Independent Analysis and Reportage
A View from Afar – In this podcast, Paul G. Buchanan and Selwyn Manning will analyse how supply-chain bottlenecks, a global economic reset, and post-pandemic security are about to trigger a new era in geo-economics.
Analysis by Keith Rankin. To the surprise of most pundits, substantial real estate price inflation has resumed, after a hiatus from 2017 to 2019. As to be expected, most of the usual tropes have been employed: a lack of supply, immigration (in this latest case returning New Zealanders), and low interest rates. The only missing ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – Fixing the 2020 New Zealand House Price Bubble" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/11/23/keith-rankin-analysis-fixing-the-2020-new-zealand-house-price-bubble/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – Fixing the 2020 New Zealand House Price Bubble">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. The Linear Political Spectrum In both New Zealand and United States, we have just seen the political success of the one-dimensional political centre; perhaps a nudge to the left of centre. By one-dimensional (or ‘linear’), we mean the traditional left-right political spectrum, whereby the ‘right’ means private capitalism aligned with institutional ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – The New ‘Centre-Left’ Establishment" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/11/12/keith-rankin-analysis-the-new-centre-left-establishment/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – The New ‘Centre-Left’ Establishment">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. I recently encountered the concept “pay it forward”, with reference to a debt. While it was in a personal context that I came across this concept, on reflection I am wondering why – as a follower of news media – I have never heard the concept in any current affairs discussion. ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – Public Debt: Pay it Back or Pay it Forward?" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/10/16/keith-rankin-analysis-public-debt-pay-it-back-or-pay-it-forward/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – Public Debt: Pay it Back or Pay it Forward?">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. The most recent TVNZ Colmar Brunton poll felt about right: Labour/Green on 54% and National/Act on 38% of decided voters. But I sense that Labour is losing momentum. What needs to happen to make Judith Collins the Prime Minister in October? National/Act need just five percentage points more, and Green to ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – The 2020 New Zealand Election is Not a Foregone Conclusion" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/09/25/keith-rankin-analysis-the-2020-new-zealand-election-is-not-a-foregone-conclusion/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – The 2020 New Zealand Election is Not a Foregone Conclusion">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Definition ‘Balance sheet recession’ is an innocuous name for a very big economic event. It represents a particular kind of contraction of a country’s economy – or of the global economy – in which one of the most important laws of ‘financial economics’ is practically disabled; that is the economic law ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – Balance Sheet Recessions, and the Government Debt Fix" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/09/18/keith-rankin-analysis-balance-sheet-recessions-and-the-government-debt-fix/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – Balance Sheet Recessions, and the Government Debt Fix">Read more</a>
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards. Will the rich get richer under Labour’s latest tax policy? Based on the analysis in reaction to yesterday’s announcement, the answer would seem to be yes. The consensus from commentators is that inequality and severe economic problems will remain unchanged or even be made worse by Labour’s new policy. Although ... <a title="Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Labour gives up on tax transformation" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/09/10/bryce-edwards-political-roundup-labour-gives-up-on-tax-transformation/" aria-label="Read more about Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Labour gives up on tax transformation">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Before the 1950s My MA thesis was about labour supply in New Zealand and Australia during the 1920s and 1930s, with particular reference to the 1930s’ ‘Great Depression’. The central finding related to the workings of whanau as an economic unit, and how the loss of income to the ‘family breadwinner’ – ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – The Added-Worker Effect, in Economic Hard Times" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/09/10/keith-rankin-analysis-the-added-worker-effect-in-economic-hard-times/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – The Added-Worker Effect, in Economic Hard Times">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. In practice, democratic political reforms are usually incremental, though typically seen as part of a process leading to wider and more embedded improvement. Reforms are ‘evolutionary’ – indeed, in a technical sense – in that they improve the ‘fitness’ of democratic society. Unlike biological evolution, which is a fully blind process, ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – Extending Democracy; a Path-Dependent Process" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/09/02/keith-rankin-analysis-extending-democracy-a-path-dependent-process/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – Extending Democracy; a Path-Dependent Process">Read more</a>
Analysis by Dr Bryce Edwards Inequality and poverty look to be the forgotten issues of the election campaign, with not much more than lip-service being paid to them on the campaign trail. Yet decisions are currently being made that appear to be fuelling a greater gap between rich and poor. Newsroom’s Bernard Hickey has tweeted ... <a title="Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Politicians making inequality worse" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/08/27/bryce-edwards-political-roundup-politicians-making-inequality-worse/" aria-label="Read more about Bryce Edwards’ Political Roundup: Politicians making inequality worse">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Macroeconomic Policy Macroeconomic policy is largely the art or science of the governance of economic imbalance. Some of the words that indicate imbalance are ‘recession’, ‘inflation’, ‘deflation’ and ‘contraction’. Another word, ‘stagflation’, represents a mix of recession and inflation. (Note that ‘inflation’ here indicates an unsustainable and ongoing process of price ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – The Two Policy Silos: Reserve Bank and Treasury" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/08/27/keith-rankin-analysis-the-two-policy-silos-reserve-bank-and-treasury/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – The Two Policy Silos: Reserve Bank and Treasury">Read more</a>
Analysis by Keith Rankin. Representative Democracy On 26 June, I attended a zoom webinar called ‘Modern politics – 20thC to MMP’, run by Auckland Libraries and Ancestry.com. The speakers were politics’ academics Grant Duncan and Toby Boraman, from Massey University. Duncan is a well-known political scientist, and Boraman is a specialist in Labour History. (An ... <a title="Keith Rankin Analysis – Universal Basic Income: Left, Right, and Centre" class="read-more" href="https://eveningreport.nz/2020/07/16/keith-rankin-analysis-universal-basic-income-left-right-and-centre/" aria-label="Read more about Keith Rankin Analysis – Universal Basic Income: Left, Right, and Centre">Read more</a>