Matt Nolan

RBA cuts 100

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The Reserve Bank of Australia cut 100 basis points last night taking the cash rate to 4.25% – well into easing territory.

A feeling that global commodity prices were in for a sustained lower period was a driving force behind this stimulus.  Surprisingly the Reserve Bank of Australia did not mention to enormous decline in fuel prices – however, there suggestion that the terms of trade would fall markedly implicitly suggests that the decline in petrol prices will be dominated by other factors.

What does this mean for New Zealand – a rule of thumb stemming from cuts so far (Aussie cut + 25) would suggest 125bp.  100 is still conceivable, as is 150.  My pick of 75 now seems incredibly unlikely.  Note, further discussion of the decision occurs in the comments of this post 🙂

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jamesz

Poverty and violence in Africa

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A recent article on VoxEU discusses the link between poverty and violence in Africa. It’s a tricky topic because there are good arguments to be made for causation in both directions and the direction of causation matters hugely for aid policy. Read more

jamesz

National chooses not to rule ‘by decree’

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It looks like National has decided not to continue with the previous government’s plans to introduce a standard for lightbulb efficiency. They say

We want to encourage people to [switch], we think there may be benefits for them to do it, but it should be a choice they make as consumers.

It’s a good point: efficient CFL bulbs are tough to dim, take time to reach full brightness and don’t bring out the sparkle in chandeliers, apparently. So why would we want to force everyone to use them when they’re clearly not suited to some applications? Of course, if people did use them in their homes and offices, where they are suitable, it would be great for reducing our national power consumption. Read more

jamesz

Is our economy killing the planet?

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I’ve recently been browsing old magazines and my attention was grabbed by a feature in the October 18 edition of NewScientist. In it they collate a series of articles under the heading ‘Why the economy is killing the planet and what we can do about it’. At first I was disappointed that a publication puporting to be scientific in nature was resorting to scare journalism and economics bashing; however, there are a number of interesting ideas in the articles that bear discussion. Read more

Matt Nolan

No need for fiscal stimulus – monetary policy is coming

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Or so says John Key. Very interesting.

Ok, as Prime Minister, John Key needs to stop talking about monetary policy!!! Luckily Kiwiblog has already covered this – so you won’t get another rant from me 😉

I am not sure whether he is speculating, or whether he’s been briefed and then wandered off and spilled the beans. All I know is that he pushed up the price of the “over 100” contract on iPredict.

All I know is that my pick of 75 is looking increasingly unlikely – Australia’s decision tonight will make everything a lot clearer 😉 . However, I am glad to see that he agrees with the idea that we don’t need to be introducing a fiscal stimulus.

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Matt Nolan

Tax cuts, the minimum wage, and incidence

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The Standard has been stating that tax cuts should be “fairer”. Now in principle I have no problem with things being “fairer” – however, defining what is fair very is subjective, and what the Standard sees as fair and what I see as fair might be different.

Still, both the Standard and No Right Turn go on to quantify what they feel is an injustice – the fact that a greater proportion of the tax cut will go to the wealthy. However, for what they are saying to be true, the wage everyone is paid following a tax cut must not change (or must change by the same lump sum) regardless of their current income – yet this is not the case.

Many moons ago we discussed tax incidence – I think it is time to run with this again, taking for granted some of the assumptions about the labour market that the Standard has provided us with over time.

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