Articles by Dr Don Brash

Unfortunately, welfare spending is addictive. And addictive in two ways. First, once government has committed to a particular level of benefit, it is exceedingly difficult to reduce that level. And second, the benefit itself changes behaviour: many people who might otherwise have tried harder to find employment choose to go on, or stay on, a benefit, something strongly encouraged by the very high effective marginal tax rate faced by those…

PART ONE Over the last couple of decades, the world has watched the Middle East as country after country has tried to establish a democratic regime and country after country has failed. The United States and its allies toppled Saddam Hussein and announced that they wanted to see a democratic regime take root in Iraq. The western powers helped to topple Colonel Gaddafi in Libya, and welcomed moves towards democracy in Tunisia, Egypt and the…

A couple of months back I wrote a column on New Zealand’s high and, at that time, accelerating rate of inflation. I concluded that column with the following comment: · There has to be some risk that, faced with growing public concern about inflation and the impact of the rising interest rates which the Reserve Bank is using to get on top of inflation, the Government will reach for a dopey policy like reducing GST to produce a one-off reduction…

As we look into the New Year, there are a lot of crucial issues facing the country – how do we deal with the ongoing unaffordability of housing (notwithstanding the recent fall in house prices); how do we increase our rate of productivity growth so that we can afford the good things of life that wealthier countries take for granted; how do we improve the serious problems in our education and health sectors; how do we deal with the longer-term…

The last time inflation was over 7% was more than 30 years ago, and I was responsible for doing what Adrian Orr, the current Governor of the Reserve Bank, is trying to do now: get inflation back to the target mandated by the Minister of Finance, in my case within a 0 to 2% range, and Mr Orr’s case within a range of 1 to 3%. · A few weeks ago, there was at least some cheering when the inflation figure for the year to September was announced: it…

Not since the Cuban missile crisis exactly 60 years ago has the world been in such danger. · And that’s not just my own view: early in October, US President Joe Biden said that the risk of nuclear Armageddon is at the highest level since the Cuban missile crisis. He was right. · As I write, Russia’s conventional military forces are being forced to retreat on many fronts and Ukrainian forces have destroyed a key bridge linking Russia to Crimea.…

Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth has passed away, and the overwhelming majority of people in New Zealand mourn her passing. · Not, of course, because her death was unexpected, or a tragedy in the ordinary sense of that word: at the age of 96 and increasingly suffering “mobility issues”, she had outlived the great majority of her subjects by at least a decade and was able to perform her royal duties right up to the end. Not for her, prolonged…

Rarely has a political party promised so much in an election campaign and achieved so little during its time in office. Labour made extravagant promises to end child poverty, to build 100,000 houses over 10 years and make housing more affordable, to make a major contribution to reducing greenhouse gases, and to improve our education system. Instead child poverty has increased on most measures; the number of new houses built has been trivial…

On the night before the 2002 election, when I was a list candidate for the National Party, I was attending a black-tie event in Napier. Before we sat down to eat, the host asked the local vicar to give thanks. · The vicar gave thanks for the food and the drink which we were about to consume, and then said that we should give thanks also for the fact that, in just 24 hours’ time, we would have elected the members of the next Parliament “and…

The Prime Minister’s recent visit to Washington, during which she seemed to have signed New Zealand up as a strongly pro-US outpost in the South Pacific – and her forthcoming (at time of writing) attendance at a major NATO meeting in Europe in the next few weeks – should prompt some serious thought about our long-term interests. · After all, it was the US which unceremoniously withdrew from the Trans Pacific Partnership shortly after Trump…