First in the world?

You will have read about New Zealand achieving the highest accolade for social progress in a report released today by a Washington think-tank. The following is a cut and paste of what was specifically written about NZ. Check out the italicised (my emphasis) section. Makes you wonder how bad it must be in other countries. 

Still, I have often inwardly reflected, if the poor Maori statistics were removed from many indicators, NZ looks pretty good. But I think to actually give expression to this indicates a disregard for Maori and particularly Maori children. Swept under the carpet no less. Just like we used to do in the "good old days":

New Zealand

Xavier Black, Senior Analyst Corporate Responsibility – Deloitte New Zealand

New Zealand’s strong performance on the 2014 Social Progress Index is, in part, a product of the country’s unique history. Developed as a colony of Great Britain, but with a deliberately more egalitarian outlook, New Zealand has taken a comparatively progressive approach in recognizing indigenous rights. Acknowledgment of the importance of self-determination has impacted not only Māori (the indigenous people) but the societal development of New Zealand as a multicultural nation.

This egalitarian tradition is reflected in a strong tradition of welfare provision. New Zealand citizens’ access to basic human needs and the foundations of wellbeing were provided by the state, and a number of such welfare provisions continue to the present day, despite a transition into more neo-liberal politics since the 1980s. State provision of education (and health to varying degrees) is entrenched within New Zealand, and as a result the country consistently rates well in this (ranked second on Access to Basic Knowledge and fourth on Access to Advanced Education), with the

marked exception of a few groups.

New Zealand is also recognized internationally as having a strong human rights record, ranking first on Personal Rights and Personal Freedom and Choice, and fourth on Tolerance and Inclusion.

A strong and independent judiciary system has power to enforce the rights affirmed through the Bill of Rights Act (1990) and the Human Rights Act (1993) while institutions exist to resolve unlawful discrimination (such as the Human Rights Commission) or protect the people from government

(such as the Ombudsmen). Since the 1980s, there has been significant progress in the hearing and settlement of historical breaches of the Treaty of Waitangi and the protection and revival of the Maori language. More recently, New Zealand has made gains in endorsing marriage equality. New

Zealand women also fare well, with a proud history of being the first nation to grant women the right to vote—resulting in 2 women becoming prime ministers over the last 20 years. While New Zealand has made significant gains in access and participation of women across a number of fields, violence against women, pay inequality and limited gender diversity at the top (in both the private and public sector) continue to persist as systemic and frustrating challenges.

New Zealand also faces some significant perennial challenges, on which there seems to be little progress. Persistent disadvantage is experienced by Maori in terms of social and economic development. Maori represented 50.6% of the prison population in 2013, despite making up only 15.4% of the population. Further, while gaps in academic achievement between Maori and non-Maori are narrowing, they remain stubbornly wide. The place of children in New Zealand is also of concern with suggestions that the lives of up to 20% of New Zealand children are neither as safe nor nurturing as they should be. The ranking of 31st in child mortality demonstrates that insufficient

attention is being paid to childhood injury, and at the far end of the spectrum, is partly evidenced by a 68% increase in recorded violent offences against children between 2008 and 2013.

The structural change to New Zealand’s economy in the 1980’s resulted in considerable change across the board, particularly focused on welfare provision; and the country continues to search for the optimal balance between market and state to address some of New Zealand’s more persistent

challenges. Like other countries, New Zealand is debating the rights and responsibilities of citizens and the role of the state in the 21st century, as a platform for sustained improvements in economic development and social progress.

Long term benefit dependency - no inroads made yet

MSD now only reports duration of benefit as less or more than 1 year so I put in an OIA to get the breakdown they previously published. I've graphed some of the data supplied. The first compares 2008 to 2013:

It's not a great picture. But perhaps to be expected given the GFC. The ten years plus dependency is a worry. With our rapidly ageing population the numbers long-term dependent should be moving onto Super at a faster rate than prior yet the number has actually increased slightly.

The height of the GFC effect was in 2010 so it's worth looking at what improvement there has been since:

As you'd expect the shorter term dependants decreased. But the 4-10 years number increased and the ten plus number has barely budged.

If I use the National government's official definition of long-term dependent  - one year plus - the percentage has actually increased ever so slightly between 2010 and 2013 from 69 percent to 69.4 percent.

David Cunliffe - a very unpleasant person

Keeping Stock has blogged about David Cunliffe's hour on NewstalkZB yesterday with Tim Fookes. It was an eye-opener for me, not a pleasant one. He is indeed a sneery, arrogant bully. And my post title reflects how he behaved towards the host at times, despite beginning most convivially.

But there was a bright moment (apart from when Cunliffe claimed John Key has more money than  God!?).

A caller rang in to ask Cunliffe why he wouldn't appear on a sister station's Farming Show. He replied that he had been advised not to because it had been rude to his predecessor. But in what you could hear the cogs of his mind churning as a magnanimous gesture on his part, he told the listener that, in future, he would appear.

How generous.

After Cunliffe left, Tim received a communication from the Farming Show team that he would not be invited on again any time soon. They had asked Shane Jones who had agreed to be their regular guest.

Outflanked again. Bad advice again.

Mr Cunliffe puts up an abrasive and aggressive front to control and to show he is in control. But there is a great deal of anger simmering which manifests in nastiness. And I don't think that anger is just the product of his opponents policies.

Daily Blog/Matt McCarten conspiracy theory busted

In February the Daily Blog screamed the headline, 

EXCLUSIVE: Billions of dollars stolen from the unemployed

EXCLUSIVE: Billions of dollars stolen from the unemployed - See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/01/30/billions-of-dollars-stolen-from-the-unemployed/#sthash.HGg7ojrP.dpuf

which claimed a hundred thousand plus people were being denied an unemployment benefit.

The number of those on average receiving a benefit compared to the number of unemployed in the household survey is now about 130,000 fewer than it was in the late 1990s.

The missing 130,000 are the reason why so many social agencies are being inundated for help for food, clothing, shelter despite the so-called recovery in the economy over the last year...
tax cuts for the rich have been paid for by denying entitlements to the poorest and most vulnerable is theft from working people of about a billion dollars a year. It is time to get angry.

The tax cuts for the rich have been paid for by denying entitlements to the poorest and most vulnerable is theft from working people of about a billion dollars a year. It is time to get angry. - See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/01/30/billions-of-dollars-stolen-from-the-unemployed/#sthash.vvibofX6.dpuf

Then Labour's Chief of Staff, Matt McCarten, still writing for the Herald on Sunday, picked up the accusation:

The 130,000 uncounted unemployed are officially invisible.
As such, they don't get a penny. The billion dollars they should be getting to survive keeps the government books nicely inflated.
It's not only cynically dishonest, but heartlessly cruel. Only totalitarian regimes get away with this.

So I asked the following question under the Official Information Act,  

In the years 2005 to 2013 how many unsuccessful applications for Unemployment Benefit were received/processed?

Here is the answer.

In December there were just over two and hundred fifty thousand people who were officially jobless. 130,000 people were receiving Jobseeker Support. Most of the balance have not applied. Indeed they may already be on other benefits. Those who did apply unsuccessfully, according to MSD,  "did not meet the criteria for an Unemployment Benefit" or presented with a "lack of evidence for eligibility."

The number of those on average receiving a benefit compared to the number of unemployed in the household survey is now about 130,000 fewer than it was in the late 1990s.
The missing 130,000 are the reason why so many social agencies are being inundated for help for food, clothing, shelter despite the so-called recovery in the economy over the last year.
- See more at: http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/01/30/billions-of-dollars-stolen-from-the-unemployed/#sthash.fdeskW7e.dpuf

Family structure and values strongly correlated to economic mobility

From NCPA today:

Thoughts on income inequality

...American Enterprise Institute Fellow Jonah Goldberg explains that liberals, in general, view inequality as a systemic problem -- that income is a sort of common good that should be distributed evenly. If it is not, the government or the system messed up. The right, he says, tend to see inequality as a symptom: if the poor are falling behind, it could be the result of poor job creation or stagnating wages. But Goldberg notes that inequality can largely be driven by non-economic issues. Family structure and values, he says, are much more strongly correlated with economic mobility than is income inequality.

Another murder. Another agonising heartbreak. Another perpetrator throws away their life.

Murders are fairly unremarkable in this country now.

But as I look at this young woman, I wonder why?

Numbers of murders have increased dramatically in New Zealand. In the 1950s a total of 95 people were murdered – an annual average of 9.5. In the 1970s the total number of murders rose to 281 – almost three times as many as in the 1950s. In the 1980s and 1990s there were over 500 murders per decade. While the total number of murders dropped slightly in the first decade of the 21st century, an average of 54.6 people were murdered each year. New Zealand's population grew from 1.9 million in 1950 to 4.36 million in 2009, but this does not explain why murders increased fivefold.

Source

Governments force up housing costs

Housing affordability isn't my subject but it's a given that government is behind many problems perceived as market-created by the Left.

The following supports the theory that government-limited land supply and barriers to building are significant factors in poor housing affordability.

From the Institute of Economic Affairs Kristian Niemietz looks at the affordability of property in Germany versus the UK.

...it is true that you could do a lot worse than being a tenant in Germany. I lived in various rental properties for six years there and found it to be a relatively tenant-friendly market. Perhaps the best ‘soft indicator’ for this is the fact that people there rarely talk about housing, whereas in London, the topic is constantly under discussion. Germany has consistently released more land for development than the UK, and has therefore consistently achieved higher levels of housing development (see Graph 1).... Germany has no green belts, no ‘Campaign to Protect Rural Germany’ and no National Trust. NIMBY hysterics are generally treated with the contempt they deserve.

 Graph 1: Dwellings completed per 10,000 inhabitants, UK vs Germany

 

 Graph 2: Ratio of average house prices to average incomes, UK vs Germany (1995 = 100)

 , cvomment.

 

Remembering feminist spiel from the sixties

As a teenager I read a couple of feminist books like the Women's Room, bought into the ideas for a few ...days maybe. But with the heart and mind of an individualist, the idea of treating all males as a class with the same unappealing characteristics quickly grated with me.

Here's a reminder of what the feminists of those times believed:

Liberal feminist icon Gloria Steinem turns 80 today. She once said that “A feminist is anyone who recognizes the equality and full humanity of women and men.”

Yet for all her talk about equality and rights, one right she worked diligently to deny millions of both sexes was the right to be born and celebrate birthdays of their own. Once again, in her view, a “woman’s right” trumped the rights of another—in this case, an unborn child.

The fact the Supreme Court is hearing a case today about employers being forced to include abortion-inducing drugs in their health plans—even if it violates an employer’s conscience—is in many respects a testament to the work of Steinem and others. It’s a good example of how the “equal rights” she championed result in stepping on the rights of others.

The liberal sisterhood railed against a society they said encouraged women to stay at home and raise children. They demanded the marketplace open up more opportunities for women and pay them the same as men. Fine. But what about women who choose differently?

Today’s young women are empowered to choose career, family, and all sorts of combinations of both. But the words of Steinem and other liberal feminists revealed what they believed about American women…

Steinem: “[Housewives] are dependent creatures who are still children…parasites.”
Simone de Beauvoir: “No woman should be authorized to stay at home and raise her children. Women should not have that choice, precisely because if there is such a choice, too many women will make that one.”
Betty Friedan: “[Housewives] are mindless and thing-hungry…not people. [Housework] is peculiarly suited to the capacities of feeble-minded girls. [It] arrests their development at an infantile level, short of personal identity with an inevitably weak core of self…. [Housewives] are in as much danger as the millions who walked to their own death in the concentration camps. [The] conditions which destroyed the human identity of so many prisoners were not the torture and brutality, but conditions similar to those which destroy the identity of the American housewife.”

Steinem has never been a fan of women who didn’t think like her or buy in to her radical feminist political agenda. “Having someone who looks like us but thinks like them (meaning men) is worse than having no one at all.”
So much for tolerance—and the belief that women are individuals who should be free to think and make choices for themselves.

Duncan Garner has a point

How long will it be before Duncan Garner enters politics? Because he has all the attributes of a budding Winston Peters rarking up public outrage with the worst statistics he can find.

In today's DomPost he writes that unemployed young kiwis should be forced to "work for the dole"
(the headline on-line is different) given the enormous need for labour in Christchurch.

The latest stats show 67,000 Kiwis aged 15-24 aren't in any form of education, training – or work. Some are no doubt getting really good at video games, funded by the taxpayer, but the reality is they're rotting away and learning nothing. We could fit them all into Westpac Stadium – twice over (the Hurricanes and the Phoenix could use that support).  

We need to get these young Kiwis off their backsides and into apprenticeships. I'm not suggesting that every beneficiary currently claiming the dole doesn't want to work – but we all know there are plenty who'll do anything to not get a job.

Only 26,887 - or 40 percent - are on the dole but that number is still unnecessarily high.

There are even 1,621 in the Canterbury region. The government has put some effort into getting the unemployed into work locally but that scheme only involved up to 100 unemployed, and not specifically 18-24 year-olds either.

I imagine the problem is skills are required now and apprenticeships actually divert qualified tradesmen away from the job at hand as they teach the apprentice.

But I agree with Garner. There is a golden opportunity going begging.

In a more general sense I have said the same about opportunities the ageing population will present in terms of the jobs their needs will create. More residential carers, in-home carers, various health workers, home maintenance providers, etc. While the government funds much of this, it makes total sense to be diverting dole money into training for these roles. How hard can it be?

The answer must be "very". It's easier to import able and willing workers and hope their productivity and taxes will support the unemployable.

Clear correlation between one parent families and deprivation

The reality that single parent families are responsible for much of the growth in relative child poverty is gaining traction. These two graphs highlight this dramatically. They are a bit dated but nothing has improved since.

They come from a Counties Manukau DHB report so use the health decile rating system whereby 1 is wealthiest and 10 is poorest

The first shows that in the wealthiest decile over 90 percent of children live in two parent families while in the poorest just over half live in two parent families:

 The next shows the same broken into ethnicities:

In the poorest decile around 22 percent of Asian children live in a one parent family compared to around 56 percent of Maori children. What a stark difference.

Quote of the Day

 From Future Freedom's daily newsletter, as relevant today as 164 years ago:

Once we start from this idea, accepted by all our political theorists [that] "The motive force of society is the government"; once men consider themselves as sentient, but passive, incapable of improving themselves morally or materially by their own intelligence and energy, and reduced to expecting everything from the law; in a word, when they admit that their relation to the state is that of a flock of sheep to the shepherd, it is clear that the responsibility of the government is immense. Good and evil, virtue and vice, equality and inequality, wealth and poverty, all proceed from it. It is entrusted with everything, it undertakes everything, it does everything; hence, it is responsible for everything.
 

– Frédéric Bastiat, The Law [1850]

 

 

Resist WOFs for private rental property

I don't sign many petitions but this one I have. Some rental properties are below par. Some landlords are negligent. But as Muriel Newman points out, there are already legal requirements on landlords and protections for tenants under the Residential Tenancies Act and via the Tenancy Tribunal. I'd urge you to read her column this week.

STATE CONTROL OF RENTAL HOUSING
By Dr Muriel Newman

Sir Bob Jones told property investors at a conference last year that he was sick of landlords being called evil persons and getting attacked by politicians. “You are providing a terrific service. You have to get politicised. Government’s declaring war on you. You have to kick back.”[1]
Sir Bob is correct – property investors provide a crucial service to society by supplying housing to almost half a million New Zealanders who do not own their own home. Yet politicians across the political divide treat property investors as a whipping boy, knowing they won’t get much of a fight and that landlords will not get much sympathy from the public at large.
They are under attack again – this time from groups who want state control of the rental property sector. But first, some facts.

More

"Fell into crime" because of childhood poverty?

Labour's candidate for Whangarei. Lawyer, Kelly Ellis, says:

"If one addresses poverty then everything else falls into place," she said, referring to the "so many files" on her legal shelves of people who fell into crime because of issues related to childhood poverty.

 Serious criminals end up in prison in which case prison statistics should match child poverty stats.

From the Household Income Survey table H5 I can construct a comparable pie chart (bar Asian) for ethnic percentages of poor children 2010-2012:

Similar.

But a pie chart which shows the ethnicity of parents/caregivers on a benefit (2009) is a closer fit:

And if I'd depicted children rather than parents the fit would get even closer due to Maori/Pacific families being larger (but the Child Health Monitor source is currently under revision.)

On the other hand, the prison population is around 8-9,000 whereas the number of children living 'in poverty' is between 205,000 and 285,000. More generally there were 194,000 apprehensions for crime in 2012 of which NZ European made up 43 percent, Maori 42 percent, and Pacific 10 percent.

So I suppose I come back to the same sticking point. Maori are over-represented in child poverty statistics, the benefit system and in crime. Pacific people are over-represented in child poverty statistics but not particularly in the benefit system or in crime.

(All not withstanding there are ethnic categorising issues.)

Update

Berend suggested a bar chart as a better method of making my point. He's right (though I still have a slight problem with depicting caregiver instead of children.) The first two colums relate to children, the last to caregivers.

And here's another way of looking at it. As before the first two columns relate to children, the second to caregivers and the final to the prison population:

Tupuranga Aotearoa

Statistics NZ has just released a new interactive tool called Tupuranga Aotearoa to show change over time.

Here I selected social > income inequality. Oh. Decreasing up until the recession.

What a surprise. Not.

Greens ignore child abuse realities

Not that it matters because the legislation doesn't need their vote, but the Greens are withdrawing their support from the Vulnerable Children Bill. From the report of the select committee their position is based on increased state powers to remove children at birth:

The single most critical factor in how children survive exposure to domestic violence is the presence of at least one loving and supportive adult in their life. For many children the loving and supportive adult is their mother

who repeatedly does her best to provide her children a normal life even where she is being abused

This seems a continuation of the article of faith amongst feminists who uphold the rights of women first and foremost - even over children's. Yet there is no rational reason to put mothers on an untouchable pedestal.

83 percent of child abuse takes place in the child's home. Most happens in benefit-dependent homes. And most welfare dependence in families with children is amongst female single parents.

But let's see what an unbiased expert says

University of Otago Professor David Fergusson, an expert on domestic violence, said the public perception that men were the perpetrators of most domestic violence was the result of biased publicity.
"The proper message is that both gender groups have a capacity for domestic violence [and] women probably perpetrate more assaults on children then men do," Mr Fergusson said.

Additionally the Greens are using the bill to once again politic about child poverty. They say that they can't support measures to reduce child abuse if the government won't address what they see as the major cause. Child poverty.

You have to wonder, as I frequently do, whose interests the Greens really serve.

(Labour, to their credit, are continuing to support the bill).

Colin James on David Cunliffe's chances of becoming PM

Colin James writes about Cunliffe's leadership so far and his prospects for becoming Prime Minister:

In his six months as leader Cunliffe, first, got only a short-lived bump in opinion polls and then in February-early March took Labour back to its David Shearer low. His biggest publicity recently has been for leadership stumbles.
First, Cunliffe chose to run Labour’s innovative children policy as a cash handout when its real value is a focus on children’s physical experience in the womb and nutritional, emotional and cognitive experiences in the early years of life. That is, he highlighted the palliative of a dole to parents over investment in children to give even the disadvantaged a close-to-equal opportunity to be full citizens as adults. And he did not say the palliative would be discounted for parental leave cash.

More

("Palliative"? )

Sons of preachers

The precedent for political success isn't good.

Don Brash was the son of a Presbyterian minister.

David Cunliffe is the son of an Anglican minister.

Ex government MP quick to get snout in trough

Funerals may be a touchy subject but comment on taxpayers being compelled to share responsibility for their funding shouldn't be taboo.

Ex National MP Katrina Shanks is now Funeral Directors Association something- or- other and says that the grants available and accessed by about 5,000 annually (one in six deaths) are too low.

 “We have concerns that due to the costs of burials, those with few means will not have the choice to be buried and may have to be cremated against their wishes.” She says there needs to be a shared responsibility for ensuring funerals are accessible for all by promoting advance planning for funerals, the industry providing a range of services including basic services, and government assistance for those who can’t afford funeral services.

The funeral business does a great deal of advertising. Listen to Radio Live or NewstalkZB if you want a taste. It constantly encourages people to plan ahead and save so their families won't be lumbered with the cost. Perhaps they should come up with a new line in advertising encouraging individuals to save so the taxpayer won't be forced to fork out?

Oh, and what's the bet that if the grants start to escalate so will funeral costs, just like rents under the accommodation supplement.

Bob Jones' loathing of "Leadership"

Sir Bob Jones never holds back much, to the benefit of those who read him. Here he has given an interview to an e-mail website and newsletter, "Get Frank" on the subject of leadership:

The most important piece of advice I would give an aspiring leader is to do the decent thing and cut your throat.

And make sure you find out the answer to "Where are the Maori leaders?" Priceless.