Posts by Terence W

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  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    What Don Christie said.

    What Don Christie said.

    And, what Don Christie said.

    Thanks Don.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    arrggghh reposted with better tags:

    If it was entitled "scientific articles used in this book here" then you couldn't really complain.

    But it isn't, so I am.

    I just found the demands of scientists to be taken off a list strange.

    The list calls them 'co-authors'. In light of this, surely they're entitled to ask for their names to be removed.

    Re the dead astrologer, I agree: it wasn't the fact that they were deceased that bugged me; more their profession.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    </quote>If it was entitled "scientific articles used in this book here" then you couldn't really complain.

    But it isn't, so I am.

    <quote>I just found the demands of scientists to be taken off a list strange.

    The list calls them 'co-authors'. In light of this, surely they're entitled to ask for their names to be removed.

    Re the dead astrologer, I agree: it wasn't the fact that they were deceased that bugged me; more their profession.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    Oh this is just sad. One of their experts is a dead astrologer...

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    Thanks for the second link Kyle - it's helpful to see the actual papers being cited.

    All my other criticisms stand though. And, explain to me again, why we shouldn't be criticising the Heartland Institute? They're the ones with it on their website.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Birthday Cheer for Ricky the…,

    <b>What Lyndon said<b>

    This isn't some sort of annotated bibliography. It's not *even a bibliography* (struggling not to lapse into caps here). <i>It is a list of names.</i>

    No details of particular publications are listed meaning that there is no way of checking the actual work in question. Nor are we able to check which names correspond to which of the seven (quite different) claims they are purportedly associated with.

    It's just utter nonsense. It's misleading (they call them co-authors FFS!), it's unscientific, it's unethical, it has no scholarly merit and the scientists involved are well within their rights to ask for their names to be removed.

    That some people here can't see this leaves me utterly puzzled.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Things To Do,

    How about no income tax for people earing under X K a year, that is far more manageable than GST changes. It's just another tax rate.

    Hi Sue,

    That is, in my opinion, a good idea (and what I was referring to when I wrote 'tax free threshold'). All the more so if benefits are currently taxed.

    Christopher,

    Thanks for an interesting comment.

    The idea that GST is regressive is actually a bit of a canard. Yes, at a given point in time, the rich save a higher proportion of their income. But over their lifetime high earners still tend to spend what they earn, so they pay the same rate in the end (more actually, because they pay tax on the returns from saving as well). Those that die with massive savings have actually done the rest of us a huge favour by, in effect, working for free all those years.

    But the wealthy could save more, if they so chose to; GST disproportionately denies the poor this ability - hence regressive.

    The latter reason is basically why tax changes are not a good solution to addressing poverty issues - they're never targeted enough. The same criticism applies to a tax-free threshold, and to a certain extent to minimum wage increases (which have plenty of other problems to boot).

    Not if you balance a tax free threshold with commensurate increases in your top marginal tax rate. Do this and you can ensure that the wealthy are no better off. Also, while I don't want to get into a debate about the broader merits or not of raising the minimum wage I struggle to see how it isn't in some way targeted to the most poor (at least among workers). Isn't that kind of inherent.

    The fact that Labour has done little (but not nothing) to increase direct targeted benefits probably has less to do with the "entrenched new right establishment" lurking under their beds in Wellington and more to do with the fact that beneficiaries aren't swing voters and increasing benefits isn't a popular policy with the middle class. It certainly doesn't resonate in election-year the way "interest-free student loans" does.

    Maybe, but adherents to the ideology in question certainly tried their best to paint beneficiaries as unworthy (remember those awful 80s 'documentaries'). And this still resonates, I think. Which makes the issue less likely to ever gain political traction.

    George D,

    Nice comment.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Things To Do,

    Linger:

    Essentially (b) noting that those people least able to afford meat will also be those least able to purchase bulk freezers and the like. And least able to afford the time involved (which also involves a considerable amount of research time to find out how to get it all done).

    By and large, I suspect that markets for meat in New Zealand come close enough to perfect competition for the price we pay in the supermarket to approximate the opportunity and other costs involved in DIY - for most people

    I'm not saying Steve's suggestion is a bad one mind you. Just that it doesn't surprise me that more people don't follow his advice. For the majority it ain't so easy to make the savings worth it.

    Back to work.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Things To Do,

    I'm amazed more people don't.

    I'm not.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

  • Hard News: Things To Do,

    doh. I started writing my comment when no comments had been posted, then got called out of my lunch break for an impromptu meeting. So, by the time it was posted, everyone had already said everything...

    Sorry for the repetition.

    YesWeCanberra • Since Mar 2008 • 41 posts Report Reply

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