Mike Moore on Australia vs NZ
Former Labour Prime Minister, and WTO Director-General, Mike Moore, talks about why so many Kiwis are moving to Australia. Some of his key points:
* 100 Kiwis a day leaving to Australia
* In OECD ratings Australia has gone from 17th to 7th and NZ from 20th to 22nd
* Per capita income is one third higher in Australia
* Tax is lower at every income level but the top one
* Wages are rising in Australia, after tax, at twice the rate of New Zealand
* Apologists say, with some truth, that Australia is enjoying a mineral boom, but service sector job growth is expanding at four times the jobs in mining, and the drought has shaved 1 per cent off growth, pushing up commodity prices to New Zealand’s benefit
* Australia has concluded a preferential trade deal with the US; New Zealand has not yet begun. Australia is in full negotiations with a trade deal with Japan; New Zealand has not even done a formal study
Moore also explicitly criticises National, as well as his implicit criticism of the Government.
He ends by saying we need to study why one in four NZers now live overseas, compared to one in 20 Australians.
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:34 am
Labour may be spending on infrastructure, but the rate is glacial compared to our needs.
This government is opposed to borrowing to fund infrastructure. If it did, we could have it sooner and AT LESS COST. It makes sense for this expendidture to be funded by Debt and paid for over the life of that infrastructure.
It’s like an individual trying to save up for a house. He won’t be able to save enough to buy a house outright because the house gets more expensive. Its the same with infrastructure such as roading.
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:45 am
The minerals boom is way way overstated. Peter Costello was on Agenda yesterday saying that the rual sector has suffered a 20% REDUCTION in production caused by the lengthy drought. Furthermore the minerals boom has been uderpinned by changes in employment legislation. What the difference is that Peter Costello has steadily reduced taxes EVERY YEAR since 2002 and next year as well. This has encouraged a productivity surge in the workforce. This is something Cullen with his piggy bank mentality does not understand. Quite simply Australia has had better economic management than NZ and they are doing better.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:26 pm
It makes sense even on the most basic level. “Work harder, work smarter – we pay you more”. As opposed to the NZ Labour approach: “Work harder, we take your WWF benefit away”.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:27 pm
If he wants to know why 1/4 of us live somewhere else two words: Clark Cullen.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:32 pm
Because NZ is a small country so therefore, obviously, has fewer opportunities in certain fields than a larger one?
Oh sorry that’s probably just to simple an explanation.
Out of interest did New Zealanders only start moving abroad after labour was elected?
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:34 pm
1 in 4 kiwis live overseas.
1 in 20 Aussies live overseas.
1 in 1 billion earthlings live off-planet.
Scale is the main reason for the difference. There may be additional reasons, but you’re not going to see them if you use the wrong statistic. How many Australians live outside their home state?
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:43 pm
I’m not surprised by the data here David, you know i’m planning a move to Australia. As a recent grad. there are just many more jobs in Australia!
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:43 pm
“Out of interest did New Zealanders only start moving abroad after labour was elected?”
No, but ironically, had they stayed Labour might not have been elected.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:44 pm
“Because NZ is a small country so therefore, obviously, has fewer opportunities in certain fields than a larger one?
Oh sorry that’s probably just to simple an explanation.”
That might help explain Ireland, Singapore, and Finland’s dismal failure.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:44 pm
Cullens socialist utopia has failed, he is out of ideas and out of time.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:46 pm
Mr Moore also comments
“No new coalition deal has ever cut expenditure or promoted stern, forward-looking economic strategies.
Serious and intelligent decisions on government expenditure and, most important, productivity through more effective competition”
Now where have we heard that kind of rhetoric before?
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:46 pm
The Australian Bureau of Statistics has a different attitude to migration:
http://tinyurl.com/22z237
“In 1999–2003 there were around three Australian-born people aged 15 years and over living in another OECD country for every 100 Australian-born people in that age group living in Australia.”
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:49 pm
Ireland Hot fudge, a land that no-one ever emigrates from?
I think that is easily the worst example you could have come up with, a country whose population today is lower than it was a century ago due to emigration.
May 22nd, 2007 at 12:56 pm
I wish more jocks would stay at home myself.
They tend to go to other peoples countries with their messed up socialist ideas that don’t seem to be working out to well there.
And pete:
“1 in 1 billion earthlings live off-planet.”
This is disputable. The Greens have a larger membership than that.
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:11 pm
Well you would expect the best and brightest in any nation to have the skills and desire to see the world, only natural really.
Which is perhaps why Murray is still here!
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:24 pm
sonic creature – you must have such a understanding employer ? I think it would be a good idea to cut back on your uranium intake before the highly fissionable centrifuge spins out of control .
Mike Moore is the opposite to the corrupt Klark despot .
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:40 pm
The problem is the Cullen/ Clark governments low expectations for New Zealand, they have given up on growth.
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:44 pm
The problem is the Cullen/ Clark governments low expectations for New Zealand, they have given up on growth.
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:46 pm
“they have given up on growth.”
Prison numbers hit all time high ( 8000 ) – talk about positive growth eh ?
May 22nd, 2007 at 1:58 pm
“Wages are rising in Australia, after tax, at twice the rate of New Zealand”
yes, unions have dominated wage barging in Australia for all but 2 of the last 20 years, where as us suckers in the New Zealand are left to bargain individually with employers. No surprises here.
“* In OECD ratings Australia has gone from 17th to 7th and NZ from 20th to 22nd”
not surprising seeing as billions of dollars earned by foreign companies operating in New Zelealand go flying off overseas every year. The neo-liberals like roger douglas and ruth richardson got rid of our capital trading controls. As a result the current account deficit for the year ended June 2006 was $15.2 billion, which was $3.1 billion worse than a year before. Most of this increase was due to a $1.9 billion increase in the investment income deficit, due to incomes earned by foreigners on their New Zealand investments and interest payments on our foreign debt. How we can be expected to grow while the multinationals continue to suck us dry?
We certainly don’t need more free-market reforms. The world Bank says that we’re the 2nd most business friendly country on the planet
http://www.doingbusiness.org/ExploreEconomies/?economyid=140
and the heritage foundation’s index of economic freedom says that New Zealand is the 5th most economically free country in the world.
http://www.heritage.org/research/features/index/country.cfm?ID=NewZealand
No, if we moved any more right we would be a libertarian Utopia. We need to put unions back in the employment relationship so workers see some decent wage increases and we need to stop are country being drained by overseas investors – we need to take control of our economic destiny again.
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:04 pm
More one eyed preaching from PJ, good little indoctrinated disciple of the socialist faith that he is. Yawn…..
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:25 pm
yes, like you I take a partisan position RB. However, I do supply empirical evidence to support my arguments, something that I’ve never seen anyone accuse you of doing.
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:25 pm
It’s beautiful. See, when the actual productive part of the economy is relocating overseas to become cost competitive – what do the Labour party supporters suggest? Higher wages.
My question is: Where do you think those wages will come from?
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:26 pm
PJ, that would explain the economic sucess of the UK pre Thatcher.
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:48 pm
I’m glad you qualified your evidence as “empirical” PJ. Your hypothesis is in fact so self serving and convoluted and distorted in its attempts to support your conclusions that to argue against it is like grappling with a column of smoke.
On a timetable based on reality rather than delusion, any credit for NZ being rated highly as a place to do business belongs to Richardson and Douglas, the very people you denigrate. Nothing your great and good socialist government, elected in late 1999 has done will have had time to have much effect on any economic date relating to the early 2000′s.
In fact you can see the beginning of Labour’s influence coming in to the 2006 data, with changes in key areas like employing workers (down 2)and dealing with licenses, (down 16), and a drop in overall position from 1 to 2. A few more years and you hopeless leftist bastards will be as successful on this measure as you have been on the OECD ladder.
In one breath you’re touting our economic freedom as the reasons for our success, and in the next, demanding a legislative assault on those freedoms. Like I said, one might as well argue with a column of smoke. The kind of smoke that rises from wet green wood.
May 22nd, 2007 at 2:52 pm
Yes, kiwis have always gone overseas. Thing is, they used to come back. That is happening much less frequently now. Why? Because they don’t like what they see when they look at NZ in comparison to what they have in other countries. A nice environment still exists, the low crime rate and social harmony doesn’t.
The opportunities for well paid jobs also don’t exist. That isn’t a size issue, work is less tied to location than it ever has been. It is more related to the way both the government and society treats those who do well.
It isn’t entirely a Labour problem, it is an ongoing issue with NZ society that we are changing from a can-do society into one where everything is someone else’s fault, and anyone who does well must have somehow stolen it from someone else. Hard work to get ahead is no longer a kiwi core value.
To my mind this problem with NZ society is what leads us to elect Labour govts – the Labour govt is the symptom not the cause. Of course, it is also a reinforcing cycle – the Labour govt in turn encourages the exact things that are causing the problem in the first place.
Here’s hoping that John Key will manage to put in place a cycle running in the other direction. Pretty big ask though.
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:03 pm
“See, when the actual productive part of the economy is relocating overseas to become cost competitive – what do the Labour party supporters suggest? Higher wages.”
We can’t compete with these countries on wages – their (i.e. thailand) workforce is paid $10 a day afterall. no, we have to go for high-end, value-added niche products. This takes higher capital investment, and it takes higher workforce skills. Both of these things are encouraged by negotiating higher wages.
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:08 pm
No, creating these things encourages higher wages. You can’t have the wages before the productivity – you just drive companies out of the country.
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:10 pm
Rats flee the sinking ship, I’m manning the pumps.
Why are you here chronic?
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:32 pm
Am I the only person that gets the delicious irony in a guy called Murray attacking people for having Scottish origins?
It would be great Murray if, one day, you made a substantial point rather than just throwing around personal attacks.
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:37 pm
RB
“In one breath you’re touting our economic freedom as the reasons for our success, and in the next, demanding a legislative assault on those freedoms.”
It’s hard to see how you got that impression RB. No, in fact i was saying that despite us having carried out every free-market reform the IMF, World Bank and the Business round table have told us to do, yet we have continued to slip further down the OECD ladder. The fact is that most of the countries on the OECD ladder have far more regulated economies than we do, and they continue to grow faster than us. Food for thought no?
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:39 pm
That should have been:
The fact is that most of the countries above us on the OECD ladder …
May 22nd, 2007 at 3:40 pm
This takes higher capital investment, and it takes higher workforce skills. Both of these things are encouraged by negotiating higher wages.
That is putting the cart before the horse. You do not pay somebody more if they are not earning the company more – what they are paid has to come from somewhere. A person has to earn their wage, effectively. I had a long argument with my employer over this, because he wanted to give me an increase and I’d felt that I’d not done enough over the last year to justify a raise.
Now if you were to take that “money” and encourage study, rather than just raising wages or through on-job training then maybe yes. But you can’t give somebody money and expect them to become a better employee. A job is a partnership, isn’t it?
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:06 pm
SL:
Higher wages = Higher price of Labour relative to Capital = Higher Levels of Capital Investment = Higher Labour Productivity = More Skill Training (if workers are more productive and expensive employers see it more worth while to spend money training them) = lower labour turnover = less waiting of human capital through labour churn and higher staff moral higher work place morale = higher productivity = higher wages.
You see, centralised wage barraging starts a virtuous cycle characterised by economy with higher wages, higher work-place skill levels, higher productivity and happier workers.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:15 pm
Come of it Phillip John, if that was even a litle bit true the Nordic countries would all be prosperous!
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:25 pm
I have just arrived back in Aus after a 3 day trip home to Auckland.
I felt an overwhelming sense of decline, and I felt that that decline may soon reach it’s tipping point. Also an overwhelming sense of negativity, with even Labour voters FINALLY realising that the god awful left wing policies of Clark and Cullen have not worked. I felt a sense of hopelessness, “Who can turn around this mess”? I felt a need for a bold leader, with a vision and an achievable plan to turn the vision into reality. I felt a desperate hope that John Key can provide that much needed leadership, vision and action. I know-all that in just 3 days
Having said all that, I also felt that Auckland is an incredibly undersold city in the “best place to live” stakes. During my recent agonising over whether to come home to live, I have compared Aucklands quality of life and accessible beauty to Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne. Auckland wins hands down and is still the best place to raise children. Whilst it is economic madness for our family to return, the way my children turn out is more important than accumulating the maximum amount of capital I can.
NZ is a “sea change” destination and god knows there are thousands of people looking for that, all around the world. And the fashion, food and culture is world class (far better than alot of the stuff in Australia)
We need leadership at a local and national level, with a passion for what NZ is now and is capable of achieving, with the ability to articulate it and the boldness to make it happen. And, the whole place needs re-branding, especially Auckland, not just for the international market, but to win back the hearts and minds of Kiwis.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:27 pm
I always think that geography is important. Due to our isolation, to have high end niche production in this country you need a creative open minded environment where personal hard work and risk are well rewarded. Years of Clark and Cullen have robbed us of these. Their nanny knows best approach to government has changed our landscape. With what we have in NZ we should be the Jewel of the Pacific. If Labour steal the next election or enough idiots vote them in my business of 17 years will be gone by lunchtime.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:29 pm
I have just arrived back in Aus after a 3 day trip home to Auckland.
I felt an overwhelming sense of decline, and I felt that that decline may soon reach it’s tipping point. Also an overwhelming sense of negativity, with even Labour voters FINALLY realising that the god awful left wing policies of Clark and Cullen have not worked. I felt a sense of hopelessness, “Who can turn around this mess”? I felt a need for a bold leader, with a vision and an achievable plan to turn the vision into reality. I felt a desperate hope that John Key can provide that much needed leadership, vision and action. I know-all that in just 3 days
Having said all that, I also felt that Auckland is an incredibly undersold city in the “best place to live” stakes. During my recent agonising over whether to come home to live, I have compared Aucklands quality of life and accessible beauty to Sydney, Brisbane and Melbourne. Auckland wins hands down and is still the best place to raise children. Whilst it is economic madness for our family to return, the way my children turn out is more important than accumulating the maximum amount of capital I can.
NZ is a “sea change” destination and god knows there are thousands of people looking for that, all around the world. And the fashion, food and culture is world class (far better than alot of the stuff in Australia)
We need leadership at a local and national level, with a passion for what NZ is now and is capable of achieving, with the ability to articulate it and the boldness to make it happen. And, the whole place needs re-branding, especially Auckland, not just for the international market, but to win back the hearts and minds of Kiwis.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:29 pm
Philip. Couldn’t you turn that around just as easily? Seems that way from my perspective at least where you don’t get paid more until you’re worth more.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:42 pm
If we put D4J and Sonic on a boat, and pushed them out to the Tasman Sea, do you think they’d end up in NZ or Australia? Or would they both claw eat other’s eyes out and drown?
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:43 pm
“Food for thought no?”
Perhaps, if we were talking about a REAL economy.
A pretend economy kept afloat by inflated house prices and retail based churning as a by product of socialist ideologues and their redistributive policies tho is another case.
Over paid non-productive public servants buying imported high end cane lounge suites (for example) or welfare recipients spending up large at the Warehouse is not really an “economy”.
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:47 pm
Plunk: let’s add Redbaiter to that boat…
May 22nd, 2007 at 4:55 pm
“Seems that way from my perspective at least where you don’t get paid more until you’re worth more.”
But can’t you see that the cycle i describe above creates higher value jobs, and therefore higher value workers?
For example, your wage/salary depends as much on the productivity of the job you are work. That is, the capital intensity of the industry in which you work).
So if you have an economy that is characterised by high value (highly capitalised) jobs, people are going to generally be paid more than people who work in an economy which is characterised by low capital intensity/productivity. The question is, how do you create that kind of economy? I believe the majority of OECD countries, which have had centralised wage bargaining (everyone except NZ, the US and Korea), for the last 20 years, provide us with the answer to this problem.
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Philip, to a degree but I’d have to research the topic more before saying yes, it makes sense. All a learning process. Without that research though it seems as if you’re not creating a higher value job, you’re just paying somebody more for doing exactly the same thing they were doing yesterday.
Over time – perhaps, because an employee becomes worth more the longer they are employed by a given company simply because of residual knowledge they gain about the business. That would justify a higher wage to keep them there, but without that? Simply increasing wages doesn’t seem as if it would create that.
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:18 pm
SL:
If you want some research that supports the theory I put foward, I know of a few papers that you can google:
Parham, D. and Roberts, P. (2004) “Productivity Growth and its sources: How do NZ and Australia Compare?’”
Black, M., Guy. M., and McLellan, N. (2003) Productivity in New Zealand 1998 to 2002, New Zealand Treasury Working Paper.
Diewert, E., and Lawrence, D. (1999) Measuring New Zealand’s Productivity, New Zeeland Treasury Working Paper.
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:23 pm
“Why are you here chronic?”
Like the singing cricket, he’s enjoying the lifestyle provided to him by the productive sector of NZ. (at the same time as he daily sneers at them on this forum)
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:36 pm
Philip, thank you for those references. At the risk of sounding lazy – do you have titles for any references that does not support the theory you put forward? (Reading both sides == good)
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:41 pm
Like KarenB I returned to NZ for a visit recently to have the reasons for my departure dramatically confirmed. It is amazing how insular, smug and anti American many NZers are. People in America ask me why would I leave such a beautiful country and come to the US. I say that looking at a beautiful mountain range won’t compensate for a soaring violent crime rate that shows no sign of abating because of the wooly headed liberalism that infects government agencies from top to bottom. Nice seafood restaurants don’t improve the plight of small businesses that the current government seems manifestly unable to understand and adequately foster. Nice empty beaches don’t compensate for high schools where drug use is rampant and climbing whereas where I live in the US the benefits of steadily declining crime rates and lowered teen drug use rates are immediately evident.
The best way I describe the entrenched thinking in NZ vs the US is like this: I say in NZ the tall poppy syndrome reigns supreme – if you make a lot of money there is a chorus of sneering sonic and phillipjohn types who mutter darkly and jealously that somehow you ripped off the poor. If you make a mistake in business your peers never let you forget and forever snigger and mock. In America it is the exact 180 opposite to this mindset. If you are successful, people admire you and look up to you and want to know the secret to your success and if you fall over universally they say “get up and give it another go – many of our most successful people have failed but learned from their mistake and went on to success”. This is empowering, refreshing and envigorating and this mindset helps explain the huge GDP growth that America continues to enjoy. A similar attitude prevails in Australia.
NZ once was as wealthy as Switzerland so diminutive size and distance is not an excuse. Mike Moore sums up the economic distance magnificently. Australia plays on the A team with the US and pays the positive price. We are playing on the B team with the French now – another country stifled by the dead hand of socialism and falling down the OECD rankings like NZ. We used to cling to the “its a great place to raise kids” mantra. Even that advantage is slowly being leeched away by poorer education standards (the NCEA debacle), rising crime and dwindling health standards.
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:47 pm
“At the risk of sounding lazy – do you have titles for any references that does not support the theory you put forward?”
ha, SL, seriously, just Google “Business Roundtable productivity” – they will claim (despite NZ being one of the most deregulated economies in the world) that the reason we have been slipping back in the OECD ranking is that we aren’t deregulated enough. Go figure.
May 22nd, 2007 at 5:58 pm
Nice rhetoric KiwiInAmerica, now to discuss the facts that you present … um, well actually, there aren’t any. Oh well, maybe next time.
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:37 pm
“Nice rhetoric KiwiInAmerica, now to discuss the facts that you present … um, well actually, there aren’t any. Oh well, maybe next time.”
PhilipJohn, perception IS reality. Do you think that the 700 leaving NZ a week studied OECD reports and googled NZ economic trends and ran spreadsheets on their computers at home before they packed and left?
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:45 pm
would it not be nice if the socialists amongst us ie PJ would open their blinkered eyes just a smidgen??
the truth probably hurts just a tad too much though.
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:55 pm
Um phillipjohn – facts FYI.
If you refer to the US Department of Justice website you will see that violent crimes across the entire US (and remember some cities and states have done significantly better than the average) has plummeted from 51.2 p/1000 population in 1995 to 21 p/1000 in 2005. The statistics for NZ taken from Statistics NZ website: Violent crime in 1996: 39.7 p/1000 rising to 45.5 p/1000 in 2006. NZ, on average, now has more than twice the level of violent crime than the US.
On to adolescent drug use: the Christchurch Health and Development Study (a world famous longitudinal study of 1200 kids born in 1977) showed lifetime cannabis use of 18 year olds in NZ at 50% in 2000. The University of Auckland Alcohol and Public Health Unit “Drug Use in New Zealand” survey of 5,500 people showed lifetime use of cannabis by 15 – 20 year olds climbing from 42 to 50% between 1990 and 1998
The University of Michigan “Monitoring the Future” survey conducted every year since 1975 on 50,000 teens in the US saw High School seniors (aged 18) lifetime use of cannabis drop from 50% in 2000 to 42% in 2006 – the exact opposite direction of NZ.
OECD rankings 1990 to 2005: New Zealand drops from 20th to 22nd, the US consistently ranks 2nd and Australia climbed from 17th to 7th.
The facts speak for themselves. They merely back the perception I alluded to.
May 22nd, 2007 at 6:58 pm
phillipjohn,
I’m beginning to seriously doubt your post grad status.
When I asked for a copy of your “thesis” you told me ‘wait a couple of months’ (which I have).
You told me that your thesis was being “marked”.!!!? wtf.
I thought that theses were “accepted” or returned for further thought.
The question of “with honours” was more as appreciation of your overall contribution to the faculty and the thesis was but a part.
The main give-away and the reason for my doubt was your reference to your use of Google.
Personaly I love Google because it’s quick and shows the good with the bad and awfull.
Your faculty will not like Google because in includes enough garbage to dilute their favoured and much cherished ‘reccomended reading lists’ (what’s the use of a bibliography if one cannot have ones name listed a few times)
If, but then I doubt. If you had a faculty tutor who wished to shape your mind they cannot let you delve too deep into the chaos of Google until you have shown some scholastic discipline.
You have a long way to go..
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:11 pm
KIA:
Got any stats for the US’s ratio of prisoners to population? From memory its about five or six times that of New Zealand’s.
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:15 pm
DB:
Those web-available NEW ZEALAND TREASURY PAPERS that i cited were for SL’s convenience. I’m hardly going to say “go to the cambridge journal of ecoomics and read this article”. Come on, be reasonable.
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:22 pm
Phillip John – where is your THESIS?
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:37 pm
yes thats right KIA, America is far less violent that NZ.
BTW when that nice man sells you the Brooklyn Bridge do be sure to get a receit.
(Of course you will note that KIA is careful not to define “violent crime”)
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:37 pm
OK so while we are lauding Aussie as some blessed land, can we have their powerful trade unions and compulsory super as well?
Kiwi’s have been moving across the Tasman for decades; it’s bigger, wealthier and warmer. Sydney has nice weather, a nice harbour….and not too many Australian’s. Perfect!
The big difference is that the Aussies have access to bucket-loads of capital at lower rates than we pay. Two years ago I worked commissioning a large greenfield sawmill south of Wagga for some months. A$250m plus was buying them a brand-new mill, state-of-the-art that will be the one of the two largest in the world. Moreover they invested in some fantastic “shape sawing” technology that allows them to cut otherwise low value bent and twisted logs into high value structural timber. On top of that they also installed leading edge safety technology that allows operators to rapidly stop and isolated a whole line in a matter of seconds in order to correct misfeeds and jams etc.
None of this stuff was cheap, but the end result is fantastic. Just dozen or so operators per shift can process a wall of wood. Imagine logs up to 650mm in diameter, 5m long… being cut at a rate of 20/min. That is one 5m log per 3 seconds!!!! In order to feed this mill these guys are buying logs from all over Vic and NSW….and wait for it…NZ!! So we sell them our low grade logs at a pittance and they make the profit!!
This is the history of NZ over and over. For far too long we have been price takers…not price makers. The only real exception has been our co-operatively structured dairy industry that has resisted forces intent on breaking it up for decades. The single biggest factor holding us back is LOW wages. If our businesses had to pay higher wages they would be forced to invest in the R&D, plant and marketing that would be necessary to support them. In order to make that possible NZ businesses need access to capital at competitive rates, in order to do that we need to lower interest rates, reduce our current account deficit and take back ownership of our economy. Far too much on the profit from all the very long hours NZ’ers work is siphoned off back to Australian or American head offices…with nothing coming back the other way. That is the real path to regaining some parity with Australia….we cannot “tax cut” our way there.
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:46 pm
“yes thats right KIA, America is far less violent that NZ.”
Dickhead.. take away the stats that apply to black on black crime in the welfare ghettos that only exist because of people like you Sonic, and NZ has a much greater violent crime rate. A crime rate that have been steadily accelerating since socialism became the ascendant religion here.
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:46 pm
“yes thats right KIA, America is far less violent that NZ.”
Dickhead.. take away the stats that apply to black on black crime in the welfare ghettos that only exist because of people like you Sonic, and NZ has a much greater violent crime rate. A crime rate that has been steadily accelerating since socialism became the ascendant religion here.
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:53 pm
“Phillip John – where is your THESIS?”
Well, the answer to that lies in this very site – and judging by other’s regular attendance here I’m not the only one who suffers from chronic kiwiblog procrastinitus
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:56 pm
“Dickhead.. take away the stats that apply to black on black crime”
oh jesus, every time I think it’s gone this irritating freaking demented barking noise comes back to my computer! When will it stop?
May 22nd, 2007 at 7:57 pm
A new report on crime trends shows the continuation of a decline in the crime rate from the early 1990s, Statistics New Zealand said today. The overall crime rate in 2005 has declined to 994 offences per 10,000 population, from a peak in 1992 of 1,322 per 10,000 population. These figures are based on offences recorded by the New Zealand Police.
http://www.stats.govt.nz/products-and-services/media-releases/social-conditions/crime-in-new-zealand-1996-2005-mr.htm
Five seconds googling.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:10 pm
Just ignore it Phillip John, when someone starts blaming you personally for the poverty and depravation of black people in the USA you just have to show some pity.
It’s like the crazy guy on Lambton Quay who shouts at passers by, just avert your eyes, pretend it is not happening, and thank god you can walk away.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:14 pm
Five seconds or longer, it was wasted..
http://www.safe-nz.org.nz/statistics.htm
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:19 pm
“Just ignore it Phillip John”
Yep, as always, the only response socialist/ communists have to criticism is to try and lock the critics out of the debate. Worked for a few decades fuckwits, but it isn’t working today. Fact is, you and your kind ARE responsible for welfare ghettos, in the US, in New Zealand, and all over the globe.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:21 pm
Well, we’ll see how the American economy is fearing after a few months of this:
“NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Gasoline prices have soared to levels never seen before as even the inflation-adjusted price for a gallon of unleaded topped the 1981 record spike in price that had stood for 26 years.”
http://money.cnn.com/2007/05/21/news/economy/record_gas_monday/index.htm?postversion=2007052112
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:25 pm
There is that annoying whine again, just random white noise cluttering up the comments.
Sometimes your imagination seems to pick up a pattern, perhaps there is some intelligent signal there.
but then you realise that, sadly, it is just more static.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:30 pm
The dirty low life communists are working late tonight eh – I say foe pah to you disillisioned shrill puppets , go exercise your tabi’yeh crap in lalaland where you filth belong !
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:34 pm
“Gasoline prices have soared to levels never seen before as even the inflation-adjusted price for a gallon of unleaded topped the 1981 record spike in price that had stood for 26 years.”
Part of the reason leftists are so ignorant is that they believe totally discredited news sources like CNN, who evern entered into news suppression pacts with Saddam hussein.
http://newsbusters.org/node/12916
..and if you had any real idea of economics PJ, you’d know btter than to repeat clapped out left wing scaremongering on the price of petrol. Who cares? Its cheap horsepower even at double the price.
The real cause of high petrol prices in NZ are high petrol taxes. What a laff that you commies say you care for the poor, when there you are ripping them off wholesale on a commodity they need more than most.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:37 pm
Hilarious.
Your own source makes a fool of you:
http://www.safe-nz.org.nz/statsgraph.htm
Note carefully how the blue line for “violent offences” (not defined) makes an dramatic “quantum jump” in the period 1983-84 and continues to rise all through the “rogernomics” era until around 1998 when they start to fall again. Not plotted on the same graph is the same sudden jump in youth suicides that occurred in the same 1983-83 timeframe.
This astonishing period was triggered by the disastrous right wing experiment that saw the dismantling of traditional apprenticeship and other “youth job market entry” systems, along with a raft of other major socio-economic dislocations the rogernomic/richardson crew foisted on this country. And as the graph shows, as long as they held political ascendancy, the blue line kept on rising.
On the other hand the Statistics NZ page I linked to is a report dated Dec 2006, just a few months old, and covers much of the period those nasty socialists have been in power. It concludes that in that period crime rates have been decreasing. I’ll leave it to others to judge the relative worth of each source.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:37 pm
I see the static level has now reached the point where all real debate is drowned out by white noise.
I shall bid you all goodnight.
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:41 pm
PJ
Maybe just maybe, putting more prisoners (criminals) away for longer contributes to a lower crime rate
DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
May 22nd, 2007 at 8:53 pm
No doubt emmess. In fact I reckon that if you threw everyone who ever committed an offence in jail for life you could probably get the crime down to record lows. On the other hand would you want to live in such a society? Where prisons are run privately, and Wackenhut’s stocks improve with every person thrown in jail?
maybe you should check out the crime rate and imprisonment rates for the nordic social democracies – they put the free-market casino economies of NZ and USA to shame.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:05 pm
Phillip John, socialist bore that he is, bleats on about “the free-market casino economies of NZ and USA”. And he fails to acknowledge that New Zealand is becoming more like a socialist backwater as the days go by. Here’s $5 Phillip John – now buy yourself a fucking clue – and a barrel of peak oil laughs to boot.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:08 pm
The dirty low life communists are working late tonight eh – I say foe pah to you disillisioned shrill puppets , go exercise your tabi’yeh crap in lalaland where you filth belong !
What is it with Dad4Justice and reverse-brain-farts? At least we now have positive evidence that breathing through your anal passages is bad for your health.
I can see the Tui billboard:
Nice Daddy? Yeah right!
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Why don’t you just post as yourself RB?
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:16 pm
“This astonishing period was triggered by the disastrous right wing experiment”
Hahhaha.. yeah sure it was, the very instant that government was elected, criminals started offending at greater levels. What bullshit. Surely you aren’t that stupid??? Even if your fantasies were true, it would take some time for the policies to take effect.
The problem dickheads is culture, and its the culture promoted by leftists and pseudo-liberals like you lot that is the root cause of the crime problem and almost very other problem this country currently faces.
Just read what other people are writing here you narcissistic fuckwits. Deal with reality for once in your miserable little lives.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:21 pm
“maybe you should check out the crime rate and imprisonment rates for the nordic social democracies”
I have. They’re (the crime figures) as bad as NZ, and if you weren’t such an indoctrinated fool, you’d know that too.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:24 pm
Why don’t you just post as yourself RB?
Who said I was Redbaiter you illiterate moron?! Typical damn leftists with their presumptive smearjobs… Phillip John on a platter.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:26 pm
“Why don’t you just post as yourself RB?”
Only a conscienceless commie like you PJ, totally devoid of self respect, responsibility and integrity would make that kind of false allegation or that kind of smear without a skerrick of evidence to support it.
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:34 pm
i leaving at the end of the month for the lucky country dude, did yous say thays have good social welfare benefit as well, like can’t us ratbag class just renounce NZ citizenship and be australian,
May 22nd, 2007 at 9:48 pm
Even if your fantasies were true, it would take some time for the policies to take effect.
Sorry but you cannot argue with the blue line in the data you yourself have referenced. What could have possibly caused the “violent crime” rate to almost triple over a two year time frame between 1984 -1986?
And why did the youth suicide rate do something similar?
http://www.nzma.org.nz/journal/116-1175/460/
Note the extraordinary parallel rise in male youth suicide rate in the period 1986-92.
Even if your fantasies were true, it would take some time for the policies to take effect.
Yes.. a year or two it would seem.
Now I have been able to show that during NZ’s most significant swing to the political right, the violence crime rate and youth suicide rate both dramatically increased.
Your response has been the usual hypocritical stream of futile froth. Goodnight.
May 22nd, 2007 at 10:10 pm
Rag, maybe you could explain the relationship between Rogernomics and increases in the frequency of rape. What is that exactly?? Hunger turns men into rapists? FFS!!! Is that really your thesis??
You sad fuckwit, there have been times and there are today places where poverty is much much worse than it has ever been today in NZ, When crime has not been and is not anywhere the problem it is here today. Not anywhere near. Even the poverty stricken Bedouin in the most barren of deserts have more morality than your average socialist criminal. Even in the great depression, crime was relatively rare.
It is the idea that we are collectively responsible for crime, the idea promoted by socialists, the very idea at the root of your arguments here tonight rag, that is the real reason for the massive increase in offending.
..and this is a thesis that is supported by similar increases in countries not affected at all by Rogernomics, and any claimed fall in living standards, such as oil rich Nordic countries where living standards undoubtedly improved. Yet still, as collectivists gained social ascendancy, these countries suffered massive increases in offending. Your attempt to blame Rogernomics for crime increases is so full of logic holes its something only a brain damaged doctrinal leftist would ever try.
The gradual social acceptance of collectivism, this cultural misapprehension, this calamitous doctrine, directly parallels the disintegration of NZ society, and especially the rise in crime.
..and until people turn away from your sad sick socially destructive collectivist religion rag, and return to believing in the concept of individualism and personal responsibility for one’s own action in every sphere of life, crime and all other such negative social indicators will continue to accelerate.
May 22nd, 2007 at 10:51 pm
Ok lets see if we can work out a pattern here
1999-2005 Clark Labour Government soft on crime – crime rate rises
1990-99 Bolger/Shipley National Government soft on crime – crime rate rises
1984 – 90 Lange/Palmer/Moore Labour Government soft on crime – crime rate rises
1975 – 84 Muldoon National Government soft on crime – crime rate rises
1972 – 75 Kirk/Rowling Labour Government soft on crime – crime rate rises
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:13 pm
emmess: you are a moron if you can’t see that Clark’s government has been much tougher on crime than any of those other governments. But it hasn’t solved crime rates, indeed. Burgeoning prison populations (a direct consequence of longer sentences, a much vaunted ‘solution’ to violent crime) have created a haven for the training and hardening of criminals, an environment where networks of criminal associates are forged, an environment where inmates learn to brutalise other human beings to avoid their own brutalisation. These environmental characteristics are inherent in prisons, and are only partially mitigated by significant expenditure on facilities and staffing- a huge ineffeciency, because indeed prisons do nothing to solve the root of the problem: I challenge someone to present some convincing research suggesting that the idea of prison acts as a deterrent for the criminally inclined segments of society. Some may suggest that privatisation of corrections would produce efficiencies in the sector, but it is dubious whether New Zealand has the scale to produce gains in this area, and whether it is ethical to encourage investment in an industry which we would love to be dramatically contracting. I would also love to hear a libertarian arguing for the essential imprisonment of one private individual by another. Why is the law and order debate so often characterised by partisan screaming matches; accusations of fascism, communism, racism, sexism, instead of a constructive dialogue which agrees on some basics and then looks for solutions.
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:17 pm
“I challenge someone to present some convincing research suggesting that the idea of prison acts as a deterrent for the criminally inclined segments of society.”
Easy- Singapore.
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:27 pm
maybe, but more specifically, that the increasing severity of punishments decreases offending. In singapore, people know that if they commit an offence they are very likely to get caught. It is that likelyhood which is one of the main deterrent factors. New Zealand is geographically very different to Singapore in that it has isolated rural areas in which crime can thrive basically unchecked. (this isn’t to say that some of singapore’s policys couldn’t be good templates). In New Zealand it is recognised that prison, rather than being deterrent, is a sort of trophy for gang associated portions of society. Indeed, severity of sentence can enhance its martyr appeal.
May 22nd, 2007 at 11:53 pm
What Singaporeans (who are not collectivists/socialists) know is that if they are convicted of committing a crime, they will pay a price. This is most manifest in the death penalty for drug trafficking, and the relative scarcity of convictions for this offence as compared to other countries who do not kill traffickers.
In most western societies and especially this one (NZ) criminals know that there is no real price to pay. Even jails are relatively comfortable. Even in the US,the death penalty is seldom enforced and if it is, appeals will often result in reduction to life. There is no real deterrent.
In Singapore, there is reality. In the form of harsh conditions in prisons, strokes of the rattan, and when they say death, they mean death.
I consider this to be proof that firmness in the administration of justice brings results.
That said, I wish to make it clear that Singapore’s low crime rate is not down to harsh punishment regimes as it is to the basic morality of their society. I say again- they are not collectivists. Singaporeans have not fallen prey to the doctrines of the socialists. They are still fiercely emotionally and financially independent of the state and reject welfarism and so many other key parts of the socialist society. Most of all tho, they have personal morality. This is the main reason for Singapore’s low crime rate.
However, the Justice system there still works, because it is in fact recognised that it is there as a deterrent. The emphasis is on punishment rather than rehabilitation.
It is not my duty to reform some ill brought up delinquent. It is not the state’s duty, and they have no right to steal my money to spend in pursuit of this failed idea. Raising children not to be criminals is the parent’s duty. When parents begin once again to assume this responsibility, rather than ceding it to the state, then we will see NZ’s crime rate fall.
May 23rd, 2007 at 12:23 am
Redbaiter, whether or not you consider it your duty to reform ill brought up delinquents, you nonetheless resent the impact that it has on the society that you live in: it is nonetheless your problem because it exists and affects you. You are right, it ultimately comes down to the parents. But your perception is clouded by idealism, resentment towards even the prospect of any remedial state intervention. You say that Singapore’s emphasis is on punishment rather than rehabilitation, but by punishment do you mean being ladyboy to some enormous black power henchman or regular beatings and constant humiliation? Thats hardly the nanny-state, and its hardly working. Prisoners don’t have it good, there is nothing fun about spending several years being intimidated by some of the nastiest people in country, unless you are one of those nasty people in which case you will relish the ability to live in a chaotic, brutal environment. And what does this teach the 18 year old who went along with his cousins for an armed robbery? It teaches him to be a menace to society. How is that in anyones favour? The basic component of corrections in New Zealand, length of imprisonment, has failed to disencourage offending- trends are beginning to emerge to show the converse is true.
May 23rd, 2007 at 12:26 am
New Zealand is geographically very different to Singapore in that it has isolated rural areas in which crime can thrive basically unchecked.
Yo better watch yo arse in the South West (of the South Island) Side hood nigger.
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:39 am
I see the socialist trolls have been on the prowl.
Phillipjohn – has it ever occured to your welfare system addled brain that the very reason why US violent crime rates are now half that of NZ is because they incarcerate at a higher rate. You laud this statistic as if it is yet another fatal American flaw. US voters in State after State have favoured tougher sentencing and parole laws and have voted in governments who have built the prisons to house those caught by the tougher laws. In NZ there continues to be an ideological article of faith amongst the Corrections bureaucracy (embodied in libeltarian’s post) and the academics whose studies they feed off, that prison is to be avoided hence the result in NZ – increasing numbers of violent crimes committed by prisoners released on parole. You can bleat on about what evil places prisons are (and they are) but the fact is that when a criminal is in prison, they cannot commit crime and the longer they are off the streets, the longer society is safe from whatever their crime of choice is. Its not rocket science and Americans in general realise that it works and leads to a safer society. This thread is about why people are leaving NZ and the rise of violent crime in NZ (that cannot be disputed on the official statistics) is one of those reasons.
Sonic – if you look at both OFFICIAL GOVERNMENT WEBSITES they define violent crime similarly. Murders are listed separate and yes the US murder rate (whilst declining – quite dramatically in some cities eg New York) is still higher than NZ’s. Murder, even in the US, is a relatively rare crime whereas rapes, assault etc are much more frequent by a factor of over 4500 to 1 and thus much more dramatically effect the quality of life perception (eg in NZ in 2006 there were 50,700 violent crimes of which only 109 were murders)
Nice try at Labour spin Redrag – your stats include all crimes such as burglaries and car thefts. Those too have fallen in the US and at a rate far faster than NZ. 30 years ago the violent (non murder) crime stats NZ vs US were pretty much the reverse of what they are today.
PJ couldn’t resist his usual descent into peak oil paranoia which became his pathetic defence against the overwhelming evidence of rising US living standards and its steady No 2 OECD ranking.
May 23rd, 2007 at 7:47 am
Redbaiter,
Rag, maybe you could explain the relationship between Rogernomics and increases in the frequency of rape.
1. I made no mention of “rape” as a specific crime. The website you referenced shows a graph with a blue line called “violent crime”. If you recall I noted that they did not define what they meant by this term, but given that you had thought this a suitable source to mention in the discussion…I didn’t quibble too much.
2. Hunger turns men into rapists? FFS!!! Is that really your thesis??
No. It appears to be your thesis. Either that or you are indulging in a strawman that is even sillier than your usual standards.
3. It is the idea that we are collectively responsible for crime, the idea promoted by socialists, the very idea at the root of your arguments here tonight rag, that is the real reason for the massive increase in offending.
You totally fail to address the question. Your own reference shows that violent crime (primarily committed by young men) and male youth suicide both underwent a dramatic quantum jump during the exact period coinciding with a major right wing shift in NZ politics.
Something must have triggered this jump. It was not a gradual increase as might be explained by the evil socialists corrupting society, nor have you even attempted to explain why the data has reflected a major change in the behaviour of primarily young men in exactly this period.
On the other hand I can point to an extremist right wing govt that:
1. Abolished apprenticeships without offering anything to replace them.
2. Dismantled public service employers such as Railways, MOW and the Post Office that had traditionally given an “employment of last resort” to young men with little academic or professional skills.
3. The sudden removal of farm subsidies had huge impacts on rural farm labourers…many small communities no longer had any place at all for their young men.
4. Not to mention the huge rise in general unemployment that again affected young men more than any other sector.
Now I have pointed to some hard data that you have referenced. And more data from the NZ Medical Association and NZ Statistics that you have not quibbled with. Both sets of data show dramatic rises in crime and suicide exactly coinciding with right wing policies, and a gradual decrease under the more centrist policies of the current Labour govt. Moreover I can hypothesis a plausible causal mechanism for why this might be so.
By contrast the best you can do is reference pre-industrial Arabic Bedouin society. I could play “spot the difference” but this post is overlong as it is.
KIA:
First of all:
the very reason why US violent crime rates are now half that of NZ is because they incarcerate at a higher rate.
Then:
Murders are listed separate and yes the US murder rate (whilst declining – quite dramatically in some cities eg New York) is still higher than NZ’s.
Make up your mind. The problem is of course that crime rate comparisons between countries is a non-trivial exercise, for a whole lot of well known reasons. However this source seems to have done a reasonable job:
For 2000, New Zealand’s rate of recorded violent crime was 1082 per 100,000 population. However, this figure cannot be directly compared with violent crime rates in other western countries because of definitional and other differences. In this report, the definition of violent crime for New Zealand has been adapted to reflect equivalent offences to those contained within other country’s definitions.
In accordance with the American definition of violent crime, the rate of total recorded violent crime for America in 2000 was 506.1 per 100,000, almost four times the rate of 132.6 for New Zealand.
http://www.justice.govt.nz/pubs/reports/2002/intl-comparisons-crime/section-9.html
May 23rd, 2007 at 8:36 am
Nice try RedRag – look who wrote this report – the very government bureaucrats who make the very policy recommendations that have led to the increase in crime in NZ. Turkeys dont vote for an early Christmas. International comparisons must be examined carefully you are right on that – lets find out what the US DOJ classify as violent crime and I’ll come back with a side by side breakdown in due course.
May 23rd, 2007 at 8:58 am
KIA again fails to actually provide any sort of linkj to try and prove his far out thesis that the USA is an ocean of calm compared to violent lawless new Zealand.
I’ll take that as evidence that he has not actually got any links that prove anything of the kind.
May 23rd, 2007 at 9:28 am
Sonic and RedRag
NZ stats link
http://www.stats.govt.nz/NR/rdonlyres/7D5A6256-3D51-4F8E-ADF3-C0FC0B55D66B/0/CrimeinNewZealand19962005.pdf
US stats link
http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/data/table_01.html
The American FBI stats or the Uniform Crime Reporting (UCR) Program defines aggravated assault as an unlawful attack by one person upon another for the purpose of inflicting severe or aggravated bodily injury. Because the NZ stats break down assaults into a variety of types of assaults I have left out robbery, minor assaults, intimidations and other and only added serious and grievous as they approximate the US definition of aggravated assault.
NZ stats are published per 10,000 and US per 100,000 so you have to move the US figures one decimal place back. Due to only 2006 preliminary (6 months only stats) for the US I have compared 95 – 05 and the NZ table I was looking at was 96 – 06 so there may be slight statistical variances but bearing in mind NZ government stats now go 1 July to 30 June and US go 1 Jan to 31 Dec there is only a 6 month variance in these comparisons.
NZ combined per 10,000 rises from 44.7 in 1996 to 49.9 in 2006 or an 11% increase
US per 10,000 drops from 41.8 in 1995 to 29.1 in 2005 or a 30.3% decrease which is a net 41% differential which in only a 10 year period is pretty huge.
May 23rd, 2007 at 9:45 am
“Rag, maybe you could explain the relationship between Rogernomics and increases in the frequency of rape.”
You didn’t.
“You totally fail to address the question.”
What question???
“On the other hand I can point to an extremist right wing govt that:”
No you can’t.
Skip the rest. Long winded off topic obfuscational bullshit and baseless assertion. Marxist writing is always an exercise in outright and utter deceit, and your pitifully illogical attempts to blame Rogernomics for increases in violent crime are a perfect example.
May 23rd, 2007 at 10:04 am
KIA looks like you are comparing apples with oranges to get your figures there.
May 23rd, 2007 at 10:52 am
No he’s not Sonic. Here’s the reality. Anyone who has lived in the US, outside of the left liberal strongholds (ie San Francisco, LA, black ghetto areas in those regions and others) knows that crime is neglible compared to NZ. You, but more directly the immoral culture you promote, are/ is the true cause of crime Sonic.
May 23rd, 2007 at 11:04 am
here you are boys: A guardian story about crime and imprisonment rates in Britain:
“We imprison twice as many people as the European average, and yet we are still among the top five countries in Europe for reported crime. Around the world, researchers have found that criminal justice policies have barely any direct effect on crime. The prime minister’s own strategy unit has concluded that 80% of the reduction in the official crime rate in England and Wales since 1997 can be attributed to economic factors. It has warned: “There is no convincing evidence that further increases in the use of custody could significantly reduce crime.” Meanwhile, as jails have grown more overcrowded and the time and resources available for rehabilitation have shrunk, so the reconviction rate has shot up, from 51% in 1991, to 67% last year.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,,2021272,00.html
May 23rd, 2007 at 11:36 am
There is that whine again, where it comes from is a mystery, just like the changing of the seasons or the depths of the sea!
May 23rd, 2007 at 12:02 pm
Well the Guardian has spoken – in the eyes of a committed socialist like phillipjohn that’s tantamount to a pronouncement from heaven itself. What piffle – the left leaning spin doctors in Tony Blair’s office can be counted on for a truly non-partisan unbiased ideologically balanced opinion on this subject akin to the same non-partisan unbiased ideologically balanced opinion from NZ’s Justice Ministry. The reduction in crime across the board in the US is an indisputable fact – it is due to a number of reasons, higher incarceration rates being but one of them.
May 23rd, 2007 at 1:29 pm
“Dickhead.. take away the stats that apply to black on black crime in the welfare ghettos that only exist because of people like you Sonic, and NZ has a much greater violent crime rate.”
Yeah Dickhead, what were you thinking? Take away that portion of American crime that makes it higher than here & bingo! New Zealand has far more violent crime than the US!
Easy.
May 23rd, 2007 at 1:45 pm
KIA, you seem to be adopting a couple of bad habits.
1. Not providing references until dragged kicking and screaming
2. Dismissing all contrary evidence as inbalanced.
You ask for “non-partisan unbiased ideologically balanced opinion” (sic)
But never ever provide it.
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:20 pm
Get this!
“I will be leaving New Zealand by the end of 2008. I won’t hang around to see the country raped with the privatization of schools, hospitals and any other public services that are not yet in private hands. A vote for National is a vote for poverty. ”
This from “Thomas” over at Tumeke.blogspot.com, in response to news that Helen Clark is no longer preferred PM.
I presume the influx of disaffected National supporters returning should more than balance this loss?
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:24 pm
Sonic @ 1.45
Mate…POT>KETTLE>BLACK !
How do you write that shit and keep a straight face?
Do you honestly not see yourself as the biggest nothing-worthwhile-to-say poster on this blog?
Good entertainment value for sure, but purveyor of balanced, well thought out comments? me thinks not.
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:32 pm
“Yeah Dickhead, what were you thinking?”
I was thinking that its a bit rich for Sonic et al to be referencing high crime rates in the US when the regions with said high crime rates are where most leftist votes/ voters are found. If it wasn’t for the socialists and their paternalistic views on blacks, and their use of the black welfare vote as a stepping stone to political power, the situation would be totally different. Sonic’s political ideas and the socialists sick readiness to sacrifice anyone in their pursuit of power, are the real reason for the high crime rates.
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:40 pm
“Do you honestly not see yourself as the biggest nothing-worthwhile-to-say poster on this blog?”
Er… that’s Redbaiter easily. And sure, you might disagree with everything that Sonic says, but if he wasn’t here what would this site be?
Seems to me that most of you come to stick it to Sonic of Phil et al, rather than to actually discuss the posts.
“Good entertainment value for sure, but purveyor of balanced, well thought out comments? me thinks not.”
Um.. that applies to this entire site – and you say it like it’s a bad thing?
May 23rd, 2007 at 2:45 pm
“”Yeah Dickhead, what were you thinking?”"
Btw RB – I directed that at Sonic. Sarcasm. Etc.
May 23rd, 2007 at 3:28 pm
Sonic
Who cares when I provide a link – the facts still stand. Some of us actually work in the productive sector and can’t spend all day like you trolling blogs and being a Labour shill. You’re a humourless troll at times – phillipjohn breathlessly quoted the Guardian as the font of all wisdom on the issue of prison populations and it ends up being a partisan piece spewed out by Blair’s office. My “non-partisan unbiased ideologically balanced opinion” quote was a tongue in cheek swipe at pj’s source. Redbaiter called you dickhead – Im beginning to see why
May 23rd, 2007 at 4:03 pm
“The reduction in crime across the board in the US is an indisputable fact – it is due to a number of reasons, higher incarceration rates being but one of them.”
OK let’s have a look at this.
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs2/r188.pdf
Prison popultion rate (per 100,000)
Denmark: 59, Finland: 59, Norway: 59, Sweden, 68,
And now for the USA … 686!
Now you you think that with so many people in prison you would have a low rate of assaults, but no the US is far worse than both Canada and sweden.
http://www.ccsd.ca/pubs/2002/olympic/indicators.htm
In fact, as the link above will show sweden and canada are just far better places to live in than the USA.
May 23rd, 2007 at 4:50 pm
“Who cares when I provide a link – the facts still stand”
*sigh* sorry KIA if I tried to argue something without showing any facts people would, quite rightly, be all over me asking for evidence.
“. Some of us actually work in the productive sector”
Both of us do, your point?
Oh it was witless personal abuse, my mistake. Have fun cuddling up to RB and dad4J, I honestly thought you were better than that.
May 23rd, 2007 at 4:53 pm
There you go again with your useless “facts” Phillip John.
What have “facts” got to do with anything?
May 23rd, 2007 at 4:54 pm
PJ
The Canadian Council of Social Development – wow pretty neutral body from the look of it (a joke – this is for Sonic’s sake). Your responses are getting more desperate and off the original topic. But since you raised it why are so many Canadians moving to the US and so few Americans moving to Canada? Could be the same reason why so many Kiwis move to Aussie and so few Aussies move to NZ.
We were comparing crime rates in NZ vs the US -what has Scandanavia got to do with that? The fact is that violent crime in NZ is going up and in the US it is going down. If you look at States with a similar population to NZ (eg Minnesota) then their rate is half that of the overall US stats I cited http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/mncrime.htm
Compare even the murder rate in Minnesota and in 2005 there was only 10 fewer murders in NZ and MN has a slightly larger population if you really want to compare more similar populations because the overall US stats are boosted by very high crime cities like Washington DC and Baltimore.
PJ lets hear your reasons why you think the trends are in the opposite direction in NZ and the US rather than getting distracted with Canada, Tony Blair’s office reports, Scandanavia or peak oil!! Look we all grew up in NZ fed on the mother’s milk story of what a great safe place to raise kids and what a horrible violent place America is. 30 years ago there was some substance to the story – now there isn’t and people like you and Sonic just cant seem to get your heads around it. Maybe NZ is safer than Glasgow in fact Im sure it is but it is not the safe place I grew up in. I now live in a city with a relatively low crime rate and the fact is I feel safer. Its sad because I love NZ but Christchurch on a Sat night after 10pm is not a safe place anymore – you dont need to look at the stats to know that.
May 23rd, 2007 at 5:02 pm
Sonic
My point was that I posted the link somewhat after the initial comment to back it up – it wasn’t dragged out of me kicking and screaming as you allege, we dont all have the time to put up every link on every post. In the past I have tried to make posts with multiple links and they ended up in moderation and were never posted so I am more circumspect with multiple link posts.
I have remonstrated with both RB and d4j on their inflammatory language – I just felt that him calling you a dickhead at this juncture was probably deserved – that’s hardling cuddling up to him.
May 23rd, 2007 at 5:24 pm
KIA:
I was drawing attention to the fact that the US model is failing – When you have 10 times as many people in prison than the Scandinavian countries and you still have higher levels of assault you cannot say this any kind of success. Furthermore, if socialism is the cause of all crime then why is crime lower in the socialist Scandinavian countries while they have 1/6th the rate of incarceration exhibited by the US?
Now New Zealand used to be a social democratic society throughout the 1950′s to 1970′s, and as we have seen in Redrag’s posts throughout this thread, at these times we had extremely low crime rates. However, since the mid 1980′s we have been following the US’s free-market economic approach and as a result we have much higher crime rates, and we now the second highest rate of incarceration of any country in the OECD.
http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs2/r188.pdf
Now you want us to beef up our incarceration rate so we can contend with the US for the title of most incarcerated society on the face of the planet. You want to apply US solutions to problems created by a US system. But what you, and other blinkered right winged ideologues fail to recognise is the reason that the nordic countries have such low incarceration rates, and low crime rates, is that they have inclusive societies with low rates of inequality and intra-societal relative poverty. Now even if you realised this I doubt you would care about it. For instance, the fact that the US is by far the most incarcerated society on the planet isn’t an issue for you, because imprisonment is something that, for the most part, only poor people will ever experience. Their fate is irrelevant, because as long as you feel safe in your plush surroundings, well who cares right?
May 23rd, 2007 at 5:51 pm
PJ
RedRag’s attempts to link the free market reforms to rising crime in NZ are nothing more than that – attempts and are left wing fantasies. The perfect socialist models you cite in Scandanavia are scaling back their super welfare states because their economies are groaning under the weight of massive taxation, excessive socialist interventions and 50% of their GDP being from gov’t spending. Norway has been buffered from this trend somewhat by oil revenues and the three Nordic countries maintain homogenuity in their racial mix due to highly restrictive immigration policies. Sweden had the benefit of a massive productive capitalist sector courtesy of its non involvement in WW2 and the lack of damage to its infrastructure and diversion of its industry in armaments to fight and defeat fascism that gave it the financial ‘fat’ and strength to experiment with socialism the way it chose to. Recent election results in Sweden have seen a swing away from the super welfare state model with enactment of modest free market reforms. I know that is heresy to a purist collectivist such as yourself but it has become an economic reality.
You measure failure by incarceration rates – you’re entitled to do that. It wont change the fact that Americans feel safer and are safer because more crims are behind bars for longer. It is better to compare NZ with the countries culturally similar such as the UK, Australia, US and Canada as our cultural histories and development are quite different from Scandanavia.
PJ I used to be a left leaning, socialism loving Labour activist. I used to write letters to the editor defending the very interventionist policies you shill for. I did my time at any number of Labour meetings, conferences and campaigns. Once I broke free from the collective liberal think of the universities I started to see the real world and self employment helped me see how the market truly works. Embracing more free market thinking caused me to look at socialist social policy interventions and I saw the same wooly headed thinking and poor results.
May 23rd, 2007 at 5:57 pm
“RedRag’s attempts to link the free market reforms to rising crime in NZ are nothing more than that – attempts and are left wing fantasies.”
well, may we please hear your alternative explanations?
May 23rd, 2007 at 6:09 pm
“PJ I used to be a left leaning, socialism loving Labour activist.”
great, so now you, like so many other upwardly mobile labourites can’t see anything but your own narrowly defined self-interest. Yes markets are great, they provide a powerful engine for growth and development, however, they should be seen as a servant of humanity, not a divine law in themselves. The are a means to an end, not an end in themselves, so where they produce negative outcomes, they should be regulated. Unfortunately there is a tendency amongst “upwardly mobile” people, once they are no longer feeling the negative aspects of the market, to forget this. You seem to be one such person.
May 23rd, 2007 at 6:09 pm
Tomorrow PJ – bedtime here in America
May 23rd, 2007 at 7:09 pm
NZ is a shadow of its former self.Why wouldnt people want to move to australia.wages are better,taxes lower,cost of living is cheaper.I lived in australia for over 20 yrs. i wonder why the hell i ever came back.It makes me sick to see the police and government corruption and self intrest that exists in nz. What this country needs is an independent royal commission into govt,police,youth and family services.What is happening here i saw numerous examples of in australia.But over there they got rid of the corrupt officials.Why doesnt the labour govt want ppl looking into its affairs?..Easy answer is there is some truth to the alligations.The sooner nz becomes part of australia the better off we all shall be.
May 23rd, 2007 at 10:00 pm
“The perfect socialist models you cite in Scandanavia are scaling back their super welfare states because their economies are groaning under the weight of massive taxation, excessive socialist interventions and 50% of their GDP being from gov’t spending”
True, because of starins associated with globalisation their political centre of gravity it shifting slightly rightwards, but nowhere near as far as we have in New Zealand. The fact is that you can have healthy economic growth, very powerful unions (they don’t necessarily cause increased unemployment), a comprehensive welfare state, low levels of poverty, and low crime and imprisonment rates, all at the same time.
People will often site America as an amazing economy, but the truth is that America’s economic strength has been based, in large part, upon their domination of the international monetary system rather than anything intrisic linked to their productive power of their economy.
In the early 1970s the OPEC countries agreed to only trade oil in US dollars. So, Since the oil shocks of the 1970′s, the need to have dollars to import oil became national security policy for most countries. In this way, the value of the US dollar is held artifically high. Furthermore, the US is running a multi-trillion dollar trade deficit, and the public debt is also in the many trillions of dollars. But that’s OK, the United States has followed a deliberate policy of trade deficits and budget deficits for most of the past two decades, so-called benign neglect, in effect, to lock the rest of the world into dependence on a US money system. America lives off the borrowed money of the rest of the world in the Dollar System. In effect, the German workers at BMW build the cars and give them away to Americans for free, when the german central bank uses the dollars to buy US bonds. What is perverse about this system is the fact that Washington has succeeded in getting foreign surplus countries (countries it has a trade deficit to) to invest their own savings, to be a creditor to the US, buying Treasury bonds.
The US Treasury is certain that its trade partners will be forced to always buy more US debt to prevent the global monetary system from collapsing, as nearly happened in 1998 with the Russia default and the LTCM hedge fund crisis.
So treasury continues to rely on foreign money to prop the consumer debt bubble, at low interest rates. Were foreign money to stop propping the US economy, now at some $2.5 billion daily, the Federal Reserve would be forced to raise its interest rates to make dollar investments more attractive (interest rates were just 1% 3 years ago). Higher rates would trigger a crisis in consumer debt, mortgage defaults, credit card and car loan failures. Higher rates would plunge the US economy into a depression.
Interesting times lie ahead.
May 23rd, 2007 at 10:07 pm
KIA,
Well I do appreciate a decently linked reply, and it has taken me a little while to spot where you have gone wrong.
The main problem is that the US and NZ definitions you are using are not equivalent.
The US definition of “aggravated assault” normally includes the us of a weapon and injuries very likely to cause death. The closest equivalent in NZ is “grievous assault”. ( I could include “attempted murder” but that is a relatively rare charge.)
The US “aggravated assault” rate over the period concerned (1996-2005) is in the range 414 to 291 per 100,000.
The NZ “grievous assault” rate in the same period moved from 57 to 94 per 100,000. Still 3-4 times lower than the US.
Not a great result, but then as the data I presented above clearly and unmistakably demonstrates, NZ had a very low violent crime rate for decades until 1984. Just for convenience I’ll link to it again:
http://www.safe-nz.org.nz/statsgraph.htm
What the hell caused the blue “violent crime” line to suddenly rocket upwards from 1984 onwards? And then curiously enough start to trend downwards after 1998?
And for a concrete reference, let’s just compare the US “homicide” and NZ “murder” rates over the same period:
US: 8.2 to 5.6 per 100,000
NZ: Around 2.5 per 100,000
Again the same 3-4 time higher in the US. (The “murder” rate for NZ is not explicitly mentioned in the document you referenced. It is wrapped up in another much larger category rather oddly named “other”, which includes a whole bunch of other things such as “kidnapping” and “abductions”.) But at about 110 murders per year in NZ, that works out at aprox 2.6 per hundred.
Now I am pretty confident that “homicide” and “murder” are very comparable crimes both here and in the US. Therefore I am justified in using the relative ratio between the countries of 3-4 times higher in the US as a baseline. I would also expect that if “aggravated assault” and “grievous assault” were comparable charges, that they would demonstrate a similar ratio…ie in the range 3-4 times higher in the US. Which is the result I have.
BTW if you want to selectively use places like Minnesota, can I select …umm…Golden Bay for comparison?
And just to round this off:
The figures confirm New Zealand crime rates have been trending down since peaking in 1996, Mr Hawkins said. Taking into account that New Zealand’s population grew by approximately 277,000 people between 1996 and 2003, total recorded crime figures in 2003 were 7.3 percent lower than 1996, and the resolution rate 6.7 percent better.
Rates of recorded offences per 10,000 population have fallen 13.7 percent since 1996. That year crimes per 10,000 population numbered 1279.7, compared with 1103.7 in 2003.
Opposition politicians had misrepresented crime rates as rising, when the facts were total reported offences had fallen since peaking seven years ago, Mr Hawkins said.
http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PA0403/S00178.htm
May 24th, 2007 at 12:15 am
Fancy wasting reader’s time with that well known bogus crap from the discredited charlatans Hawkins and Goff. What cave do you live in rag?
http://www.act.org.nz/node/27242
May 24th, 2007 at 8:24 am
So the inimitable Mr Baiter quotes Stephen Franks, who without any attributing of his sources claims:
the risk of sexual violence in New Zealand was nearly 3 times the risk for an average United States citizen;
Nowhere on the page does he attempt to justify this assertion. (Note the rather weaselly wording he employs.) So I’ve bounced around and checked on a few sources and they all agree with these numbers in 2000:
Forcible Rape category:
US Rate: 32.0 per 100,000
NZ Rate: 13.7 per 100,000
http://www.justice.govt.nz/pubs/reports/2002/intl-comparisons-crime/section-5.html
ie about 2.5 time lower. Maybe Mr Franks should attend a remedial arithmetic class.
Mr Franks also makes the disingenuous claim that:
Only for murder are US citizens supposedly more at risk than New Zealanders. However over 80% of murders occur in 7 police districts confined to black drug dealing areas.
Which is of course pretty much the case for all nations, that there are some areas and social groups that disproportionately contribute to the numbers. The same applies to NZ, drop for instance Counties-Manakau, and suddenly our figures look better too.
Finally as I sit here I chuckle inwardly at Mr Baiter’s response if perchance I had had the temerity to quote a Labour party website in support of my argument.
May 24th, 2007 at 8:59 am
” homogenuity in their racial mix”
“black drug dealing areas.”
“black on black crime in the welfare ghettos”
Anyone else starting to see a pattern there?
May 24th, 2007 at 9:03 am
RedRag
In reading the US definition of aggrevated assault there is no reason to take out the NZ category of serious assault as you suggest. The NZ stats do break down assaults into various sub categories and it is only right to exclude minor assaults (as I do) and all other categories except grievous and serious as these two most closely approximate the US’s broader definition.
I have never tried to claim that the US had a lower murder rate than NZ – it clearly doesn’t only that murder even in the US is rare and in both NZ and the US aggrevated/serious/grevious assaults (however defined) outnumber murders by an average of 4000 to 1. It is a quality of life statistic.
In pointing to Minnesota I was trying to bring some population equivalence. I’m comparing NZ with a State of over 5 million with the urban area of Minneapolis-St Paul being over 2 million with all the same big city issues you would find in Auckland. Rochester is Hamilton sized and MN has 4 cities between 50,000 and 100,000 outside the Minneapolis urban area. To compare the crime rate in MN with Golden Bay as you suggest is laughable. When you compare the murder rate in NZ it has risen to a level 0.2 p/10,000 in 2005 where the homicide rate in MN fell from .39 p/10,000 in 1995 to 0.22 in 2005 – only a fraction above NZ. Murder stats in the US are distorted by the very high rates of several key cities. My point in all this is the trend – in NZ violent crime is trending upwards and in the US it is trending downwards, very strongly so in many cities and towns.
May 24th, 2007 at 9:39 am
“Anyone else starting to see a pattern there?”
You sad fuckwit, the pattern is the socialist’s sacrifice of black people to the left’s obsession with power. You are disgusting racists prepared to trap black people in welfare ghettos and crime regions just so you can hold on to the power you crave so insanely. You do it here in NZ too, to Maori and Pacific Islanders. Lead them into your welfare lairs and deprive them of their Independence and self respect at every opportunity. Just so they’ll vote for you. You people are power drunk narcissistic scum who have abused democracy to such an extent it is now almost worthless as a means to arriving at effective governance.
May 24th, 2007 at 11:05 am
“Anyone else starting to see a pattern there?”
come on sonic – I think it’s very unfair to be accusing Baiter of such a horrible mind-set, what would his friends at the National Front Say?!
May 24th, 2007 at 11:10 am
KIA:
“My point in all this is the trend – in NZ violent crime is trending upwards and in the US it is trending downwards, very strongly so in many cities and towns.”
Is this the best you’ve got?
If economic growth was trending up in Malawi and down in New Zealand would you say that the economic situation is better there than here?
You should acknowledge that you have been OWNED, and bow out with some dignity while you still can.
May 24th, 2007 at 11:30 am
PJ get a grip – read all the threads – the stats back the statement up notwithstanding RedRag’s attempts to parse the definition of violent crime for the NZ stats. I haven’t responded to your latest posts defending Scandanavian socialism plus your snide little anti-capitalist rant as both were getting off the thread topic and would require a veritable essay to respond to not the least of which is your obsession with peak oil.
May 24th, 2007 at 12:14 pm
I have read the threads, and the stats make it clear that the US is a much more violent place to live than New Zealand, both in terms of assaults and murders. Your pathetic excuse for an argument is that the US is better than NZ because it has slightly improved its situation by having a proportion of its population incarcerated, that is six times higher than any other OECD country, whilst New Zealand has gotten better since 1998 without putting its prison population through the roof. Give up sucker.
May 24th, 2007 at 12:32 pm
“what would his friends at the National Front Say?!”
Another cowardly smear from another intellectual yellow back. ..and ignorant too. How can anyone who wants small unnoticeable government agree with the big government ideals of the National Front FFS??? They’re leftists, and like you PJ, they see government and regulation and force as the answer to very perceived problem. You PJ are in fact much closer to the National Front than anyone who advocates for small government and individual liberty will ever be.
May 24th, 2007 at 1:50 pm
Sigh – PJ 10/10 for being a committed lefty. “the stats make it clear that the US is a much more violent place to live than New Zealand” Wrong again. Lets do the run of more stats
NZ from http://www.stats.govt.nz/NR/rdonlyres/7D5A6256-3D51-4F8E-ADF3-C0FC0B55D66B/0/CrimeinNewZealand19962005.pdf plus clarification from the Police website previously posted.
US from http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm which are lifted straight from the FBIs figures
All figures per 10,000 population
1. Vehicle Theft (US)/Car Conversion (NZ term)
US ’95: 56 US ’05: 41.6 Change:-26%
NZ ’96: 139.2 NZ ’06: 90.6 Change: -35%
Current differential: NZ 85% higher car theft rate
2. Burglary
US ’95: 98.7 US ’05: 72 Change: -27%
NZ ’96: 139.2 NZ ’06: 90.6 Change: -35%
Current differential: NZ 26% higher burglary rate
3. Aggravated Assault
US ’95: 41.8 US ’05: 29.1 Change:-30%
NZ ’96: 44.7 NZ ’06: 52.7 Change: +18%
Current differential: NZ 79% higher aggravated assault rate
4. Rape (US)/Sexual attacks (NZ)
US ’95: 3.71 US ’05: 3.2 Change:-14%
NZ ’96: 5.9 NZ ’06: 6.0 Change: 2%
Current differential: NZ 87% higher rape rate
5. Murder (US)/Homicide (NZ)
US ’95: 0.82 US ’05: 0.56 Change:-32%
NZ ’96: 0.23 NZ ’06: 0.2 Change: -13%
Current differential: US 64% higher murder rate
Please note that p 47 of the NZ Stats Dept survey has complete definitions of each crime type and the FBI website in various locations has the US definitions. In all categories detailed the definitions are very similar.
So PJ there have been declines in some NZ crime stats but wth the property related crimes, NZ rates are still higher than the US. Aggravated assault has been hashed over in previous posts. Rapes see divergent stats with NZ much higher than the US. Only in the area of murders does the US outstrip NZ but heading in the right direction. You can also see the ratio of murders to agg assaults in 06 in NZ is 263:1 (my previous stat of 4000:1 was wrong) and the US equivalent ratio in 05 is 289:1.
May 24th, 2007 at 2:22 pm
What the hell is this “disaster centre” place that you link to. Why should we believe their claim that their stas are lifted straight from the FBI? You could at least provide a credible source to support your arguments – this i’m afraid is just laughable.
Red Rag’s stats at least com from a credible source, even if they’re 6 years old they show clearly that the US had 4 times New Zealand’s rate of violent crime offences.
http://www.justice.govt.nz/pubs/reports/2002/intl-comparisons-crime/section-5.html
Now I really doubt that is has changed to the extent that you believe as a result of reading thi “disaster centre”. So if you can show us a credible source then please do.
May 24th, 2007 at 2:39 pm
PJ
Cant handle the message so shoot the messenger. Go to http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/ucr.htm#cius and compare then tell me what stats I got wrong.
The Justice Ministry report you reference is by a Labour Govt appointed bureaucrat – hardly a non partisan source and one wedded to the spin you buy into and the Corrections orthodoxy that saw Graeme Burton released to murder again.