Hard News: The sole party of government
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Farmer Green, in reply to
All good there Chris, but you didn't mention competitive advantage. I reckon that we may still have one or two of those.
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Jack Harrison, in reply to
Yes, lower vote turnout is not good for a democratic society, a society which gives us a strength to change. A million missing people who don't engage.
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mark taslov, in reply to
Yeah there’s a lot going on some of it is mindblowing, though I think this may be one of the examples that has taken Goverment funding and now may be on the way somewhere else. But those logs, IKEA knew what to do with logs, there’s no reason a company like that should monopolise. Though if the carbon produced in building a car is more than the carbon the car produces for the entirety of it’s lifetime, how much carbon is produced when building a plane? Not that I think we're in a position to be choosy, compromise being the name of the game.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
And yet again our media appear to be mathematically challenged.
Just as they haven't pointed out that National's loss in 2002 was even worse than Labour's loss last night. Anyone reading MSM would be sure this was the worst ever result for a major party. All they are quoting is how it's the worst for Labour since 1905 (or some other such distant past).
Can't remind the punters that it's not so long ago that the now "rock star" Bill English landed a bigger bomb of his own.
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mark taslov, in reply to
You seriously want me to have a go at that lot now?
I sure do Green, I’m always fascinated by your ideas, your thinking is in many ways revolutionary, so it's best you share as much as you can for us to digest.
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Farmer Green, in reply to
How do we use our primary goods sector efficiently, profits, jobs, new exports.?
C'mon Jack , we've just had how many successive think -tanks of industry leaders flown of to . . . Stanford was it . .. and they have all come back with the same answer. Added -value.
That means more people -input . . . . jobs , training, education, playing to our strengths , using our friggin' brains.
What's the hold-up? -
Amanda Wreckonwith, in reply to
Diversify, people! And let’s try and persuade the government to join in
It would be great if that were to happen.
Why would they bother though? It's much easier to dig for victory. The mining companies even help you to get that unobtainium out of the ground (conditions apply - see the small print). Worked for the Lucky Country - what could possibly go wrong? -
Jack Harrison, in reply to
Yep. Farmer Green, going to make you rich. Make policy. Share it.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
So when do we get the US flag ?
Those who know me will know I'm an ex-pat American - came to this South Pacific paradise in 1978, having married a Kiwi. We choose to live here for a very good reason (not to mention the fact that there are no such thing as meat pies in the US).
Oddly enough, I've just finally got round to becoming a NZ citizen a couple of weeks ago. Why did I never do this before? I never considered the US to be a threat to me, my family and my way of life before.
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Jack what we want to do is build capital . . . of all sorts , so that we have the resilience to withstand the shocks that a small country like ours will always be subjected to on the ocean where the big boys crash in to each other and make a lot of waves.
Capital - social , environmental, and economic. It must be built. Because we want a peaceful , inclusive nation.We all know this ; some of us can and do do it. But there aren't many of us at present.
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Farmer Green, in reply to
what could possibly go wrong?
You forgot the sarc tag :-)
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BenWilson, in reply to
There is no sense in which it is a “death tax”.
Well, except in the purely trivial sense, that all taxes are death taxes. You either pay them while you're alive, or they'll take the difference off you when you die.
But on Mark's statement
Labour wanted to slip in there and skim some off the top when they sell it. I can’t for the life of me understand the ethical position. It’s a death tax.
I don't find that hard to answer even if it is a non-trivial death tax. We used to have them in NZ and they were quite significant. The idea is that it reduces the currently tremendous power of inheritance to set up and maintain a class structure in society. Many of the world's greatest fortunes are things that spanned generations. The aristocratic stockpile of land, for instance. Inheritance tax was at least a partial leveler, although, like all other taxes, if you inherit a vast fortune and the state takes 30%, you're still inheriting a vast fortune.
I quite like the idea of it, even though I would personally probably pay quite a significant figure one day. We've become accustomed to it not being there and find the idea outrageous now. It's like we feel entitled to this gigantic gift we didn't actually do anything to deserve, for the most part. Somehow that's become axiomatic, when in fact it's about as unfair as any possible way to organize the distribution of wealth.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
Ideally everyone would be engaged in environmentally sustainable farming like you Green but where’s their land to work?
Landcorp outbid them on it (unless there was a foreign buyer willing to do so).
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mark taslov, in reply to
I never considered the US to be a threat to me, my family and my way of life before.
There not a threat to you Katharine, we've been in FIve Eyes since 1954 as I recall and before that, always allied with the worst of 'em. Most of those 88 people found to have been spied on in the Kitteridge report would have been under Helen Clark's Government, before then even this was going on. It is as John Key says "business as usual". 53rd state or whatever, farthest outpost of the empire. Tatooine even.
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Jack Harrison, in reply to
That's a pretty standard idea on the left (old term) too. Welcome over.
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mark taslov, in reply to
if you inherit a vast fortune and the state takes 30%, you’re still inheriting a vast fortune.
Sure but if you inherit 20 dollars and the state takes 6.66 you’re not. The real question here is how was it going to get an opposition party into power? Once your in, yes I can see how it would work, I can see how it could be slipped under the masses pillow, but as a marketing strategy for a political party it’s not powerful. An easy sell is simply CGT on trusts (300,000 trusts?) excl family homes which is later widened to encompass everything else.
The key reason I see it as a death tax is that, correct me if I’m wrong, but there is no inheritance tax in New Zealand, so if I’m dying and sell my family home before I die then I can pass the money on to relatives tax free, but if I fail to sell my family home in time, then the tax is owed due to my untimely death. What is that if not a death tax? Or are they taxing the money too? Do I need to invest in a collection?
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Amanda Wreckonwith, in reply to
You forgot the sarc tag :-)
So I did, thanks.
Now back to the greenhouse gasses - CO2, CH4, NOx - pollution or not? Something to change our current lifestyles to reduce the concentrations of? Or is it all a big conspiracy? -
Bart Janssen, in reply to
So what now
Privitasation of ACC abolition of RMA and Pharmac.
Potential privatisation of core health services.
Moar RONS! -
Farmer Green, in reply to
Yep. Farmer Green, going to make you rich. Make policy. Share it.
You'll have to do better than that to motivate me. My partner and I have jointly put in a month's work between us , every week , for the last 35 years. So 80 hours each, every week. You don't do that for money … at least I wouldn't .
We' might be pretty useless if we weren't well -off by now .. or we might have had some really bad luck.You probably know that there is scarcely a farm in the land that doesn't need to double , even triple, its labour force if the land is to be properly cared for, and to become its most productive in the widest sense.
But the current agricultural paradigm is not working ; it doesn't make enough money , and so extractive practices proliferate. That's not real farming in my book , but it come down to a lack of profitability.
That's the problem I set out to solve, and the answers were all tried and tested over hundreds of years. It wasn't an easy wicket , but I thought I could do it.If it remains that hard , then very few are going to do it.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
What’s the hold-up?
I recall the days of the NZDB. Seemed to me the whole strategy then was developing added-value brands for export .. Zap, and that sort of thing. Most highly prized marketing jobs in the country were with NZDB.
Fonterra seems only to be focused on more volume/commodity production (and management salaries, of course!).
But, I'm not in the industry so would be interested in your thoughts.
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Jack Harrison, in reply to
Death taxes made America and New Zealand survive the 1920s recession and set up distribution of wealth concepts that powered up their economies. Death taxes are perfectly capitalist. Survival of the fittest not the silverspoonishnest.
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TracyMac, in reply to
Until Lucy gets to it, here's one I made based on her figures.
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Michael Homer, in reply to
Well, except in the purely trivial sense, that all taxes are death taxes. You either pay them while you’re alive, or they’ll take the difference off you when you die.
... except in this actual case, because they only take it when you realise the gain, not when you die, which mark seems to think happens (or something). It's exactly the same cost at exactly the same time whether you're immortal or it's inherited a dozen times before it's sold. Someone dying makes no difference at all, which is as it should be.
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Katharine Moody, in reply to
Yes, lower vote turnout is not good for a democratic society, a society which gives us a strength to change. A million missing people who don’t engage.
" The highest measure of democracy is neither the extent of freedom nor the extent of equality, but rather the highest measure of participation."
Alain de Benoist
" The obstacles to democracy have little to do with culture or religion, and much more to do with the desire of those in power to maintain their position … at any cost."
Kofi Annan
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Graeme Edgeler, in reply to
I read earlier that Labour only won the party vote in five electorates. I’m not sure that’s true, but it feels it.
Twelve electorates.
Dunedin North
Kelston
Māngere
Manukau East
ManurewaHauraki-Waikato
Ikaroa-Rāwhiti
Tāmaki Makaurau
Te Tai Hauāuru
Te Tai Tokerau
Te Tai Tonga
Waiariki
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