Free Press - ACT's Regular Bulletin - Dec 11
Free Press - ACT's Regular Bulletin
Child Neglect
(Poverty)
The Prime Minister
has staked her job on child neglect but what isn’t
measured isn’t managed. How she will measure it is now
career defining. Will it be a cop out, or will she do
something that would give the average National minister
palpitations and set a bold and measurable target?
The Cop-out
option
The real cop out was
National’s when they said it child poverty couldn’t be
measured, or worse, could be ‘measured in lots of ways.’
It reminds us of the old Groucho Marx quote, if you don’t
like my principles, I have others. But if you are serious
about measuring poverty it’s quite technical. Our new
Prime Minister has just given the field of poverty
measurement an unexpected exposure.
A
Political Exercise
Actually,
measuring poverty has always been political. We just
haven’t noticed it because the left have won so easily.
Basically, if you are a socialist you’ll want to measure
poverty 1) relative to other people, 2) by income, and 3)
by snapshots in time. Those of us on the sensible side of
politics prefer to measure it in absolute terms, by
consumption, and over time.
Income vs.
Consumption
Socialists love to
measure poverty by income because Robin Hood can fix it
easily. Just tax the rich and give their money to the poor!
Income measures miss people living off savings, so they
always count more people in ‘poverty’ than there
actually are. More importantly they miss how people spend
their money, so a thrifty person who lives well within their
means might be in ‘poverty’ but a decadent person would
be measured as fine. Measuring what people consume instead
of what they receive eliminates these problems.
Absolute vs.
Relative
Socialists love
relative measures of poverty, such as ‘you are in poverty
if you earn less than 60 per cent of the average.’ The
only way to fix poverty on a relative measure is to make
everyone equal. If your idea of poverty is based on relative
measures then everyone’s income could double and
‘poverty’ would stay the same. More sensible is agreeing
a minimum basket of goods people should have access to
regardless of how well others may do.
Snapshot vs Long
Term
Socialists love to take a
snapshot in time to measure poverty. More sensible people
like to measure people over several years, because they find
two types of people. People who really do have a rough time
year after year, and people who are in poverty for a period
of time, between jobs for example, but generally don’t
have a problem. If you measure a snapshot in time they get
mixed up. If you track individuals over time you get a
measure of who is facing chronic difficulty and who is
having a bad year.
Example I –The Povo
Bachelor
Imagine a young man,
30 years old, with only no income for almost a year. By the
leftie measurements, this guy is in poverty. His income is
far below 60 per cent of the average at the time of the
snapshot as he has none. The Government must give him more
money! If you ask a few questions you’ll find he was
running for parliament, well housed by friends and family at
some pretty decent addresses, and, thanks to savings (which
a longer-term view of income would have suggested) was able
to make a pretty decent assault on the 2014 Bluff Oyster
season. A consumption-based measure would avoid this
nonsense.
Example II –The Adequately
Funded Child Neglectors
Imagine
a family that received nearly $1,000 per week in benefits
and supplements, but managed to blow almost all of it on
hire purchases, tobacco, and alcohol, leaving only a few
dollars left for McDonalds, which they puree for the younger
children, and soft drinks, which they buy in place of tooth
brushes. By absolute consumption, these guys are in poverty
and the children are neglected, but their income is above 60
per cent of the average.
So How Would You Do
It?
If the Prime Minister is
serious about measuring child poverty she’ll do it like
this: Have a division of Statistics New Zealand (the
specialists we all pay to do statistical things) to track a
significant number of children, perhaps 200 born each year
from birth to age 18. Statistics NZ should never reveal the
identities of these kids to any other department. They
should interview the families and children twice per year to
measure their actual consumption of food, housing, clothing,
and education.
Can’t Just Tax and
Spend
This measure would be a
measure of child neglect. The question would be whether kids
get the necessaries of life and an education for a future.
It would require the Government to fix actual problems
instead of taxing and spending. They would have to work out
why it’s so hard to build homes right now. They’d have
to consider ACT’s policies of cashless welfare that mean
benefits can only be spent on certain things using
electronic cards. They’d have to consider why so many kids
drop out and stop going to State Schools (but keep going to
ACT’s Partnership Schools). They’d have to start talking
about personal responsibility and quality state
services.
Not Holding Our
Breath
The Prime Minister’s
commitment to measuring child neglect is a noble one.
However, we are afraid her measure will be a relative,
income based, snapshot measure of child poverty where the
only solution is to tax and spend more where child neglect
goes unchecked.