The ultimate call for compensation

Cut and paste in full from Samizdata. Only the exclamation mark led me to suspect it was....well read for yourself. Local substitutions could be made and the piece becomes entirely relevant to this country.

I demand reparations for the crimes committed against women by men!

Natalie Solent (Essex) · African affairs · North American affairs · Philosophical

My case to receive reparations is just as solid as the case for reparations to be paid to African-Americans by lesser-hyphenated-Americans.
Many members of a group to which I belong by accident of birth were enslaved by the group to which you belong by accident of birth (talking to you, heterogametic oppressors). Don’t waste my time with talk about how the law has given women equal legal status to men for generations now, because we are still poorer than you. Well some of us are poorer than some of you and some of us are richer than some of you, but let me tell you that even if I’m doing fine myself, the thought of people with bodies more like mine being on average poorer than people with bodies less like mine is a profound hurt that can only be assuaged by money.
No, the fact that you personally have never enslaved, beaten or otherwise oppressed a woman is not relevant. Can’t you see this thing is bigger than mere individual morality?
You can stop whingeing about how lots of men in history were oppressed quite as much as women were, or how people of both sexes were oppressed on many grounds other than gender, such as class, religion, nationality and race. I am quite aware of that already and join with all victim-groups in unbreakable solidarity, unless any of the oppressors included my ancestors such as to place me in a paying-out group, in which case the notion of paying reparations for the crimes of one’s ancestors is ridiculous. It is the present – a present in which many women are cruelly oppressed – not the past that matters! (Er, when it comes to us getting the money, that is. When it comes to deciding who pays the money, it’s the situation centuries ago that matters, obviously.)
Anyway, why should an artificial construct like “nationality” or “race” be the factor that determines who gets reparations? Gender, unlike race, can be determined objectively. Make gender the criterion and you will be troubled by very few of those pettifogging legalisms you get with race about how all the mixed ancestry people would have to pay reparations to themselves.
Cease your caterwauling about how your great-grandpa once put half a crown in a suffragette collection box. Obviously guilt can be inherited (by you) but the notion of heritable credit is contrary to reason.
None of your man-splainin’ nonsense about being partially descended from women, either. I’m certainly not going to let myself off from the solemn duty of identifying solely with my own gender just because some of my ancestors were men. See, if I can maintain decent standards of group segregation, so can you.
Do not presume to ask how many generations must go by before your group is to be permitted to cease its duty of unrequited toil (mediated via the tax collector and the Reparations Administration Agency) for the benefit of my group. Be assured that we will let you know when we no longer want your money. Until then, woe to that man by whom the offense cometh. That’s you, that is.

May 23rd, 2014 |

Metiria Turei: Govt "punishing" newborns

On Wednesday Green's co-leader Metiria Turei questioned John Key about the extra assistance for newborns in the budget. She wanted to know why the Parental Tax Credit wasn't being extended to children of beneficiary parents. In fact she asked for it to be immediately extended and the Prime Minister said, "No". Turei has now twisted this into:

"It’s bad enough to punish an adult for not having a job but to punish a newborn baby is a step too far," Mrs Turei said.

Adults are not punished for not having a job. They are supported by the benefit system. This country is amongst the most generous in the world in its means-tested but otherwise universal  social security coverage for the unemployed.

When a child is born to someone on a benefit they receive extra weekly financial assistance. That is the Family Tax Credit. It used to be called Family Support. Back in 19931 the maximum amount for the first child was $42 and additional children received $22 (with 16-18 year-olds receiving the higher of the two payments).

According to the Reserve Bank inflation calculator

A basket of goods and services
that cost $1.00
in quarter 4 of 1993
would have cost

$1.55

in quarter 1 of 2013

Total percentage change	54.8%
Number of years difference	19.25
Compound average annual rate	2.3%
Decline in purchasing power	35.4%
Index value for 1993 quarter 4 is	758.4
Index value for 2013 quarter 1 is	1174.0

OK. So if Family Support had been linked to inflation it would now be worth $64 for the first child, and $34 for additional children. In fact it is much higher.

Today it is $92 for the first, $157 for two, etc.


So newborns, regardless of their parent's source of income are well-supported by the government. They are not punished.

Metiria Turei's description of the situation of children of beneficiaries is deceitful. The Family Tax Credit was not increased in the budget because it would have been inconsistent with the philosophy of incentivising work.

1/ Social Developments, Tim Garlick, p146

Where is the National Candidate for Hutt South on cannabis decriminalisation today?

Chris Bishop has been selected as National's Hutt South candidate for the 2014 election. As it is my electorate and I would very much like to see it taken from Trevor Mallard I'm naturally interested in the prospects of this happening. As I was just corresponding with a friend about cannabis decriminalisation it occurred to me to see whether Mr Bishop has any stated views on the matter.

In 2003 (I am assuming this is the same Chris Bishop) he was Muriel Newman's representative in the Youth Parliament. A mock bill was drawn up regarding the partial decriminalisation of cannabis which the youth parliament debated and voted on. Chris Bishop is recorded as:

On the Right, Christopher Bishop, from Lower Hutt, saw the bill as increasing personal freedom.

And

Christopher Bishop, youth MP for Muriel Newman, argued "instant fines isn't the solution, we need a system that will control the cannabis market such as a regulation model."

Wonder where he stands 11 years on?

(National should be applauded for selecting some relatively young candidates this time around.)

"Poverty driving road deaths" - Dog and Lemon

The following thoughts are worthy of wider circulation. The fatalistic attitudes described don't just lead to road deaths. They lead to premature deaths from ill-health and other risk-taking behaviour:

“Poverty isn’t just a lack of money; it’s a lack of knowledge and a lack of understanding. Middle-class car drivers believe in cause and effect, so they buy safe cars and wear seatbelts. Many poor people see life as something that just happens to them, and that they can’t control. Therefore, to poor people, road accidents are simply bad luck, rather than bad management.”

“Worse, in many country areas, there’s no public transport, so the poor often drive illegal cars that won’t protect the occupants in a collision.”

“Among the poor, substance abuse is often considered normal, and if drink-driving causes an accident, it’s considered bad luck, not irresponsible, behaviour.”

“As far as the poorest of the poor are concerned, life is crap, but junk food, cigarettes and alcohol make it bearable. So when you tell these people not to smoke, drink and over-eat, what they hear is: ‘I want you stop enjoying life’. This is a crazy view, but that’s the way many poor people think.”

Sounds to me like he is describing  rural (and perhaps to a lesser degree urban) inter-generational welfare  dependency.

Smoking: relationship between smoking and deprivation

Hot off the press, the graph below shows the percentage of smokers in each deprivation area, 10 being the most deprived. The data is extracted from the Census 2013 and was released this month in the NZDep2013 Index of Deprivation

Figure3: Current smoking in 2013 by NZDep2013

The chicken and egg question poses itself. Do people smoke because they are deprived, or are they deprived because they smoke?

Stephen Berry standing for ACT

ACT has just announced Stephen Berry will be standing in the Upper Harbour electorate. That's good news. With Libertarianz no longer contesting electorally, I am delighted to see one of their past candidates joining up with ACT. Stephen is very committed to individual rights and small government. Hope he gets a decent list ranking.

Cost of smoking for the 'poor'

Yesterday I blogged, "Who can afford to smoke?"

To flesh out just how much cigarettes have risen in relation to incomes here are some numbers.

In 1974 - 40 years ago - a packet of Rothmans or Pall Mall cost 42 cents. I know because I used to buy them.

The people most likely to smoke today are Maori females. They also rely disproportionately on the DPB for their income. So let's peg 42 cents to the (basic) weekly DPB rate which, in 1974 was $26.85.

A packet of cigarettes cost someone on the DPB 1.5% of their weekly income.

Fast forward to 2014. The DPB (Sole Parent Support) rate is now $299.45 and a packet of cigarettes is $26.90 - now a whopping 9 percent of the beneficiary's (basic) weekly income.

If you are Maori and smoke, you'd have to be a masochist to vote for either the Maori or Mana Parties, both instrumental to the ongoing tax hikes and now, a 75% cut to the duty free allowance.

Who can afford to smoke?

A friend was under the weather and she asked me to pick up a few items from the local supermarket.  A couple of items were identified. "Are you sure there's nothing else," I asked?

"You wouldn't buy ciggies would you..."  reluctantly, a facet of the induced guilt smokers now carry. "Course I will." She'd told me the brand was either 'mild' or 'mellow'. As she was also describing her coffee choice, there was probably some confusion between the two.

I arrived at the counter of my local supermarket, a couple of other items in the basket, with a written description in hand. The ciggies reside in a solid cabinet. I said,  "I want two packets of Horizon mild or mellow, please."
"But we don't know which they are," was the response. "What colour is the packet?"
"I don't know, I replied. I'm buying them on behalf of. Which ever packet has the words mild or mellow on it I expect."
"But we can't open the cabinet to show you", they said, as the queue behind me grew. An awkward, absurd, impasse was reached.

"They are for my friend  --- ". Eureka. The magic password. They recognised her name. The non-visibility vault was opened and the cigarettes surrendered. As per usual I handed over my eftpost card and didn't even look at the receipt.

Today my reimbursement arrived in cash. When I opened the envelope I thought, surely there must have been a mistake. Immediately my stomach sank because I thought I had handed her a receipt that was in error because I hadn't checked it.

The receipt was also contained in the envelope though. It revealed two packs of the chosen ciggies were $53.80.

$53.80

My friend is a extremely talented professional with letters after her name to boot. But, by my observations, she probably has a two pack a day habit. That's nearly $20,000 a year.

It makes me furious. Hopping mad. This rapacious government, urged on by the  mealy-mouthed Maori- saving- Maori obsessive, is stealing from smokers way over and above what their average healthcare costs are. Way back the government was already taking enough to meet the health needs of tobacco users. Now it can only claim to be attempting to price them out of their personal choice for their own good.

My working friend will be paying income tax on top of her tobacco excise. A point will arrive one day when she is working just to smoke.

More fool her, you can say. BUT we now live in a country where non-smokers are protected from any secondhand effects, where smokers are paying for their health care three to four times over. It is her choice and her freedom to smoke if she wishes.

But what of those on  low incomes?

For some time I have put up the facts showing household income inequality is static- to- falling. But when the constantly increasing cost of smoking is accounted for, the poor probably are getting relatively poorer.

As I said it makes me very angry, and very upset for those people who are quite addicted. But above all, who CHOOSE to smoke. What business, at this point, is it of the state's?

Student loans a "welfare-state scam"

This is a new take on student loans, completely applicable to NZ:

From Jacob Hornberger:

The federal student loan program ranks among the biggest scams of the welfare-state way of life that modern-day Americans have embraced.
An article in the Washington Post entitled “College Debt Is Still Keeping Grads from Buying Homes,” points out that “young people are still drowning in student loans, and that debt is holding them back from reaching grown-up financial milestones, like buying a house, according to a new report Tuesday.”
Here is how the scam works.
Federal officials point to the student-loan program and declare, “Your parents can’t afford to send you to college. We can help you go to college by lending you the money. Without our help, you’ll have to live without a college degree.”
So, both students and parents think to themselves, “Oh, aren’t we lucky to be living with such a good and benevolent government? What would we do without it? We certainly couldn’t go to college without federal loans. Praise the government for lending us the money! Praise the troops for defending our freedom!”
But neither the parents nor the students ever ask why it is that the parents lack the money to pay for their children’s education. That’s because parents and students, thanks to public (i.e., government) schooling, have never learned how to engage in critical thinking. They just innocently accept whatever the authorities feed to them.
That’s why they don’t ask the critical question: Where does the federal government get the money to lend to the students?
The answer? They get it from the parents themselves!

More

Fairness analogy flawed

Academic Deborah Russell delivers a lecture in taxation fairness in today's Herald on Sunday. She argues for progressive tax as opposed to flat. She says she asks her students to suggest what a fair tax system would look like and then uses this analogy to prove her answer is the right one:

Think of it like this. Imagine three people wanting to look over a fence to see a parade: a short person, a middling person and a tall person. If we find a box of exactly the same size for each of them to stand on, then the short person still can't see over the fence, and the tall person has a great view. That's "fair" because we made sure each of them had the same size box — but the short person is left staring at the fence.
Then imagine if we gave two boxes to the short person, and the tall person just stood on the ground. Each person could see the parade because we made sure that we took their individual needs into account. That's being fair, too.
So which sort of fairness is best? Treating everyone exactly the same or treating people according to their needs? The right of politics prefers people to be treated the same. The left thinks we ought to take some account of individual needs so everyone can get a fair go.

I hope at least some of her students have the wits to point out that height is an accident of birth. I am myself the person who would need two boxes to see over the fence.

But in real life I've never be needy in terms of tax redistribution because before marriage I was almost constantly employed. After marriage we had children we could afford, didn't spend what we didn't have, and have stayed together.

Some degree of good fortune, maybe. But where people fall in the "individual needs" stakes is very much influenced by factors within their control. Unlike race, gender or ...  height.

Half a million children known to CYF?

This is an interesting statement contained in the budget announcement about extra funding for vulnerable children

“One per cent of children known to Child, Youth and Family – around 5,000 children –  go on to cost New Zealand $550,000 each by their early 30s in corrections and welfare services.

Half a million children are known to CYF?

Over what period I wonder.

According to an MSD research paper one in five born in 1993 became known to CYF over their childhood to the age of 17.

Cost of marginalising Labour

The $172 million extension of Paid Parental Leave, said to be electorally popular,  is one of the big-ticket items in today's budget. Based on Treasury advice, there was no case for the government to extend Paid Parental Leave (beyond buying votes and sidelining Labour.)

Here's what I wrote about it in December 2013:

...last year Treasury analysed who was using paid parental leave, labour market outcomes, and child health outcomes. It found that, "...there is not a strong evidence-based argument to support extending the length of paid parent leave."

Treasury's report states, "...the majority of mothers return to work when the baby is six months old...". Marginal benefits to labour market participation and child health and well-being would therefore be small. Additionally, it notes, "...the most vulnerable children are likely born into families where parents are not eligible for paid parental leave...".

In a discussion about improving income adequacy it found that the arguments are "weak" as "the current access group are likely to be middle and high income women with stable employment." Of the 32,000 paid parental leave recipients in 2011/12, 58 percent were earning over $40,000; 27 percent were earning over $60,000.

Treasury also noted a possible negative impact for employers, particularly small to medium enterprises, as their costs are, "...likely to be more significant as the length of parental leave increases." This could give rise to greater discrimination against child-bearing age females in the labour market.

A fine example of the irrational policies thrown up by redistributive democracies.

Australian welfare spending

Australia needed to cut their welfare spending.

Although government spending overall is a smaller proportion of GDP than New Zealand's, 41 percent goes on  Social Security and Welfare

In contrast New Zealand's Social Security and welfare spend makes up 32 percent of the total.

One of the measures Australia is taking is pushing up pension eligibility age to 70:

"Over the past 100 years, there has been little change in the Age Pension eligibility age; however, over the same period the average life expectancy has increased by 25 years to around 85 years."

A point I have been making about NZ Super for a long time.

When the first Old Age Pension was instituted in 1898 the qualifying age was 65. Today it is unchanged. In his 1997 work Reforming New Zealand Welfare, Michael Jones wrote,

“If the age of eligibility for New Zealand Superannuation was adjusted to equal average periods on the aged pension in 1900, the eligibility would now be 75 for men and 80 for women.”

Winston denial about horse ownership is not adding up

Winston Peter's name is still listed in the ownership of Bellazeel.

It was winning only 5 months ago but Winston says:

"I only had an interest for a short time, but it's been out to pasture for years." 

Bellazeel, a 5 year-old Zabeel mare, would be extremely valuable as a brood mare, especially with her 3 win record. Even if Peters relinquished his share I doubt it would be without return.

Update: Peters says he had a short term leased share in the horse purchased at a charity auction in 2008, which is when the horse would have been born. Seems odd to me because a horse isn't going to return anything until it is at least a 2YO. You'd want to be in for the long haul, particularly as a propsective broodmare.

Update 2: Stuff reports, " New Zealand Thoroughbred confirmed this afternoon that according to its records, Peters continued to part-own a racing lease on the horse"

Media bias

Not aided by an interviewer determined to make ACT's budget look bad, Jamie Whyte was eventually able to make some valuable points.

He told Espiner that to argue that people should be allowed to consume things without paying for them is a ridiculous argument.

If Whyte needs some training in how to handle hostile media Guyon would be the perfect person to provide it. Seems to be the go according to Karl du Fresne.

David Cunliffe and his sappy comments

On-line over on The Standard yesterday David Cunliffe made this comment:
 

Our priority is to get kids out of poverty – that’s why our Best Start payment includes the children of beneficiaries; they shouldn’t bear the brunt of their parents’ misfortune.

Misfortune? What does that mean? Bad luck? An accident?

When one in five babies is either born onto a benefit or arrives there shortly after, how much of an accident is it?

Obviously some children will have a temporarily unemployed parent. Or a parent who has been abandoned. I accept some parents may have suffered a degree of misfortune.

But when nearly 11,700 of the babies born last year were welfare dependent by the end of December, I can only conclude something beyond bad luck is the cause.

I don't want to 'beat-up' on parents on benefits, but if we don't understand the nature of the problem, how will we ever address it?

CPAG making false claims again

According to the NZ Herald:

University of Auckland senior lecturer and Child Poverty Action Group spokeswoman Susan St John said tax credits should be extended to beneficiary families and indexed to inflation.

"A lot of newborns get nothing - they get nothing from paid parental leave or tax credits. The most cost-effective way is to give all low-income children the same weekly assistance."

That's bull.

Family tax credit (FTC) is paid regardless of your source of income.

I read the above quote out to my husband. He accepted it. He said he didn't realise children on benefits got more than just their parent's benefit.

The Family Tax Credits, plus accommodation supplement (or income related rent), plus the basic benefit rate all add up to make welfare a viable option.

CPAG want to make is even more viable.
 

Income redistribution is great ... but not by government

The NZ Herald reports the Spirit Level authors are in New Zealand to lecture us about inequality, no doubt to boost the electoral chances of the left. Simon Collins writes:

But in New Zealand, the Labour Party is struggling to get inequality off the ground as an election issue. Professor Hazledine points to a 2006 survey of 32 countries which found New Zealanders were less supportive of redistributing income from the rich to the poor than people in any other nation.

The question asked was, "Do you think it should be the government's responsibility to reduce income differences between the rich and the poor?"

But I notice in Simon Collin's description of the finding he has ommitted  word 'government'. He talks about redistribution with the implicit assumption it's a  function of government. For the left 'income redistribution' and 'government' go hand in glove.

I am all for income redistribution. But not by the government. By unfettered exchange of goods and services and formation of family units that endure, and build wealth.

Government has made people poorer than they would have been through too much welfare, too much employment legislation, and too much taxation.

There must still be some sense of this amongst the population, reflected in NZ's position at the bottom of this table. Let's hope a similar or better response would occur in 2014.

A breath of fresh air

ACT's alternative budget is a desperately needed breath of fresh air:

This alternative budget highlights how far

National, Labour, The Greens and New Zealand

First have moved from sound economic policy.

These politicians peddle the self-aggrandizing

fantasy that if only they had a bigger role in the

economy, it would grow faster. If only they took

more of our money in taxation, spent it for us,

decided which businesses we should invest in,

who we should sell our products to, how we

should use our property, the terms on which we

may be employed and almost everything else,

then we would all be better off.

ACT is the only party that utterly rejects this

foolish and ugly idea.

For all seventeen pages go here.

One measure made me scratch my head. Abolishing the Ministry of Pacific Affairs. Only because there is no accompanying  abolition of Te Puni Kokiri, the Ministry of  Maori Affairs. Under Jamie Whyte ACT has indicated it wants to steer well clear of any perceived anti-Maori feeling. Fair enough. But this approach is hardly a principled, consistent rejection of publicly-funded ethnic collectivism.

Labour's attitude to other people's money

Labour MP Sue Moroney says:

“The select committee report shows the impact of the Bill would be just 0.05% of the crown funds being spent in this year's budget."

What is .05% of $72 billion?

I make 0.05% $36 million

Extending Paid Parental Leave to 6 months is calculated to cost $138 million according to Treasury.

Oh what's a mere $100 million.