by Selwyn Manning

ANZ Bank figures show Auckland is driving the country’s economic growth figures with job advertisements indicating the labour market riding a rising wave.

The figures are based on the number of job advertisements and are used to indicate an expected drop in the number of unemployed people.

The ANZ figures show nationally, job advertisements for August were 2.1% ahead of July. They were also up 30% over August 1998.

ANZ economists called the trend “unusually strong” for this time of the year.

They identified Auckland labour market for pushing up the growth figures – job advertisements in the city were up 2.6% for August and up 35.4% compared with August 1998.

Further south, Wellington recorded a 2.1% increase but with an annual figure of 16.4% is lagging behind Auckland.

Christchurch job advertisements were up 15.8% up last year but this was propelled up with a boom Christmas and New Year period.

August’s figures for Christchurch show a cooling economy with -0.01% for August which follows a definite drop in July.

© Scoop Media

Gordon Campbell: On the Sony cyber attack

Given the layers of meta-irony involved, the saga of the Sony cyber attack seemed at the outset more like a snarky European art film than a popcorn entry at the multiplex.

Yet now with (a) President Barack Obama weighing in on the side of artistic freedom and calling for the US to make a ‘proportionate response’quickly followed by (b) North Korea’s entire Internet service going down, and with both these events being followed by (c) Sony deciding to backtrack and release The Interview film that had made it a target for the dastardly North Koreans in the first place, then ay caramba…the whole world will now be watching how this affair pans out. More>>