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Lower prices from productivity gains and lower import prices relative to export prices are a good thing. Yet many overseas commentators worry about price deflation. Read more

Late last year, Australia proposed a repeal bill that could see the Australian Taxation Office and Australian Securities and Investments Commission take charge from the Australian Charities and Not-for-profits Commission (ACNC). ACNC is the body that regulates and maintains a database of all registered charitable entities in Australia. Read more

Usually, we call things stable when they do not change and unstable if they do. Apparently this is not the case in monetary policy. Read more

If you have been scanning the press over the past week or so you may have come across an opinion piece by Michael Pascoe, prophesying doom for the New Zealand dairy industry and the Kiwi economy in general. Pascoe has taken a look at the similarity between iron ore and dairy prices since 2013 - both have more or less halved in value over the period - and concluded that there is a hard landing in store for New Zealand. Read more

A week just spent in the glittering, throbbing city-state metropolis that is Hong Kong, is a reminder that there is a lot more to this place than its stunning night-time skyline. Rolls Royce cars and Ferraris adorn its streets, perhaps to an uncomfortable degree from an egalitarian Kiwi perspective, yet labour-intensive, bespoke suits are still much cheaper than in New Zealand. Read more

The elections in the state of Saxony a couple of weeks ago mark a historic shift in Germany’s political landscape. The liberal, business-friendly Free Democrat Party got kicked out of parliament, having lost two thirds of their previous voters and being left with only 3.8 percent of the vote. Read more

In last week’s Insights, Oliver Hartwich talked about the dismal science but did not note the origins of the term. Economics came to be known as the dismal science because, during the mid-1800s, they worked with the Christian philanthropists of Exeter Hall to call for an end to British accommodation of foreign slavery. Read more