor.

    As I say, it’s always the poor that pay for the rich which is why having rich people like Hosking creates poverty. Always has and always will.

    If we want to address poverty then we need to get rid of the rich.

    • JohnSelway 2.1
      9 April 2018 at 12:18 pm

      “If we want to address poverty then we need to get rid of the rich.”

      What would your definition of rich be?

      • Sabine 2.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 12:27 pm

        being able to buy a maserati and drive it at 100 km as that is the speed limit.

      • Draco T Bastard 2.1.2
        9 April 2018 at 12:47 pm

        Having Unearned Income from ownership such as shares, rental houses, bank accounts etc. As well as simply being paid too much. Million dollar incomes are too much. In fact, IMO, $150k incomes are too much.

        Many of the defences of existing economic institutions are surprisingly weak, but particularly if people start treating those arrangements as natural – as ‘just how things are’ – they can persist on the basis of power.

        Like rent, interest is asset-based unearned income that accrues without any effort. There may be some administration costs in providing a loan, but these tend to be low and can be charged to the borrower. Like rent, interest presupposes that those who produce goods and services for their income produce a surplus that the lenders can buy with their unearned income. Like rent, therefore, interest is parasitic on producers. As Michael Hudson puts it, it is a ‘deadweight cost’ on the economy.42 It is not merely a transfer, a zero-sum game (where gains equal losses), but a negative-sum game – that is, one that, other things being equal, leaves the economy worse off.

        Quotes from Why we can’t afford the rich.

        • Gosman 2.1.2.1
          9 April 2018 at 1:15 pm

          “…As well as simply being paid too much…”

          Who gets to decide if someone is being paid too much – You?

          • Sabine 2.1.2.1.1
            9 April 2018 at 2:17 pm

            No, only people like Mike Hoskins and his ilk, that insist in driving a very fast car at 100 km an hour cause that is the speed limit and they must drive a maserati/porsche cause otherwise no one would know that they have money to burn.

            If they were to only drive a car for transport something smaller, less showy and less pricey would do. But then, Mike Hoskins needs his Maserati, its the only thing of value he has.

            • JohnSelway 2.1.2.1.1.1
              9 April 2018 at 2:41 pm

              Some people love cars (I like Maserati’s myself though don’t have the wallet to own one).

              Who gives a fuck what car he drives. If he wants one and can afford one then all power to him.

              He is still a dick but not because of his car

              • Chchguy …
                9 April 2018 at 7:48 pm

                You don’t want a Maserati…. believe me! I have to fix them!

              • Draco T Bastard …
                9 April 2018 at 7:57 pm

                If he wants one and can afford one then all power to him.

                You’re assuming that we can afford to pay him enough to own one. All the poverty stricken people say otherwise.

          • Draco T Bastard 2.1.2.1.2
            9 April 2018 at 2:26 pm

            No, economics.

        • Brigid 2.1.2.2
          9 April 2018 at 2:43 pm

          In one of Stephen Fry’s book he says the bank manager (or some such) wanted to talk to him about investing his savings.
          He says, that’s money I’ve earned, I’m likely to earn more, why do I now need to invest it, why cant it just sit there as savings? – or words to that effect.

          I like Stephen Fry

  3. Reality 3
    9 April 2018 at 10:53 am

    What incredible hypocrisy of Hosking on his mega salary to object to those on lowly incomes having the right to a decent income.

    If he negotiates an ncrease in his contract will we hear him whining about its inflationary impact? NO WAY. What a despicable human being.

    • Anne 3.1
      9 April 2018 at 12:42 pm

      At least he’s gone from Seven Sharp and can no longer vent his brand of venal, self- entitled spittle there any more.

  4. adam 4
    9 April 2018 at 10:54 am

    The greedy, amoral, and pompous are not going to give the poor an inch.

  5. Gosman 5
    9 April 2018 at 11:23 am

    The multiplier effect in relation to the minimum wage only goes so far. Minimum wage workers for example tend not to spend their hard earned money on Flat Whites or the like. This means employers paying an increased minimum wage won’t necessarily be the ones to benefit from the greater disposable income that people have.

    • Theodore 5.1
      9 April 2018 at 12:16 pm

      The corollary to that, Gosman is to pay people $1 per hour.

      Who would benefit in that case?

    • gsays 5.2
      9 April 2018 at 12:27 pm

      What I can say, from experience, about the minimum wage increase is that my wage has gone up one dollar an hour. Am still not on the living wage but it’s a step in the right direction.
      This was directly because of the minimum increase.

      Anyone running round ‘chicken littling’ over this increase should keep their powder dry till the minimum is in line with the living wage. Then y’all can get excited.

      • Gosman 5.2.1
        9 April 2018 at 12:55 pm

        Why?

        • gsays 5.2.1.1
          9 April 2018 at 5:26 pm

          I guess I got an increase as the employer HAS to raise the wages of the majority of the staff, so others who are more skilled/larger responsibility get an increase too.

    • mickysavage 5.3
      9 April 2018 at 1:27 pm

      Tell me Gosman what is the multiplier effect in giving this money to the wealthy instead. Do we have an explosion of jobs at maserati dealerships when generated resources are funnelled the rich’s way rather than the way of the working poor?

      That is the problem with your analysis. It does not weigh up what the alternatives are.

      • Draco T Bastard 5.3.1
        9 April 2018 at 2:30 pm

        Tell me Gosman what is the multiplier effect in giving this money to the wealthy instead.

        Houses cost more and the rich get to speculate on shares and money to become richer while doing absolutely nothing of value.

        It’s called bludging.

      • Gosman 5.3.2
        10 April 2018 at 2:12 pm

        There are only two alternatives when it comes to money mickey. You either spend it or save it. If you spend it then it impacts consumption immediately and the money you spend flows in to someone elses coffers and is likely to increase consumption further (the multiplier effect). This is generally stronger at the lower end of the income ladder. This is because of the second option to do with money – savings. When you save it you don’t immediately impact consumption or others incomes. Howveer you do make it easier for business to access capital and thus invest for growth. The wealthier you are the more you are likely to save of your income.

    • UncookedSelachimorpha 5.4
      9 April 2018 at 1:59 pm

      It goes far further than giving it to the already rich, who might sit on it.

      • Draco T Bastard 5.4.1
        9 April 2018 at 2:31 pm

        Actually, it’ll be worse than that. They’ll speculate with it without producing anything of value and the extra income that they have will be paid for by the poor thus creating even more poverty.

    • Andrea 5.5
      9 April 2018 at 3:49 pm

      Trickle up, Gosman.

      With a lift in income there may* be enough in the rainy day box to ‘splurge’. A wish becomes a reality. Someone further up the income chain, further away from the bowl of despair, can also afford to ‘splurge’. And so on.

      It takes several to many steps before the Flat Muck person buys their drink and slightly dearer nibble – yet – it happens.

      *If the Grabbies at the payday loans, the churches, the electricity provider, rent taker, petrol station, bus company – you know what I’m saying here – haven’t got to the mite first. Retailers are low, low, low in the trading food-chain.

    • Tricledrown 5.6
      10 April 2018 at 1:31 am

      Goose man. When the minimum wage goes up it has a knock on effect meaning most others get a wage rise as well.
      OECD research shows the higher the minimum wage the stronger your economy.
      Under 9years of National wages barely grew even though company profitability was at record levels.

  6. Kat 6
    9 April 2018 at 11:38 am

    Raising wages will raise the price of a cup of coffee ………”show me the logic Mr Hosking”

      • Pat 6.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 12:06 pm

        youre conflating two different aspects….economists care not whether the money is spent on pointless overpriced beverages in resource wasting establishments to little useful purpose they are speaking in aggregate over the wider economy…so while less may be spent on flat whites or soy lattes in the high street (though likely not) more will be spent at the supermarket or The Warehouse….which is more important?

      • McFlock 6.1.2
        9 April 2018 at 12:21 pm

        Wage goes up 75c/hr.
        Mojo raises the price by 10c/cup.
        If that is proportionate, Mojo baristas average 7.5cups/hr.

        That’s pretty pathetic for a workforce you can hire as and when needed around known rush times.

        Story should probably read “minimum wage is excuse to hike prices”.

      • cleangreen 6.1.3
        9 April 2018 at 12:31 pm

        Well the price of everything else has gone up every year realistically if you haven’t noticed Gosman?

        So maybe you don’t shop around for bargains like us poor folks need to?

        So what’s another item increase gonna do? – as most wont even notice it as every week all items are increasing in food items.

        The inflation index does not show the real increases in basic foods that we poor face every week.

      • Kat 6.1.4
        9 April 2018 at 1:04 pm

        I asked to be shown “logic” not examples of greed or political spin.

        • Gosman 6.1.4.1
          9 April 2018 at 1:10 pm

          When the prices rises for something Kat do you generally buy more or less of it?

          • Kat 6.1.4.1.1
            9 April 2018 at 2:01 pm

            Are you suggesting the cafe’s that increase the price of a cup of coffee will sell less.

          • Andrea 6.1.4.1.2
            9 April 2018 at 3:52 pm

            When prices drop – do you buy more of it? Only if you have the means and need to store it – and some things don’t store well.

            (If in doubt, try putting a cheap lettuce in the deep freeze for later…)

        • Gosman 6.1.4.2
          9 April 2018 at 1:11 pm

          When the costs involved in making something goes up does that generally make the price go up, down, or stay the same?

          • adam 6.1.4.2.1
            9 April 2018 at 1:49 pm

            I’ve missed your bullshit economic analysis Gosman, it’s so much fun reading your waffly liberalism. The lies and spin, to convince people that liberalism is the only option economically. Bloody Hilarious.

            What next, organise your mates to stop producing and buying toilet paper for the supermarkets, so you can blame the government for it. Oops you already did that…

          • Kat 6.1.4.2.2
            9 April 2018 at 2:06 pm

            Depends on the efficiency factors as opposed to cost reductions.

            • Gosman 6.1.4.2.2.1
              9 April 2018 at 3:22 pm

              I stated general,y not in all cases. However it is good to see you can acknowledge there is logic between raising the costs of the inputs for something and the actual end price.

              • Andrea …
                9 April 2018 at 3:58 pm

                It depends who is raising the costs, doesn’t it?

                The farmers producing cashews or cacao aren’t getting the price rises from scarcity due to a poor season – yet Someone is.

                Seems a lot like minimum wages here. People toiling hard and long for very little reward at all – yet prices to consumers keep rising.

                ‘Oh, exchange rates, fuel costs, taxes, new legislation, blah and so’

                Nothing to do with the workers. Far too much to do with a surplus of ticket clippers and arrangers in the middle. Opportunists and venal ratbags.

              • Kat …
                9 April 2018 at 4:37 pm

                Not if efficiency factors can offset the requirement to increase the end price.

              • Tricledrown …
                10 April 2018 at 1:36 am

                Goose man. Coffee machines have become more effective than allowing workers to make more coffee per hr.
                Prices should go down and wages go up.

          • UncookedSelachimorpha 6.1.4.2.3
            9 April 2018 at 3:07 pm

            There are other things that can change without increasing price – e.g. profit expectation.

            For example, Walmart in USA had gross profit around USD$132 billion in 2016 and paid its CEO over USD$22m in 2017 – but pays much of its workforce so little that they rely on government welfare to survive. Like many companies that abuse their staff – they have options to increase pay that do not involve increasing prices.

    • UncookedSelachimorpha 6.2
      9 April 2018 at 1:59 pm

      If an extra $ per coffee is what it takes to treat people properly – then that is fine.

  7. Bill 7
    9 April 2018 at 11:54 am

    The idea that a rise in minimum wage will “bust” a business is evinced by all those business owners running around in clapped out second hand cars unable to fill their tanks for the week, right? I mean, really, when was the last time you saw a rich business owner?

    Actually. Insofar as many people who make a go at setting up their own business do do it hard and don’t survive five years, the bullshit he’s spouting almost has a point.

    Of course, a point he’s missing is that with more money going around, more people would find it easier to set up a business and see it survive.

    And the really big point he’s missing is that bigger businesses deliberately undercut smaller businesses cost wise, and/or maneuver to have them excluded from supply chains and distribution networks in the never ending battle for market share.

    But meanwhile, I’m off to spend my $2 a week social security increase. I don’t expect it to have much of an impact on the survivability of the local dairy, but hey….

    • Ed 7.1
      9 April 2018 at 12:02 pm

      As you say.

      Most of the people employed by businesses paying the minimum wage work for the largest of the corporations.
      How much does McDonalds pay?
      How much does Progressive Enterprises pay?
      How much does Starbucks pay?

      etc, etc

  8. savenz 8
    9 April 2018 at 12:03 pm

    As well as minimum wage increases I’d like to see some more of that dreaded word – regulation and not on people, on business price hikes and some balls by government to actually tackle the cartels. I know that is high treason in the modern world!

    Such as in the electricity sector – funny enough we all know that a child died in a mouldy state house, however the debate never turned to, why they did not turn on power when they had a heat pump, they did not turn it on, because they can’t afford power, even the cheapest power from a heat pump.

    Sustainable power would provide them with free and reduced priced electricity but not on your Nelly in NZ – instead before getting to that, the debate gets hijacked into keep our electrical profits going on old technology , because they we will milk every last cent off consumers, while trying to stop new tech, to keep their profits going, rather than change or innovate …”

    “For those lacking the time or inclination to plod through the detail of the debate, here is a quick summary. When new renewable technologies such as rooftop solar come into the market and provide serious competition to the established generators and lines networks, those existing players see their profits threatened. To protect those profits they must either kill off the new technologies, or extract more money from their remaining customers, or both.

    If the attempt to protect profits fails, the big companies face write-downs on their asset values and share prices – which would, of course, be the normal and expected outcome in competitive industries subject to market forces.

    The New Zealand electricity industry is not, however, a competitive industry subject to market forces. The production and retailing of electricity is done by a tight oligopoly of five big companies, while distribution of power takes place through natural-monopoly networks whose prices and asset values are protected by a compliant Commerce Commission.

    Over the three decades of so-called “reform” the big players have written into their balance sheets over $14 billion of “revaluations” – pure capital gains, representing the value of wealth extracted from electricity consumers via the industry’s successful rent-seeking.

    Those huge wealth transfers, and the price-gouging of captive customers to sustain them, are directly threatened by the arrival of independent supply based on economically viable renewables technology. Faced with the reality, rather than just the mirage, of real choice for consumers, the industry has rushed to hide behind the skirts of the Commerce Commission and the Government.”

    https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/opinion/102708888/way-to-be-cleared-for-big-electricity-players-to-prey-on-lowincome-households

  9. savenz 9
    9 April 2018 at 12:17 pm

    I have not even got to the rort of how if you build a house and require a transformer, you have to pay $7000+ to the electrical company for the transformer, before you get the transformer and then wait for months after paying to hopefully receive the go ahead, but funny enough, you don’t own the transformer in spite of having to pay for it.

    You then have to pay to put in the physical lines to your house, and the meter boxes and even the number you get on the meter box. But that in spite of paying for it all you don’t own it, and you pay a heavy line rental charge to the electrical company for the usage of the infrastructure you just paid to put in but somehow they own. If something goes wrong with it, you also have to pay for the repair to “your” infrastructure. But if you move houses, you can’t remove any of it because if in that instance it “belongs to the electricity company”.

    By the time you do all that, somehow it costs about $25k in costs that benefit the electricity company before you start actually wiring up your own house and pay those costs of the electrical costs of what you do actually own.

    Then they wonder why there are no cheap houses in Auckland and why it costs so much more than overseas to build a house here.

    P.s. The commerce commission is ok with this.

    P.s.s. I’m pretty sure the 14 billion of profits called revaluations is linked to the mafia type extraction of capital from anybody connecting to the grid that new patrons personally pay for but don’t own and are forced to ‘rent’ from the power company their own improvements!

  10. JohnSelway 10
    9 April 2018 at 12:18 pm

    Is Mike Hosking still a thing? I can’t stand him

  11. Sabine 11
    9 April 2018 at 12:19 pm

    I think Hoskins is just annoyed that lowly people – not accomplished and worldy people like him and his missus – can also afford a coffee. That makes that cuppa just so much less special. Its like owning a maserati, you can still only drive 100 km an hour but at least you are the only one driving a maserati at 100 km an hour.

    • Naki man 11.1
      9 April 2018 at 1:58 pm

      Hosking sold his maserati years ago.
      If you think men who buy this type of car havnt driven them around 200km
      then you are dreaming. Speed camera fines are only a problem for poor people.

      • mac1 11.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 4:05 pm

        200 km/h, Naki man? Slow coach.

        From 2010, “A speeding Swedish driver is facing the world’s biggest ever motoring fine of 650,000 euros – around £538,000 – after being clocked at 180mph while driving through Switzerland. The 37-year-old man’s £140,000 Mercedes SLS AMG was impounded along with his driving licence after soaring along at two hundred and ninety km/h”.

        What I liked about this was that the Swiss system recognised your point about speeding fines being only a problem for poor people. This man was fined according to his income……. hence the 650,000 euro fine and impounding of flash car.

        Would you support a similar system here, Naki man, in enabling your concern for the poor to be realised?

      • Tricledrown 11.1.2
        10 April 2018 at 1:40 am

        He has a faster phallic /status symbol now Nakered man.
        But he likes being stuck larger longer traffic jams so he can show off to more lesser motorists.

  12. dukeofurl 12
    9 April 2018 at 12:55 pm

    Heres the previous NZ miniumum wage rates since 2008
    1 April 2008 $12.00
    1 April 2009 $12.50
    1 April 2010 $12.75
    1 April 2011 $13.00
    1 April 2012 $13.50
    1 April 2013 $13.75
    1 April 2014 $14.25
    1 April 2015 $14.75
    1 April 2016 $15.25
    1 April 2017 $15.75
    Wikipedia

    I well remember the spouting from Hoicking for those years ????

    • SPC 12.1
      9 April 2018 at 1:31 pm

      It’s like the petrol tax increase – the 3 cents a litre increase occured in 2009 2010 2013 2014 and 2015 and not one MSM commentator masde an issue of it.

      The MW was increased 2009-2017 and little is said by Hosking.

      But then in 2018 …

      • dukeofurl 12.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 1:58 pm

        National made sure their announcement of 3 x 3c per year ( + GST) was done on 18th December 2012.

        Would you believe they fell for it and the commentariat were already on their hols.

      • Naki man 12.1.2
        9 April 2018 at 2:10 pm

        SPC
        You have missed the point, people dont mind a increase in petrol tax when the money is spent on new motorways and improving the roads.
        Labour are increasing petrol tax and cutting the roading budget by 5 billion dollars, this after promising no new taxes in there first term.

        • dukeofurl 12.1.2.1
          9 April 2018 at 2:27 pm

          It is going to be spent on improving the roads
          According the the Governments Policy statement

          Local road improvements +42%
          Local road maintenance + 22%
          Regional improvements +96%
          Road policing +14%
          State highway maintenance + 18%

          And those going down
          State highway improvements -11%
          New state highways -40%

          national has been spending big of its RONS which affect a few areas around the big cities. These roads wouldnt normally be funded as the BCR is below One, but Joyce doesnt care about that anymore.

        • SPC 12.1.2.2
          9 April 2018 at 2:30 pm

          There is no difference between spending money on new roads and spending money to take cars off existing roads – both result in the same amount of road per car.

          National promised no new taxes in 2008, the petrol tax went up all the same in 2009 and 2010. No one made an issue of it (though there was of GST going up because this is not a common every year occurence – road cost inflation etc).

          So there is precedent for the petrol tax going up NOT to be seen as a new tax.

          • dukeofurl 12.1.2.2.1
            9 April 2018 at 4:01 pm

            Yes . Ask The Crusher did she VOTE for the increases in tax or ‘excise’ for petrol in 2013 – when the 3 X 3c per year was passed.

            National has always been VERY careful to call petrol increase an ‘excise’
            cigarette increase an ‘excise’
            Alcohol increase an ‘excise’

            The technical difference seems to be that excise is levied at manufacture rather than at sale.

          • Naki man 12.1.2.2.2
            9 April 2018 at 4:06 pm

            “There is no difference between spending money on new roads and spending money to take cars off existing roads – both result in the same amount of road per car.”

            That nuts, we wont take our cars off the roads, there is no reasonable alternative for nearly all of us. I start work at 4:30am out of town, for those of us who work 12 hour shifts there is barely enough hours in the day without trying to use non existant public transport.

            • SPC 12.1.2.2.2.1
              9 April 2018 at 5:44 pm

              If you looked you would note that provincial road funding is up, not down. Also up is road safety/median strip funding etc.

              And it is pretty obvious that the (major urban area) public transport funding occurs where it does take cars off roads. Do you have a problem with Aucklanders paying the extra on petrol to cover the cost of that?

              • Keepcalmcarryon …
                9 April 2018 at 9:03 pm

                Provincial roading is up fuck all, $4 billion for city public transport mostly Auckland, $800 million for “the provinces”
                Let’s not pretend this isn’t all about the city.

                • SPC …
                  10 April 2018 at 9:17 am

                  All … $800M …

                  Local road improvements +42%
                  Local road maintenance + 22%
                  Regional improvements +96%
                  State highway maintenance + 18%

                  Most of the roads here are outside of the major urban centres.

        • Tricledrown 12.1.2.3
          10 April 2018 at 1:49 am

          They are not cutting the roading budget by $5billion.
          Nakered man.
          They have ditched Nationals roads of political bribery to reduce the massive increase in the road toll becaise National cut road safety programs and police numbers by 1,000 reducing road policing while car numbers have increased.

    • Craig H 12.2
      10 April 2018 at 12:48 am

      I came here to post this, so thanks for saving me a job! National almost certainly would have put minimum wage to 50c, so the likely additional impact of Labour’s policy is 25c per hour.

  13. Stuff The Politicians 13
    9 April 2018 at 1:11 pm

    I reckon there is not much that would ever makes Hosking happy.

    He would be best left alone, playing with his toys in his own little sand pit.
    It is just the way he is, a very sad little man.

  14. SPC 14
    9 April 2018 at 1:38 pm

    His purpose is to remind National voters of their class interest – more immigrants and the lower the MW then they get cheaper workers/goods and services and with immigrants increasing demand for housing – highter property values/rent revenue.

    His column is perpetual class warfare.

    And of course leaving it to Like Mike plus one to put the boot into any left wing resistance (Greens).

    Similalry BS protects his Winnie, while his plus one attacks the Greens (using the female to attack the Greens for their solidarity with the poor, just as the right often use women MP’s to front their beneficiary bashing).

  15. newsense 15
    9 April 2018 at 2:18 pm

    Hosking is tedious.

    What we really need is a competent minister of broadcasting who doesn’t cost respected left wingers their jobs, so there are some damn lefties in one or two places of authority in the media.

  16. ianmac 16
    9 April 2018 at 3:52 pm

    How about this:
    Like an obnoxious uncle who has drunk too much at Christmas Mike Hosking continues to loudly broadcast his reckons on all the things that are terrible with this country and with this Government. Like how they and Auckland Council want to stop him owning a gun and will force him in the near future to live in an apartment with no guns and (gasp) no spaces to fire his guns. This is personal for him. There is no way he will let the Government take his guns from him while he still draws breath.

    I thought he sounded just like a solid member of the NRA. 🙂

    • Whispering Kate 16.1
      9 April 2018 at 4:05 pm

      Are you leg pulling – surely the man doesn’t have a gun, you have to be kidding – put me out of my misery, I am surprised the guy would get a gun permit, and for what reason – he wouldn’t go hunting for fear he would get his hair wrecked out in the bush.

      • ianmac 16.1.1
        9 April 2018 at 5:50 pm

        Sorry Whispering Kate. Do not think Hosking has a gun. He just comes across as the classic NRA bigot. Just kidding about anasty piece of work.

        • Whispering Kate 16.1.1.1
          9 April 2018 at 8:58 pm

          Thank the lord for that – the guy is a first class twat – in charge of a gun doesn’t bear thinking about.

  17. mary_a 17
    9 April 2018 at 4:16 pm

    Hosking is a pathetic, uncaring, Natz loving blow hard gobshite, living in another dimension to the rest of us!

    I’m waiting for his comments re Middlemore hospital. Bit slow coming Mike. Or did I miss them?

    • NZJester 17.1
      9 April 2018 at 5:56 pm

      Mike does not know what a public hospital is. He would be in private hospitals, not public.
      His answer would be the normal National Party reasoning of “Why not Privatise it”.
      I do wonder if that was Nationals next move if they got in. They would blame all the problems on the boards hiding the underfunding and then put in a privatized hospital system to replace it.

  18. NZJester 18
    9 April 2018 at 5:49 pm

    If it was truly a free market and everyone had equal power, wages would be higher than they are, but for too long those with money have been fixing the market in their favor paying the National Party to adjust the free market heavily in their favor. Having them let in cheap labor from outside NZ so that the businesses here do not have to offer a fair market wage, and by allowing business to have easy hire and fire schemes or 0-hour schemes that keep out unions by off the record threatening to fire or cut the hours of those who try and organize or join a union.

  19. mosa 19
    9 April 2018 at 7:29 pm

    Hosking and his ramblings are shared by a large National voting public and media that will do everything to make sure the status quo remains even if that means objecting to the crumbs being thrown in the form of a increase in the MINIMUM wage.

    ” Let them eat cake ” is still relevant today without the outrage of the french peasants.

  20. Pete 20
    9 April 2018 at 7:32 pm

    Mike Hosking reckons this, Mike Hosking reckons that.

    Does his opinion have some preference to be recognised and valued as an intellectual and sagacious one and considered ahead of the opinion of anyone else? Because he is on the radio his opinion rates serious discussion?

    Mike Hosking reckons this, Mike Hosking reckons that. I reckon he’s a shallow thinking self-absorbed person whose facile opinions deserve far less prominence than they get.

  21. Ian 21
    9 April 2018 at 7:33 pm

    He doesn’t mention the cost of not supporting low-income earners because it would sound obnoxious and probably be quite a disaster for New Zealand.

    Just image if a government followed Hosking’s prescription and 400,000 New Zealanders were pushed underwater. It would lead to war.

  22. JustMe 22
    9 April 2018 at 7:58 pm

    I get the impression Mike Hosking deems himself as being the ‘font of all knowledge’.
    He comes across as claiming he knows everything and has an answer for everything.
    Since he is known to be the ‘Mouthpiece of the NZ National Party’ I am sure he is just mouthing(word for word)into print etc everything told to him by say John Key.
    Perhaps it’s well time that Mike Hosking had his enrmous pay packet cut so he starts to know what NZers especially those on low incomes have to live with.
    Still his ‘I know everything attitude’ reflects badly back upon the NZ Herald who allow him to write so much rubbish on an almost daily basis.
    Because of Mike Hosking I now cannot be bothered reading articles in the NZ Herald. The tabloid newspaper with its copious number of National Party Admiration Society ‘journos’ have become too much.

  23. Nic the NZer 23
    10 April 2018 at 7:48 am

    Seems Mike Hosking has been turned into a blithering idiot by the economics 101 version of economics.

    Unfortunately economics is taught from the most unrealistic and simplistic, heading towards the more complicated and somewhat realistic concepts. In the simplistic version we its assumed that market demand curves slope down and market supply curves slope up. This is unrealistic even for individuals who often violate the implied behaviour of both demand and supply functions. Individuals also do not transact and conduct business as if prices float and are demand driven (frequently businesses don’t change prices, and workers don’t demand a change in pay just because there is more or less demand at a particular moment).

    In addition it was demonstrated mathematically that in a market, where pay feeds back to individuals participating, even where all the individuals behave according to conforming demand and supply functions the aggregate market demand and supply function could take on any shape at all. This is called the Sonnenschein–Mantel–Debreu theorem. Mike clearly never learned that it proven factually he is incorrect in his assumptions.

    Yes, economists have started to look at actual experiments but these have not demonstrated clearly how markets will respond to changes in the minimum wage with much clarity. Typically though it doesn’t seem to effect the number of jobs much (sometimes the effect seems to be to create more jobs).

    • Pat 23.1
      10 April 2018 at 10:29 am

      “Seems Mike Hosking has been turned into a blithering idiot by the economics 101 version of economics.”

      You mean there was a time when he wasnt?

  24. Tricledrown 24
    10 April 2018 at 9:35 am

    The Unite unions head was on latent Smiths right wing show yesterday saying the fuel tax was extremely bad for his members.
    But using his logic wage rises would also be bad for his members.

  25. Tricledrown 25
    10 April 2018 at 10:21 am

    Goose man your an certifiable idiot. That is one company that aims at the top end of the market their customers won’t quibble over a few cents.
    The wage content of a cup of coffee doesn’t match the large increases.
    Coffee has remained the same price for years even though wages have gone up by a lot more the 25cents more than the normal increase.
    The sheer number of coffee outlets has continued to grow. And must be profitable for this to occur!
    But Gooseman the pathetic propagandist tries to mix smaller amounts of truth with his froth believing people wil fall for his Trolling.

  26. smilin 26
    10 April 2018 at 2:08 pm

    Pretty simple really people like him are just going to have to wear it for the first time in a bloody long time because what they cost this country is now becoming more obvious and the last thing we need is an obnoxious self serving git bleating about that which he has only an opinion of .And all the rest of us have an opinion that is probably more valid anyway .