Americans Become Easy Targets In Nationwide Surveillance Dragnet The Wall Street Journal BY SHANE SHIFFLETT AND HANNAH CRITCHFIELD Liz McLellan spent a morning in January witnessing the work of federal agents who had arrived in Maine to pursue the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown. Like other community activists, protesters and passersby…
Pressreader.com: Rise of the Machines
Really really really get the pressreader.com appFrom The Wall Street Journal, 27 February 2026 Anthropic Turns Down U.S. on AI Guardrails The Wall Street JournalBY AMRITH RAMKUMAR Anthropic said it wouldn’t back down in a dispute with the Defense Department over artificial-intelligence guardrails, complicating efforts to reach a compromise ahead…
Cross-Cultural Language Difference Appreciation
Interesting day! Quietly loving how the Broadcasting Standards Authority (BSA) operates 🙂The BSA is a New Zealand government body created under the Broadcasting Act 1989. Their function is to “receive and determine complaints from persons who are dissatisfied with the outcome of complaints made to broadcasters”, and to encourage the…
What’s Wrong With These Pictures?
Here’s three pictures of delicous full cream milk from New Zealand, with one massive, massive difference between them.Can you spot it?The first picture is from Woolworths Lower Hutt store, taken on the 17 December 2025. The second picture is from Pac n Save Lower Hutt, taken on the 19 December…
Falling in Love: RBNZ Governor Edition
I was listening to the new Reserve Bank of New Zealand Governor on RNZ today. She’s awesome! I’m liking the cut of her jibb.Her economics are orthodox, her communication is on point and not distracted from the minimalist message she wants to say, and she’s quite happy to jump out of…
Dead Hand of Government – Kiwisaver Edition
Kiwisaver was a policy initiative introduced with a big hiss and a roar by Michael Cullen back in the Helen Clark government in May 2005.Convinced that he had single handedly created a government fiscal surplus through his superior fiscal rectitude, he seemed to think no one was as good at…
Sustainable Development Seen Through an Economics Lens
When we think about environmental resources what do we mean by “sustainable” development? Economic growth is the change over time in the volume of goods and services which are available for investment or consumption. With increased production comes higher incomes, wealth, and improved living standards. Economic development, the reward from…
If it felt like it hurt, its because it did
Stats NZ updated their annual national accounts for the year ending March 2024 today. These updates bring their GDP stats into line with the Annual Enterprise Survey and other benchmark data sources. The annual measures shake out as much of the data vagaries that plague the quarterly measures, and reset…
Housing Cohort Effects
I’m wondering about the systemic effects of large mortgages. I might be wrong, but here goes. The scenarioSo we are looking at moving houses. But moving up in house quality means moving up in price. Twenty years ago, moving up in quality meant going from a $100,000 house to $200,000 –…
Greenshoot of Recovery
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) this week dropped the Official Cash Rate (OCR) to 3.0% from 3.25%. In theory, that should flow through the banking system, and drop the “price of money” (the loan interest rate) which banks demand for mortgages.Cheaper interest rates “should” increase demand for mortgages,…
Faceplant – New Zealand Economics Style
New Zealand is currently in the worst economic recession since the Mother of All Budgets back in 1990. Our Golden Years (1998 – 2008) are well behind us. The business cycleHere’s a little thing I fizzed up when I was at the New Zealand Institute of Economic Research but have…
Heat, Spiders and Crashed Aeroplanes
Last week I boldly and deftly led from the back a small, but hardy group, of timid (but brave!) adventurous thrill-seeking explorers into the mountains of New Caledonia. Our quest: we searched for the final resting place of a World War 2 United States Airforce Douglas R4D-1 supply plane that…
Omagosh! Asia is Angry with Donald Trump
BTW: a gentle plug for Pressreader.com, my source of truth, alternative truth, and the most likely thing that occupies the middle.Is he good? Is he bad? Does he care? Is he strong? Does he love America and hate war? Or does he love power, and hate freeloaders..Frequent readers of my…
Wanna Be an Economist? Take the Test
Show us your skillsWelcome to XXXXXX – we specialise in statistics and numerical analysis.Your ability to read, process, analyse, interpretate and communicate statistical information to a lay audience is fundamental to the position you have applied for.This exercise is designed to allow you to demonstrate your skills at data manipulation,…
USA National Debt
I’ve previously written about how the US Dollar is the ultimate IOU: the USA seems impervious to monetary crisis. The US Government seems to be able to continuously borrow from the world running some weird sort of international ponzi scheme where it keeps issuing more debt, and international creditors keep…
Imperfect Substitutes: Immigration and Consumer Preferences
An interesting story in the business section of today’s New Zealand Herald: Tucked down the bottom was this comment below plucked from Burger Fuel’s annual report. It sounds like immigration is altering Burger Fuel’s traditional customer base. I really hope they adapt because I think their food is delicious (… says…
Normal Photo…
Check out this pretty normal photo in today’s (26 June 2025) New Zealand Auckland Herald from the NATO Head of Government meeting:… until you zoom in closer and wonder who let in THIS absolutely mad screamer… NATO Heads of GovernmentSo I went to the NATO website and pulled this picture…
Thank you
CAUTION: GORY PHOTOS IN BLOGWith sepsis and streptococcus infection to my leg, I could have died.Merci beaucoup Doctors Sylvain Rouches and Lisa McIlwraith. Merci New Caledonia’s health system, Allianz Insurance and SPC.Merci beaucoup to Rebecca for her care, my friends and everyone in the health care system who saved my…
Pretty Trigger Happy
… did President Donald Trump really just drop the single biggest explosive motherlode since Harry Truman?!?I give it 3-6 months before America sees the next 9-11 terrorist attack.Note to world: Iran “didn’t have strong cards”
Pay Equity Laws and “Structural Gender Discrimination”: Economics Component
As an Economist, this REALLY annoys me: https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/560417/opposition-ramps-up-to-government-s-pay-equity-moveThe whole concept that you can look across different industries and try to equate remuneration rates without looking at the demand and supply pressures on the industries themselves is economic ignorance and massively annoying!For Economists, its like people claiming the Earth is flat…