Lindsay Mitchell

I posted earlier some opportunity cost examples Brian Scott provided in his critique of the living wage calculations. Kiwiblo g has now lin...

The graph below depicts the 'support ratio' for NZ over the next 46 years. The support ratio is the ratio of workers to consumers. ...

A reader sent me the following: Could these comments apply to NZ and Australia ? The top 1 percent of U.S. earners pay nearly 40 percent...

From Reason.com: A district court judge in Florida granted summary judgment for the plaintiff in a case challenging the constitutionality...

At 15.7 percent, Pacific people have higher unemployment than Maori at 12.2 percent.   Yet their reliance on benefits is low compared to M...

The current and beloved article of faith amongst leftists is rising inequality . Here's a very recent example from Boxing Day:   I...

Here's an interesting claim from a poster at the Daily Blog : Right now the minimum wage is so low that those receiving it look upon ...

Time for a break from the hand wringing promulgated by left-wing academics, politicians and media, and note some of the positive trends that...

Part of the 'poverty' proganda focuses on house size. In particular, how many children have to share a bedroom. While New Zealand...

Governments come and go with ambitious reform ideas and plans.  Treasury just keeps on forecasting numbers and expenditures seemingly reg...

Here's a passage written earlier this year by a female academic: New Zealand women are losing their human rights - the right to:  ...

The weather in Wellington has packed up so time for a bit of reading. After Colin James drew my attention to it, I thought I'd have a ...

I didn't want to blog today. But this couldn't go without comment. It's an extract from Colin James' Christmas message : ...

Social Development Minister, Paula Bennett, released a good-feel statement to end the year. Welfare reforms helping thousands get ahead...

Earlier this year I came across an MSD fact sheet "Children's contact with MSD services" . The title of the paper  had bee...

As mentioned previously, it gets increasingly difficult to get timely information out of MSD.  I only now have the complete answer to a ques...

The living wage wage was calculated by the Lower Hutt Family Centre Social Policy Research Unit, based on a two parent, two children family....

Jeepers. 8 years ago today I wrote my first blog post. Thinking back, the 2005 election had just been fought and lost. ACT dropped to 2 MPs ...

The graphic below shows one parent families as a percentage of all families dropping from 18.1 to 17.8 percent. Notice that percentage of...

The DomPost has produced a great editorial pointing out the folly of a council-led living wage: The stated aim of Wellington City Cou...