There were supposed to be a number of important points made today as I can finally cover the house price pick. Here is a list of what I was supposed to cover: The first house price increase (to June 2010) merely takes us back to where we were in December 2007 in nominal terms. Real […]
In an excellent article from Brian Fallow, the idea that GST could be applied to rent is brought up. I agree with this 100%. By not taxing rent we are distorting incentives regarding the investment in housing – after all, rent is a form of consumption and should be captured by a tax on consumption. […]
I will be on Breakfast tomorrow (at 6.50am) defending Infometrics pick of a 24% increase in house prices over the next three years. Although the last pick was a little off, house prices still only feel a little bit more than we stated (falling 10% vs our 5% – although if you look at median […]
There has been a bunch of good stuff written out there about the trade-offs between using GST and a (flat) income tax to raise government revenue. However, there is one point I think has been slightly exaggerated – the mobility argument for a lift in GST. An example of this comes from an excellent article […]
There is a little bit of talk about a ANZAC currency I see. Lets be honest here, this effectively implies that New Zealand would be adopting the Aussie dollar. I remember arguing about this with my brother a while back, he was pro I was against. Nowadays, I’m not sure – I’d like to see […]
As we’ve said before, the first port of call for economists is trying to frame an issue as objectively as possible. However, in a practical sense many economists can’t help jumping in and adding some conclusions along the way. Now, I’m no philosopher so I find it handy to keep some rules of thumb in […]