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These are strange times, even for economists. Fearmongers are urging governments to pump up their spending in order to maintain economic activity. Read more

They say you should never let a good crisis go to waste. New Zealand’s employment figures currently look superb. Read more

Eighties glam-metal band Cinderella taught us we don't know what we've got until it's gone. But it can be harder to know what you could have had if you never had it at all. Read more

Alan Duff’s latest book – A Conversation with My Country: Where we have come from. Where we can go. Read more

A collegial relationship between Treasury and the Reserve Bank is a good thing in principle. Monetary and fiscal policy remain the most important levers of economic policy, and the two institutions in charge of those levers need to exchange their views. Read more

Dear Minister of Finance, I am writing to apply for the position of Lead Economic Advisor to the Government, a position held by The Treasury since the 1940s. Please find enclosed my CV with references. Read more

A truism in politics has been codified in what’s been called Miles’s Law: “Where you stand depends on where you sit.” In other words, principles can depend a bit on one’s interests. Legend had it that one of the professors who taught courses in antitrust where I went to graduate school liked to quip: “I support antitrust because antitrust supports me.” Consulting in antitrust cases was rather lucrative. Read more

Lost in the government’s response to the Interim Climate Change Committee this week was the decision to put on ice its 100% renewable electricity policy to focus on other more effective measures. It is hard to overstate the significance of this decision. Read more