Bernard - I feel that this note has slipped over the line from analysis to activism. IMO the PREFU definitely did not "expose the Opposition’s claims about the Government being ‘addicted to spending’". I am yet to hear a good explanation for why core crown spending went from $74b in 2017 to $128b this year (per PREFU). That is a 73% incr…
Bernard - I feel that this note has slipped over the line from analysis to activism. IMO the PREFU definitely did not "expose the Opposition’s claims about the Government being ‘addicted to spending’". I am yet to hear a good explanation for why core crown spending went from $74b in 2017 to $128b this year (per PREFU). That is a 73% increase and spending this year is *higher* than during COVID. Some commentators have tried to suggest this number is much lower on a real per capita basis, but why should government spending increase in perfect correlation with inflation or population? Wage inflation has lagged consumer prices, and we don't need more policy analysts when more people enter the country. Also, isn't adjusting government spending for inflation a bit circular when one of the drivers of inflation is....the government spending? This would all be OK if we were getting better services but I see little evidence of that and there are numerous anecdotes of very low quality spending (bike bridge consultancy, Te Pukenga centralisation, etc). I am genuinely curious about this, but don't have the time to do the serious analysis needed to assess it. Blaming it on the floods is insufficient. The increase in spending has been so large, that it demands a line-by-line reconciliation of what has driven the additional spending and what the rationale for that spending is. I don't need or want a tax cut, but I sure would like the taxes I pay to be well spent.
Bernard - I feel that this note has slipped over the line from analysis to activism. IMO the PREFU definitely did not "expose the Opposition’s claims about the Government being ‘addicted to spending’". I am yet to hear a good explanation for why core crown spending went from $74b in 2017 to $128b this year (per PREFU). That is a 73% increase and spending this year is *higher* than during COVID. Some commentators have tried to suggest this number is much lower on a real per capita basis, but why should government spending increase in perfect correlation with inflation or population? Wage inflation has lagged consumer prices, and we don't need more policy analysts when more people enter the country. Also, isn't adjusting government spending for inflation a bit circular when one of the drivers of inflation is....the government spending? This would all be OK if we were getting better services but I see little evidence of that and there are numerous anecdotes of very low quality spending (bike bridge consultancy, Te Pukenga centralisation, etc). I am genuinely curious about this, but don't have the time to do the serious analysis needed to assess it. Blaming it on the floods is insufficient. The increase in spending has been so large, that it demands a line-by-line reconciliation of what has driven the additional spending and what the rationale for that spending is. I don't need or want a tax cut, but I sure would like the taxes I pay to be well spent.
Were you away on another planet when the Earthquakes, Pandemic and climate disasters struck?