Good point.  Although I was under the impression that the minimum wage was only binding for a small number of people.

Also if that was their entire justification for it, they could have just increased the minimum wage by more – rather than trying to sell it as a general policy for everyone.

Agreed.  It would be nice if the media pushed to actually discover information, rather than sensationalising everything.

There are people in the media that do great work, but they just don’t have the hours in the day to deal with all this misinformation 🙁

Good points as always – so we need to develop the right institutions right … like an independent body to cost and discuss trade-offs with party policies 😉

Politicians would call you anything that they thought helped them get elected. I’m pretty sure the social contract isn’t with the politicians, which is why we have elections every now and then to hold them to account.

I suppose we’ll have to agree to disagree about the morality of Labour’s actions. I don’t find them in the least objectionable: it’d be nice if politicians were fair and balanced but their incentives just aren’t set up that way. We’re just lucky that people like you are here to set the record straight. It seems likely to be a stable equilbrium 🙂

Muldoon said, don’t worry about that – the government would pay.  And that is where we are now.

The idea of setting up a Kiwisaver scheme that was opt out made sense.  The subsidies, and the random “employer” “employee” contributions were just a pile of crap thrown on to make the whole scheme something politicians could sell to make it look like they are doing something special.

So I don’t disagree with having Kiwisaver there to frame something different – but parties using it as a lolly scramble device, one where they promise things that are misleading especially, is a pain in the ass.

“Don’t you think thats a bit pedantic Matt?”

No.

“If someone interpreted the statement as meaning that their long term wages would not be impacted, they mislead themselves, because that is not at all what the statement says.”

Umm, they announced that they were doing it this way to avoid pain to households – how do you expect non-economists to interpret this?  Non-economists are smart, but they aren’t accustomed to the idea of tax incidence, and are likely to view this statement as suggesting that it will be employers paying for them … people often see prices as magical, you have to be trained to think of prices in terms of a market and trade – it isn’t in our set of natural views.  In this context, I can understand where these types of views come from.

And Labour is manipulating it here for the sole interest of trying to get elected – I’m not exaggerating in the slightest when I say that the abuse of asymmetric information makes me feel sick, angry, and generally grumpy.

“Moreover, you completely got it when you said that over time wages would adjust.”

And the policy is phased in at 0.5% a year … well below inflation, and so well within the range of normal adjustment.

“So, “because we know families are finding it hard to make ends meet right now””

Because the policy is being phased in … so the implication is that the reason for doing it is because they will still be struggling at that point.

“To fund superannuation by compulsory taxation or by pre-funded compulsory savings and investment.”

At least compulsion through tax (national super) is transparent and is for a “minimum living standard” – they are just trying to take out tail risk.  Trying to force people to set up their entire retirement savings is at best social planning – and at worst a pain in the ass.

“I do find the arguments put up that households will simply substitute away from other forms of savings that they do a little bit immature”

And empirically true.  And policy relevant.

“Its not as if overall savings levels in Australia fell after they introduced compulsory superannuation savings.”

Why would they fall in the face of compulsion?  No-one said aggregate saving would fall – just that it would likely be misallocated.

Have you noticed that the biggest proponents of it in New Zealand are fund managers and their ilk … there is a good reason for that.