Independent Analysis and Reportage
Keith RankinKeith Rankin is an economics and statistics lecturer, recently retired from Unitec, Auckland, New Zealand.
Keith Rankin - Is it possible that an unintended consequence of moral compliance in relation to pay equity – of attempts to equalise pay by gender, within firms and other employing organisations – has been to create more young adult female NEETs? It's a hypothesis that at least deserves to be investigated further.
Keith Rankin - We can easily see that the United States 'national' debt is on an upwards, not a downwards, trajectory; the Department of War can loosen Treasury's guard-rails more easily than the Department of Health. (This is true in Germany too, with last-year's partial removal of that country's debt-brake.)
Keith Rankin - A lethal transmissible disease which is asymptomatic for six weeks, and which is infectious before symptoms occur, is one of our worst public health nightmares. The present scare should remind us of that.
Despite its minimal emphasis in the anglophile understanding of WWI, the central conflict of that war was between the German Second Reich (the Prussian Empire) and Russia (the Russian Empire). The war was started, with full intent, by the German military who were able to play the emotionally volatile Prussian Kaiser, Wilhelm II.
Keith Rankin - What would happen if the Strait of Hormuz was blocked by a giant earthquake? Then a pipe, tunnel, road or canal would have to be built. There would be no argument then about a portage fee being charged.
Keith Rankin - New Zealand is increasingly becoming a country with a high denizen-to-citizen ratio. New rules intended to make it more difficult for New Zealand permanent residents to become citizens of Aotearoa New Zealand can be expected to keep more immigrants here. That may be the intention.
Keith Rankin - Before mentioning crime, cocaine and apartheid, we should note that Sweden is a large-scale military systems exporter. For Sweden, the 'big gun' industry is equivalent to the dairy industry in New Zealand as a source of foreign exchange revenue.
Not me personally; and, of course, all ethnicities are equal. A week or so ago, as I was casually doing something else, I saw being interviewed a gentleman who I understand was a Gazan intellectual.
New Zealand is almost completely dependent on four things for its survival in the contemporary world. Imported wheat, rice, and refined fuel. And ships.
There is a narrative going around that the war in the Persian Gulf and Gulf of Oman – Israel/USA versus Iran – is a training exercise for the big one, a war between the United States and China centred on the Taiwan Strait.
Inflation is a topic which has, for a long time now, been at the forefront of normative economics. Normative economics is the economics of mainstream ideology, not the economics informed by concept or science.
Are we witnessing, for the first time, a British King appeasing a foreign emperor? And on the quarter-millennial anniversary of Britain's greatest ever geopolitical humiliation. Could King Charles be enacting one of the final straws in the deathknell of the Monarchy?