Open mike 07/02/2024

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, February 7th, 2024 - 51 comments
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Open mike is your post.

For announcements, general discussion, whatever you choose.

The usual rules of good behaviour apply (see the Policy).

Step up to the mike …

51 comments on “Open mike 07/02/2024 ”

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  1. SPC 1
    7 February 2024 at 6:16 am
    1. Donald Trump does not have presidential immunity and can be prosecuted on charges of plotting to overturn the 2020 election, a US court has ruled
    2. The DC Circuit Court of Appeals panel announced the decision on Tuesday
    3. The former president is expected to appeal against the ruling
    4. Special Counsel Jack Smith has charged Trump with conspiring to overturn the 2020 election
    5. But Trump claimed he was carrying out his official duties as president when the 6 January riots happened, and in the weeks leading up to it
    6. Trump has claimed having no presidential immunity would open "Pandora's box" and unleash political backlash against future presidents

    https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-us-canada-68023315

    The case is now likely to go to SCOTUS.

    The politics

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-67272569

  2. SPC 2
    7 February 2024 at 6:31 am

    The intellectual apologist for low levels of support to sole parents to give them an incentive to work, has no critical comment about the small MW increase, instead …

    https://pointofordernz.wordpress.com/2024/02/06/lindsay-mitchell-a-terrible-trend-in-desperate-need-of-turning/

    • Descendant Of Smith 2.1
      7 February 2024 at 7:34 am

      Also misleads in this statement as right wingers (right whingers) often do by not including the additonal help that someone on average wage can get and is further misleading by mentioning family tax credit which you cannot get on benefit and you can only get if working. It also fails to mention that family tax credit is simply topping up the low shitty wages that employers pay not the fact that there are fewer jobs in Northland and people have returned home as high rents have driven them out of larger urban areas due to areas where rents are cheaper.

      In fact, for a sole parent with a couple of children, there is now no gap between income from a benefit (with all the add-ons like accommodation supplement and family tax credits) and an average paying job. By April last year the average benefit income for this family type was $1,057 weekly.

      From IRD website.

      When you cannot receive the minimum family tax credit

      The minimum family tax credit is not available to families receiving the following:

      • an income-tested benefit
      • a parent's allowance
      • a children's pension from Veterans' Affairs New Zealand
      • Res Publica 2.1.1
        7 February 2024 at 1:57 pm

        That's what bugs me the most about WFF: it's nothing more than thinly disguised subsidy for business that enables them to keep wages down and let the taxpayer foot the bill.

        It was Labour's biggest ever betrayal of the working and middle class. And has set any discussion about wages, taxation, and the welfare state back by decades. All any government of any stripe needs to do, is point to WFF and argue we already have a subsidy for working families.

        All very reminiscent of the workhouse scene in Oliver Twist. We already have our gruel. Why should be able to ask for more?

        What's worse is that the thresholds are set so that if you quality, you probably aren't earning enough to attract a subsidy large enough to make an appreciable difference.

        And if you earn enough to make it worthwhile, you either don't qualify or your subsidy is abated away to basically nothing.

        • SPC 2.1.1.1
          7 February 2024 at 2:06 pm

          I totally disagree.

          1.Labour faced the winter of discontent in 2000 for a modest reform of the ECA

          2.Labour was facing in 2005 Don Brash kiwi or iwi and a large tax cut bribe. The WFF tax credits transferred the budget surplus money to families rather than an across the board tax cut unrelated to need.

          The 2005-2008 government increased the MW by a dollar per annum for 3 years.

          The post 2008 government left WFF untouched, it has won public acceptance – that there should be help to families within the tax system.

          That leaves FPA/Industry Awards and more general working conditions – improvements related to parental leave, annual leave (4 weeks), sick leave and regulations related to contract work, casual work etc.

          • Res Publica 2.1.1.1.1
            7 February 2024 at 2:56 pm

            All of those things are true.

            But I see that as Labour trying to solve a pressing political problem and heading off Don Brash (shudder) at the pass, rather than necessarily introducing visionary social policy.

            If we can criticize our last 2 left-leaning governments on anything, it was their surrender to cautious, bland, but politically acceptable incrementalism. It's left (pun intended) the working and middle classes materially worse off while they tinker around the edges.

            There was a time, not so long ago, where both of our main political parties actually stood for something.

        • UncookedSelachimorpha 2.1.1.2
          7 February 2024 at 7:58 pm

          100%. WFF is a subsidy from the public to private business, allowing them to pay their workers less than they need to survive, pocketing the savings as private profit.

          (exception only when the employer is a public or charitable organisation)

      • Craig H 2.1.2
        7 February 2024 at 4:31 pm

        Minimum Family Tax Credit and Family Tax Credit aren't the same – beneficiaries receive Family Tax Credit but not the Minimum Family Tax Credit.

        • SPC 2.1.2.1
          7 February 2024 at 5:54 pm

          Working for Families payments

          There are 4 types of Working for Families tax credit payments.

          Family tax credit

          Paid regardless of your income source. You can be on salary and wages or receiving an income-tested benefit.

          In-work tax credit

          This is a payment available for families who have some income from paid work each week.

          Minimum family tax credit

          A payment to make sure families are getting basic income where the parents or parents work a required number of hours for salary and wages.

          This is a payment if your annual family income after tax is: … It tops up your family's after-tax weekly income to at least $658 …

          Best Start tax credit

          A weekly payment for families supporting a newborn baby.

          https://www.ird.govt.nz/working-for-families/about

    • aj 2.2
      7 February 2024 at 7:35 am

      Apparently bringing up children is not a job in itself…

      For one, homes where no-one is employed lack routine and discipline. Who gets the kids up and ready for school?

      • Descendant Of Smith 2.2.1
        7 February 2024 at 8:23 am

        A group of local sole parents here pretty much runs the kindy. I assuming only commercial state funded childcare while mum works is an acceptable form of early education in a right wing world – unless it is fundy home schooling.

    • Kay 2.3
      7 February 2024 at 10:43 am

      Lindsay's been on this stuck-record crusade for years now. One has to wonder what made her so bitter and twisted towards sole parents, beside just warped ideology.

  3. observer 3
    7 February 2024 at 9:37 am

    I'm not going to comment every time our embarrassing PM says something false or foolish, because I'd be doing it every day and we all have lives.

    But this is an absolute whopper, on TV3 this morning, talking about the Treaty Principles Bill:

    He said it was a "sticking point" for ACT and to form the Coalition Government he had to compromise.

    Newshub political editor Jenna Lynch reacts to Luxon's Treaty Bill comments on AM | Newshub

    Yes, sure. David Seymour would have responded "Well, thanks for the 3 Ministers in Cabinet and a bunch of ACT policies, but it's not enough, so I'm off to support Chris Hipkins to form a government, because he'll give us more …"

    [/heaviest sarc]

    It wasn't a "sticking point", at all. Luxon did it because he wanted to.

    • Tony Veitch 3.1
      7 February 2024 at 10:31 am

      Yes, Observer, ration yourself to only major faux pas.

      Which still means you'll be spending a considerable time commenting here.

      As you say – 'sticking point' my arse. He could have called both Seymour's and Peter's bluffs – where else could they have gone. But he caved!

      • mikesh 3.1.1
        7 February 2024 at 1:41 pm

        He could have called both Seymour's and Peter's bluffs – where else could they have gone.

        The poll booths, presumably.

        • observer 3.1.1.1
          7 February 2024 at 1:49 pm

          In theory, yes. In reality, they were offered 3 Cabinet positions each, and plenty of policy gains.

          If they'd walked away there would have been months before the GG would agree to an election (Seymour and Peters couldn't call one, they weren't PM). It could not have happened before this year.

          What would Seymour's reward have been for forcing an election on this one issue? The voters in Epsom saying "sure, we care passionately about a bill that our party won't support into law anyway"?

          Of course not.

    • Bearded Git 3.2
      7 February 2024 at 10:38 am

      smileysmileysad

      Effectively NZ has Liz Truss, a Dinosaur and a young Trump running the country. And they don't get on very well.

      Less than one-term government?

      • Ad 3.2.1
        7 February 2024 at 10:46 am

        Here's hoping.

        Let's conspire on what we can do to assist this.

      • observer 3.2.2
        7 February 2024 at 11:50 am

        I assume that National will replace Luxon before the election, the usual internal change to be presented as real change (Thatcher/Major, etc).

        But then again, I assumed the same before the last election, and was proved wrong. The difference is that he was then only a potential failure, whereas now he's got the job and his limitations are painfully obvious.

        Whether Labour can benefit is a whole other discussion, which is on hold until they decide on their leadership.

        • gsays 3.2.2.1
          7 February 2024 at 12:38 pm

          Don't get me wrong, I am no fan of the man.

          For a first term MP, to lead and unite the den of snakes that is the National caucus, defeat and overturn a majority Labour government, negotiate a coalition agreement with the biggest 3 egoes known to man (including Shane Jones) then not get booed at Waitangi, an argument can be made for his knighthood now.

          Like Ardern, I think it is a grave mistake underestimating this person.

          I fully agree, more time and attention is needed in where to now for Labour

          • Robert Guyton 3.2.2.1.1
            7 February 2024 at 2:43 pm

            You can't boo if you're asleep.

          • Bearded Git 3.2.2.1.2
            7 February 2024 at 3:56 pm

            Do you really think they are united gsays? I'll bet you a thousand pounds they don't last as a government for 3 years. (Joking-only Sunak would be daft enough to make such a bet)

            • gsays 3.2.2.1.2.1
              7 February 2024 at 11:38 pm

              I do think they're united.
              Not like a lefty, purity olympics type group. Looking for sell outs, traitors or splinters. Peoples Front of Judea anyone?

              They've got a common goal, power. They will hold their nose, smile through gritted teeth, tolerate all sorts of shit and do what it takes to keep it.

              With the lightening rod out the front drawing all yr ire, the rest of them can get on with their self serving ways.

        • Obtrectator 3.2.2.2
          7 February 2024 at 5:31 pm

          "Whether Labour can benefit is a whole other discussion, which is on hold until they decide on their leadership."

          And their policy.

    • Phillip ure 3.3
      7 February 2024 at 11:24 am

      And/or..luxon is just totally owned by seymour..(and/or peters..?)

      The man can't be sleeping well..

  4. alwyn 4
    7 February 2024 at 11:59 am

    For Weka.

    On Saturday 3/2/24 you told me " I don’t like having to moderate on Saturdays. Take the weekend off – weka"

    When is the weekend over?

  5. roblogic 5
    7 February 2024 at 1:33 pm

    Well done Mihi Forbes handling Shane Jones on RNZ yesterday.. what a slimy character… loved the part where she said “so we shouldn’t believe a word you say?!?!” He tried to weasel out of it, but those were his words…

    I put together a transcript

    26:12
    SJ:This is electoral politics. You may hear from me, David Seymour, but the god of wind blows our words away. We're politicians, and in the heat of debate, rhetoric is deployed, whether it's left or right of politics. And we shouldn't actually cling and use those words as a justification for remaining angry.

    26:36
    MF:Are you saying that we shouldn't believe anything you say? Is that what you're saying?
    SJ:When you're in an election, you are fighting for every iota of attention. And for example, I said that you could kill every cow tomorrow and you wouldn't change the climate. Obviously, that's hyperbole […] And you know, we deploy rhetoric.

  6. newsense 6
    7 February 2024 at 3:04 pm

    New Zealand leadership is pathetic.

    Climate change is here. And the people in Hawkes Bay are left to fend for themselves, reliant on community groups to clear silt.

    We have farmers carrying about how tough it is as they help us miss our Paris obligations.

    We have Simeon Brown focused on culture war, continuing the idea that water infrastructure can be done magically.

    We have inflation and a housing market designed to benefit landlords. This is corruption, but the mild NZ type with no guns or dramatic confrontations, just fat cats and desperate people being told to be cheerful and resourceful.

    Apart from feeding greedy landlords, the other priority seems to be working as hard as possible for the tobacco companies. And the car industry.

    • roblogic 6.1
      7 February 2024 at 3:50 pm

      also

      fucking up public water supplies so they are easier to flog off

      privatising hospitals

      shitting on Te Tiriti

      wrecking transport plans for Cook Strait and Auckland light rail

      mining and oil prospecting on DOC preserves

  7. SPC 7
    7 February 2024 at 4:25 pm

    The December quarter unemployment is 4%.

    Business spokespeople think it is higher – … all that migrant labour without full-time work, looking for casual work/temp/contract/part-time work …not counted … and or

    While the unemployment rise was less than economists were predicting, a business group suspects the picture is actually worse than the statistics show.

    "These numbers are from the last three months of 2023. We know anecdotally that the economic situation has further deteriorated, and the real unemployment rate today is likely to be higher," Employers and Manufacturers Association (EMA) Head of Advocacy Alan McDonald said.

    "The numbers released today don't feel right."

    McDonald said the business association is increasingly hearing from its members that the economic environment is becoming more difficult, with their advice line seeing calls for restructuring and redundancy support surge by nearly 90 percent compared with this time last year.

    https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/money/2024/02/new-zealand-s-unemployment-rate-rises-to-4-percent.html

    • Bearded Git 7.1
      7 February 2024 at 5:39 pm

      The Nats have been whinging for years that Adrian Orr at the Reserve Bank should be sacked because he lifted interest rates too fast and too high.

      Now it turns out that he was right all along they have quietly stopped saying this.

      • SPC 7.1.1
        7 February 2024 at 6:10 pm

        Read my lips the OCR will not increase any further. They have already said this and I believe them. Inflation is tracking down – it is 4.7% after a 0.5% quarter. They are on track for their 3% target by the end of 2024.

        Unemployment is probably over 4% now and then comes the public sector layoffs and the impact on consumer spending of rents going up faster than wages this year (and mortgage rate pressure still on-going) is on track for 5% by year end.

        For mine Orr was lax in 2021 when it was known the economy was doing OK, the housing market overheated as a result (his excuse the Auckland lockdown). But it is about right for this OCR to be the peak.

        https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/liam-dann-could-todays-low-unemp2loyment-number-mean-another-interest-rate-hike/FUYJDUWD55EKTF6BXANHU7RGDY/

        • Bearded Git 7.1.1.1
          7 February 2024 at 6:20 pm

          But SPC, our inflation stayed lower than most countries early on. So Orr probably had it right.

          The problem has been that it has been a little slower to fall than some countries recently, but as you say it is down to 4.7%. The predictions I have heard are that NZ will be close to the goal of 1-3% in a year's time-your 5% may be pessimistic.

          • SPC 7.1.1.1.1
            7 February 2024 at 6:46 pm

            CPI inflation was not a problem in 2021, but house prices were ridiculous. Action then would have limited inflation later.

            Our inflation stayed higher because of things like the gib board market failure and the weather events (and Cook Strait inefficiency) and overdue wage increases (bus drivers etc).

            The RB goal of inflation of 3% by the end of the year looks possible, a 0.5% quarter suggests 2%, but rents and maybe power will push it higher.

            My pick is unemployment at 5% by the end of 2024.

            https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/business/501422/stats-nz-unemployment-rises-to-3-point-9-percent

      • Nic the NZer 7.1.2
        7 February 2024 at 10:23 pm

        The conclusion should not be that Orr was correct at all. The OCR increases have in themselves driven up rental prices which form a significant component of the CPI forming a positive feedback loop. The alternative policy of simply leaving the OCR flat at nearly zero would just as likely have resulted in a flatter inflation spike with marginally better unemployment and GDP numbers coming out.

        The issue here is we don't know that the OCR is negatively correlated with even house prices. It might be positively correlated by the mechanisms of accruing excess rental income to existing multiple property owners with equity (speeding up second purchases) or just by the mechanism of increasing saving returns (on future deposit funds). The way this actually works depends on the distribution of returns due to the price changes resulting from the OCR and how those sectors respond to that.

        If or not there is a positive or negative correlation its certainly quite slight and impacts long after the OCR change (due to mortgage holders fixing for several years typically). A good general description of the relationship between the OCR and house prices seems to be the housing market seems to do what it wants and doesn't respond to the OCR much at all. In particular the bigger (percentage wise) changes in house prices circa 2007-2009 occurred while the OCR was up at 7,8,9%.

        Also if 2021 is going to be a strong test of the RBNZ policy we need to take into account that the housing market was effectively shut down for a few months, and for well understood reasons savings rates went through the roof just prior. Once that was opened again of course there is a sudden flood of people back into the housing market then your pretty much guaranteed to get a short term price bidding war coming out from that.

        • Nic the NZer 7.1.2.1
          8 February 2024 at 7:47 am

          I've actually given too much credence to the RBNZ being able to control excess house prices via its OCR policy choices. This is not however how the RBNZ thinks of it and they don't expect their OCR policy choices to impact first on the housing market or directly. Instead the OCR impacts are expected to flow into the economy via elevated unemployment levels.

          As the RBNZ has explained in detail they expect to raise the NZ unemployment rate above their estimate of the NAIRU rate via the OCR and so to lower inflation which is therefore being driven up by a nascent wage-price spiral. They never got unemployment above the NAIRU before the inflation rate turned negative, demonstrating this was not a pertinent cause of inflation. Instead they only managed to slightly elevate unemployment and slightly lower GDP, pushing the impacts on inflation first onto marginal workers in NZ, and the wider low wage sector of the economy who have lower wage bargaining power. In their own terms the RBNZ policy was unnecessary and never worked as described (while having negative distributional impacts on the country).

          • SPC 7.1.2.1.1
            8 February 2024 at 7:13 pm

            The problem of this singular blunt method was noted years ago by the RB itself when Bollard asked for other tools – he mentioned a mortgage surtax to better target the housing market without impact on the dollar value.

            The focus currently is deposit criteria and income related loan levels.

        • SPC 7.1.2.2
          8 February 2024 at 7:26 pm

          The OCR increases have in themselves driven up rental prices which form a significant component of the CPI forming a positive feedback loop.

          The dominant factor is the market – supply and demand for housing. The recent migrant labour inflow …

          The other factor is cost of ownership to cost of rent and that is influenced by the OCR and related mortgage cost.

          A good general description of the relationship between the OCR and house prices seems to be the housing market seems to do what it wants and doesn't respond to the OCR much at all. In particular the bigger (percentage wise) changes in house prices circa 2007-2009 occurred while the OCR was up at 7,8,9%.

          There is the issue of access to money and anticipation of CG. And fear of missing out if those in jobs get access to mortgages easily.

          Q4 2001 $61,000

          Q2 2007 peak $114,000

          Q4 2008 $98,000

          Q4 2009 $102,000

          https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/QNZR628BIS

          Of course some markets were different, where expectation of CG was a factor.

          For example 2002-2004 50% gains in some markets and then 100% again 2004-2007 (Auckland and Wellington). But even these flatlined 2007-2009.

          • Nic the NZer 7.1.2.2.1
            8 February 2024 at 8:53 pm

            Whether or not you want to refer to the land lord class as 'the market', many land lords have clearly put their rental prices up as a result of the escalating costs of mortgage repayments. The RBNZ needs to operate within the existing framework of the NZ economy including how their monetary policy will impact the NZ economy through economic behaviors they don't control.

            You appear to have a fundamental belief that the OCR is the primary factor and negatively correlated with the housing market, but there are some pretty obvious problems with this. First off, there is a clear positive correlation between real house price changes and the OCR level. The reason for this is that central banks have a long standing tendency to raise the cash rate in response to economic strength and lower it in response to economic weakness, but this lever just is very ineffective at having any impact on the housing market from there.

            The next problem is access to credit is not institutionally limited by the OCR, in fact the OCR is the rate at which banks can always borrow the clearance funds to clear payments. As long as they can pass this on profitably because a borrower will (usually) repay their loan at a slightly above OCR interest rate then they can lend profitably. This is related to the reason that the RBNZ does not think of its OCR policy as targeting house prices in any specific way. This is not something the RBNZ can do much about actually, because if the lending is financially sound then its well outside the remit of the RBNZ to be rationing credit for some other policy reasons.

            So as I suggested the housing market has the full capacity to determine its direction regardless of OCR policy. Many participants don't really let high interest rates stop them getting into the housing market, maybe because they still get more value from their capital gains than their interest payment costs, but that is the behavior.

            This makes a lot of penalty costs come down to the question of if the housing market behavior is economically 'rational'. Those can be higher OCR costs, or CG taxes, or mortgage surcharges (all of which are forms of penalty costs to home ownership). These kinds of policies are however unlikely to work if the housing market doesn't start behaving rationally at some level of penalty costs, they simply become a cost of participation. On the other hand there are plenty of economic analysis describing that housing is already at a level of not pricing the risk in rationally anyway and has not been for some time. I don't really see why some of the proposed taxes are likely to bring an irrational market to its senses anyway. On the other hand as described in relation to the OCR many of these costs are sure to be passed on as rent increases. It was certainly true prior to about 2008 that a lot of land lords didn't worry too much about the rent, or running their property profitably as they were satisfied with the supposed capital gains, anyway.

  8. newsense 8
    7 February 2024 at 4:28 pm

    The other thing about Waitangi is it is where Paheka talk to each other about who they are.

    The announcement that Pakeha would be separated into two groups, those who like having Maori in NZ and those who…tolerate them at best. Almost a Jim Crow distinction.

    Which is typical of their division between renter and owner, Wellington and elsewhere, (quietly) climate change affected property owners and the rest, smokers and non-smokers…

    The bland great divider was at work, ignoring evidence in front of him as he let things happen and not wanting people to be jealous of his success.

    But that’s the hidden substance, the disappearance of difference, the Americanisation of the political divide…just beginning here to the point there where Putin is seen as less extreme than Biden. Not opposition, but enemies.

  9. weka 9
    7 February 2024 at 4:39 pm

    The announcement that Pakeha would be separated into two groups, those who like having Maori in NZ and those who…tolerate them at best.

    who said that?

    • newsense 9.1
      7 February 2024 at 7:38 pm

      Before Pakeha and Tauiwi all visited on the same day.

      This is my reading of the government. For example Luxon was asked not to mention truancies and did, and has also fibbed about having to run ACT’s treaty principles bill.

      His transport minister’s priority is not having Maori on signs.

      And he was the least controversial.

      You look at what’s been said by the government at Waitangi and before, and that they didn’t want the opposition there on the same day.

      I’d accept the argument that the current Labour leadership is less pro-Maori than previous leaderships.

      But not turning up as one group on one day is a division, requested by the government.

  10. Reality 10
    7 February 2024 at 4:42 pm

    With Luxon's lack of personality and/or charm, his cue card way of speaking, his inability to persuade in a genuine way, leaves New Zealand with a "boring, bland, nothing" type of PM. He tried dressing up as a pirate and being photographed in matching family pyjamas for goodness sake! He is getting more cringeworthy by the week.

    • Phillip ure 10.1
      7 February 2024 at 7:50 pm

      I googled it..luxon in pyjamas…

      The matching nite-attire are cringeworthy…but I was more disturbed by the books on the shelf behind them…books as decoration…the only burr under that saddle is that they are upside down..(it's the little things..!)