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Economic Intelligence

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Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Governments run financial deficits; it’s their role to do so

October 17, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. The above chart shows that the world’s governments, taken collectively, run financial deficits every year. This is not a weakness of the global financial system; it’s a strength, perhaps the strength of the world system. Government deficits offset private sector financial choices. We note that when the world government deficit becomes ... <a title="Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Governments run financial deficits; it’s their role to do so" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/10/17/keith-rankin-chart-analysis-governments-run-financial-deficits-its-their-role-to-do-so/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Governments run financial deficits; it’s their role to do so">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth: Ireland compared to Australasia

October 12, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. This chart shows the anomalous economy which is Ireland. In tradingeconomics.com, Ireland and New Zealand are shown as having exactly the same population (5.15m). Yet Ireland has a GDP of $US529 billion, whereas New Zealand has a GDP of $US247 billion, less than half. (Even Sweden, with double Ireland’s population, has ... <a title="Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth: Ireland compared to Australasia" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/10/12/keith-rankin-chart-analysis-economic-growth-ireland-compared-to-australasia/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth: Ireland compared to Australasia">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth per Capita: New Zealand in Context

September 26, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. The principal measure of economic success in the mainstream narrative is economic growth. The pointy heads associated with that narrative will correctly point out that its economic growth per capita that matters, and which serves as a crude proxy for ‘living standards’. This conventional wisdom says that annual economic growth of ... <a title="Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth per Capita: New Zealand in Context" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/09/26/keith-rankin-chart-analysis-economic-growth-per-capita-new-zealand-in-context/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Economic Growth per Capita: New Zealand in Context">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Analysis – New Zealand’s Exceptional Financial Policy Signature

September 4, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. The Financial Profile of a Nation State New Zealand Incorporated (in abbreviation, NZ Inc.) is Aotearoa New Zealand thought of as an economic nation. The domestic economy of New Zealand splits into the ‘Government’ and ‘Private’ sectors, where ‘Private’ means ‘non-Government’. ‘NZ Inc.’ is embodied within ‘World Inc.’; that is, within ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – New Zealand’s Exceptional Financial Policy Signature" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/09/04/keith-rankin-analysis-new-zealands-exceptional-financial-policy-signature/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – New Zealand’s Exceptional Financial Policy Signature">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – New Zealand’s Financial Exceptionalism

August 31, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. New Zealand’s Exceptional Economic Policy Fingerprint The above chart shows New Zealand’s financial (im)balances from 1999. What is truly exceptional is the number of years in which Aotearoa New Zealand has green and red together on the ‘surplus’ side of the chart. (I have discussed this in May in Visualising Countries’ ... <a title="Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – New Zealand’s Financial Exceptionalism" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/08/31/keith-rankin-chart-analysis-new-zealands-financial-exceptionalism/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – New Zealand’s Financial Exceptionalism">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Essay – Subsidise Vegetables and Fruit

August 15, 2023

Essay by Keith Rankin. Fresh vegetables and fruit – quality foods – are what economists call a merit good, like primary health care, education and urban public transport. By contrast, ‘junk food’ – rich in sugar – is a demerit good. We in New Zealand and many other countries have a problem: too much unhealthy ... <a title="Keith Rankin Essay – Subsidise Vegetables and Fruit" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/08/15/keith-rankin-essay-subsidise-vegetables-and-fruit/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Essay – Subsidise Vegetables and Fruit">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Visualising Countries’ Deficits and Debts, Surpluses and Credits, in context of the US Government’s Debt Ceiling

May 29, 2023

Analysis by Keith Rankin. The topic of financial debt is one of the hardest for humans to get their heads around. The normal understanding of a debt is a sacrifice made by one party (the owner of the debt) in favour of another party (the ower) which will be remedied some time in the future ... <a title="Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Visualising Countries’ Deficits and Debts, Surpluses and Credits, in context of the US Government’s Debt Ceiling" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2023/05/29/keith-rankin-chart-analysis-visualising-countries-deficits-and-debts-surpluses-and-credits-in-context-of-the-us-governments-debt-ceiling/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Chart Analysis – Visualising Countries’ Deficits and Debts, Surpluses and Credits, in context of the US Government’s Debt Ceiling">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Essay – Predicting the Coming Quarter Century

December 6, 2022

Analysis by Keith Rankin. On 29 October 2022, the New Zealand Listener published 10 Billion reasons to be cheerful, an article by Greg Dixon summarising “futurologist” Hamish McRae’s 2022 book The World in 2050: How to think about the future. (Note also the accompanying article, A blast from the past; and the letters responses.) The ... <a title="Keith Rankin Essay – Predicting the Coming Quarter Century" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/12/06/keith-rankin-essay-predicting-the-coming-quarter-century/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Essay – Predicting the Coming Quarter Century">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Essay – Using the Sex Industry to Critique Textbook Economics

December 2, 2022

Analysis by Keith Rankin. Economics is a profound and important discipline. But its practice is prone to self-censorship, and still reflects in large part its (Victorian era) glory days and the sensibilities of that era. The father and mother of today’s textbook economics were Alfred Marshall and Mary Paley who published The Economics of Industry ... <a title="Keith Rankin Essay – Using the Sex Industry to Critique Textbook Economics" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/12/02/keith-rankin-essay-using-the-sex-industry-to-critique-textbook-economics/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Essay – Using the Sex Industry to Critique Textbook Economics">Read more</a>

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Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Clawing back $7bn of corporate welfare

December 2, 2022

Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards. Political Roundup: Clawing back $7bn of corporate welfare The taxpayer is short of billions of dollars that were overpaid to businesses during Covid according to Christchurch philanthropists Grant and Marilyn Nelson. They are taking legal action against state agencies to push them to recoup up to $7bn that was wrongly paid ... <a title="Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Clawing back $7bn of corporate welfare" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/12/02/bryce-edwards-political-roundup-clawing-back-7bn-of-corporate-welfare/" aria-label="Read more about Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Clawing back $7bn of corporate welfare">Read more</a>

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Keith Rankin Essay – How do Left-Wing Elites Make their Money?

November 30, 2022

Analysis by Keith Rankin. The academic study of history, more than anything else, is about the relationships between social elites and the lower classes. Yet, when it comes to the present, the relationships between elites and wider society is under-discussed, both popularly and academically. (In academia, it is the province of sociology, a social ‘science’ ... <a title="Keith Rankin Essay – How do Left-Wing Elites Make their Money?" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2022/11/30/keith-rankin-essay-how-do-left-wing-elites-make-their-money/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Essay – How do Left-Wing Elites Make their Money?">Read more</a>