Long stories short, the top six things that stood out to me in our political economy around housing, climate and poverty in the week to Sunday, February 23 were:
Stats NZ reported on Thursday that none of the nine official measures of child poverty improved in the year to June 30, 2024. See more below in substack essentials.
Stats NZ reported on Thursday that 28.4% of renters were spending more than 40% of their disposable income on rent, up from 26.5% before covid. See more below in substack essentials.
Stats NZ reported on Monday the net loss of 72,000 New Zealand citizens in the 12 months to the end of December was the largest ever for calendar year, with 56% going to Australia. See more in chart of the week below.
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand announced on Wednesday it cut the Official Cash Rate by 50 basis points to 3.75%, as expected, and pulled forward its projection for three more 25 basis point cuts to the first half of this year from the second half of the year. See more below in substack essentials.
The Government welcomed the rate cut and prospects for more as the key ingredient in its hopes for economic recovery, but its own counter-productive and ongoing fiscal tightening, along with the way the RBNZ’s DTI rules will limit landlord lending to reflate the housing market is likely to frustrate their hopes, in my view.
Aotearoa-NZ now has to make some difficult and probably expensive decisions about how we work and trade with China and the United States after Donald Trump overturned 80 years of post-war certainty about how the US deals with and protects the allies it fought with in World War Two and the Cold War.
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Substack essentials elsewhere this week
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