Friday, May 06, 2011

Mr Tactless

Not quite Hone Harawira but....

Am I being pc because this guy makes me wince?

"What's so tragic about a 6.6 per cent jobless rate anyway?" asked Bank of New Zealand economist Craig Ebert.

Ex Treasury. Bloodless. Yeah, yeah and I'm a bleeding heart.

Mr Ebert obviously doesn't have friends or relatives who have lost jobs or businesses.

"A lot of countries would give their eye teeth for that sort of level, albeit we should hope for something a bit lower in due course. For a truly stuffed labour market, and economy, go back to the early 1990s, with 11.2 per cent [unemployment]."

Mr Ebert doesn't look old enough to have actually experienced the early 1990s. For the first time in my life I couldn't get a job and it is a most depressing, but empathy-building experience.

What really pisses me off is this supercilious attitude is what gives capitalism a bad name. Thoughtless prick.
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13 comments:

Anonymous said...

I agree, it is a "let them eat cake" stance.

Faversham

8:01 AM
Anonymous said...

Yep. Job-hunting is really tough going, let alone interviewing -means being treated like less than human.

He has a job. Talk about callous. Agree, does give capitalism a very bad name, and so do some prospective and heartless employers. They don't take chances on people anymore, they just want unfeeling robots, who have no famillies, needs or complaints. And each position these days requires the employee to do the job of two to three people. Unions! Come back!

8:21 AM
Anonymous said...

Am I being pc because this guy makes me wince?

Yep. Read the article, unemployment is being artificially lowered in Christchurch by people moving to part time.

More to the point, real elimination of benefits, and restructuring/re-balancing the economy needs unemployment sustained at 10-15% for at least 3-5 years.

That's the hard work NZ needs to do, that's one of the things the 2025 Taskforce report is designed to produce - and we haven't even started yet.

Or we can keep borrowing up to $1 BILLION dollars every week to pay dole we have no way of affording!

8:50 AM
Kiwiwit said...

I agree the economist is, like all of his contemporary ilk, a twit. However, blaming capitalism for unemployment is like blaming gravity for rain falling on your head. The market will always adjust to the sum total of its political and economic environment. A more useful discussion would be around what are the current political factors that act to discourage people from starting and growing businesses and therefore employing people? Now that discussion would take more than this little comments window allows.

8:55 AM
FAIRFACTS MEDIA said...

I agree Lindsay, some people, including bosses are their own worst enemies.
Were it not for bad bosses, unions and the Liarbour Party would not have been created.
You have my sympathy about having trouble finding work.
I am in the same predicament.
I hope it is not an age thing.
But today at a newspaper that will remain nameless I had an interview.
The editor was 30ish and her deputy about 20-25, young enough to be my son!
I felt very old afterwards and remembered when I was that age on a daily paper in England and a colleague likened the paper to a Children's Crusade.
Trouble is, employers do need the wisdom, skills and experience of us old timers.
And I'm still in my early 40s!

10:19 AM
Anonymous said...

Fairfacts Media, they don't care about experience these days, it's all abouit jumping over hurdles, endless mind games, and having obvious money and shining good looks. All men and women are supposedly born equal!

11:31 AM
Anonymous said...

Obviously Fairfacts Media, you don't expect to get that job, the paper may remain nameless, but reading this, they may know who you are.

Good luck with it all!

11:33 AM
Anonymous said...

A more useful discussion would be around what are the current political factors that act to discourage people from starting and growing businesses and therefore employing people?

Not really: that is also common sense: corporate tax rates, FBT tax rates, anti-employer legislation like the ERA, holidays act, and legally-permitted unions. It's all in the 2025 Taskforce report: go and read it.

The bill to remove all of those would be slightly over three pages in length - Brash already has the repeal acts ready to go!


Were it not for bad bosses, unions and the Liarbour Party would not have been created.

Completely and utterly naive. Labour and Unions are communists - they hate "bosses" and hate successs. It wouldn't matter if every "boss" paid every "worker" $1M per year and gave 11 months leave - they'd still agitate and strike.

11:46 AM
Anonymous said...

on the subject but off on a tangent I remember my youth in Petone back in the 50's. I went to primary school with Robert Cameron who in later life became one of Fay Richwhites inner circle. We used to play cowboys and indians together and I sometimes wonder if our immaginary games of holding up the stage for the strongbox followed Robert into New Zealands world of high finance?
To think, I might have unintentionaly helped shape the New World as we know it. WOW!

Dirk

4:44 PM
Lindsay Mitchell said...

"...blaming capitalism for unemployment is like blaming gravity for rain falling on your head."

I wasn't. But the labour market is a feature of capitalism. I believe the more unfettered the market, the greater the employment rate would be.

Fairfacts, good luck. When we had the opportunity to meet I found you a likeable sort so no doubt others will :-) BTW hope you make it to Wellington again soon. There is always a glass of bubbly with your name on it.

4:46 PM
Anonymous said...

Define your objectives clearly, and move towards them in quantum leaps, otherwise the interest groups will have time to mobilise and drag you down


Wipe them out: unions, Labour, Greens, and the rest of the leftists. Wipe them all out. Finish the job Roger started.

7:52 PM
James said...

Earth to Anon....Unions ARE a part of the market...they have every right to form and negotiate on behalf of their members.

To ban them you would in effect be banning peaceful, consensual interaction and freely chosen pursuit of a common purpose,as well as the rights to liberty and property in ones person...all of which are basic tenets of free market Capitalism.

Do read a book sometime please...

10:38 PM
Anonymous said...

Earth to Anon....Unions ARE a part of the market...they have every right to form and negotiate on behalf of their members.


Rubbish. We don't let the mafia operate in NZ. We don't let biological terrorists or bombers operate in NZ. We shouldn't let communist economic terrorists operate either.

Any "union" or any other econo-terrorist group which damages NZ businesses should be personally civilly and criminally liable for the damage to that business. It really is that simple.

11:07 PM

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