So there is talk of comparing New Zealand to Finland. Fine, I still think this is as pointless as comparing us to Australia – but not to worry. The plus of comparing us to Finland rather than Australia is that Finland is a small open economy more in our mold. However, they are also significantly […]
For me, the independence of central banks is one of the greatest institutional changes that has taken place in the past 30 years when it comes to “economic management”. This independence has allowed central banks to clearly articulate goals and ensure that the arbitrary monetary distortions that previously occurred no longer take place – governments […]
On the Freakonomics blog there is a discussion of why a delicious vegetarian option at a restaurant was cheaper than the meat options: Was it because his revenue from it was only €63 compared to €91 for a five-course regular menu (which had one meat and one fish course)? Maybe. But I don’t believe the vegetarian menu […]
This post from mainly macro combines my favourite (although getting dated) book on macroeconomics, my preferred methodological statement for economic modeling, and tackles the idea of microfoundations in macroeconomics. One of my favourite blog posts in a while – I suggest you have a peek at it. One thing I would note is that, for […]
Apologies for the lack of posting. I am currently in the process of finalising forecasts at my workplace – which of course involve traveling to the farthest reaches of New Zealand and battling mythical animals. In many ways its similar to the labours of Hercules – and as a result gives me little chance to […]
It may just be me, but this statement by Statistics New Zealand sounds like an (appropriate) smackdown of this speech from the RBNZ (which we discussed in terms of appropriateness here). In his speech, the Governor had said that the Reserve Bank’s very rough analysis suggested that the measurement differences could mean our GDP was […]