Free Press ACT’s regular bulletin

Back Benchers
A fun time was had by all last week, as Parmjeet Parmar, Jacinda Ardern, James Shaw and David Seymour sparred over a few issues. Consistency was gleefully tossed out the window as Jacinda segued from complaining that the sort of high calorie food you can buy at supermarkets is too cheap, to a moment later complaining about a supermarket duopoly making food too expensive. We think her point was that that cheap food should be taxed so that low income people are….er….healthier but poorer?

How to Destroy a City
No, we are not talking about council planning in Auckland. One of the questions put to the political panel on Backbenchers was whether rent controls would be a good thing. David Seymour quoted Swedish economist Assar Lindbeck, who observed that rent controls are the best way to destroy a city, second only to bombing it. Numerous economists have made similar observations. That is, it’s a great way to create a ghetto etc. We are fearful that Jacinda and James still don’t really get this basic economics thing. Their central planning, command-and-control instincts run deep.

The Best or the Worst of Times
Opposition politicians tend to preach doom and gloom. How else to motivate voters? But as tech commentator Brian Hall notes: Never have so many benefitted from so much technology that is so cheap and so accessible. A free global thinking machine — Google. A free global online community — Facebook. Free phone calls — Skype. A supercomputer in your pocket — iPhone. Agribusiness that feeds billions. Pharmaceuticals and vaccines that radically extend the life of nearly everyone on the planet.

OMG, is Capitalism Dead?
James Shaw claims that “free market capitalism is dead”. That seems an odd claim in light of the previous paragraph and, well, the state of the world around us, or as we sometimes say, reality. To us, capitalism looks more vigorous than it has ever been, lifting millions out of poverty, delivering mind-blowing innovations, connecting billions of people to a world of knowledge through a tiny smartphone.

The Political Left
Haven’t they noticed any of this? Is this why they seem so glum all the time?

Profits
The political left still don’t understand profit. They keep moaning about the possibility that somebody might make a profit from engaging in a social service, or building a house on some land sold off by the government. Profits are a return on investment, just like the interest income you get on a term deposit. Except most investments are riskier, so nobody will make them unless the expected return is a bit higher, to compensate for the risk. Some investments go well. Some don’t.

Annette King Writes
She claims that “National are using vulnerable mental health patients as guinea pigs”. Social bonds, she says, are “an untried and unproven experiment that have failed overseas”. Huh? How can they be untried if you claim they have failed? Let’s skip the tedious rhetoric. This is the Orwellian “profits bad” fallacy again.

Experiments
Speaking of experiments (or as Labour would say, experiments on vulnerable children), how did that Numeracy Development Project turn out? The one rolled out to New Zealand primary schools in 2001. It seems to have triggered a decline in NZ maths performance – see the NZ Initiative report released last week; Un(ac)countable, Why Millions on Maths Returned Little.

Profits Too High?
If you think businesses profits are too high, just try running one. Building and running a business is hard – it is risky and demanding. If you are not prepared to do it yourself, then quit moaning about those that do. Entrepreneurship is great, can be rewarding, often involves failure, and is anything but easy. ACT celebrates entrepreneurship. It’s the driving force behind rising incomes.

Three Strikes
Recall that the Sentencing and Parole Reform Act 2010 was an ACT initiative, a three strikes law which was narrowly focused on violent, recidivist offending. It gave a clear message to violent offenders - repeat offending would be met with tougher sentencing. Our expectation, based on overseas evidence and on the sort of commonsense that seems to be utterly lacking on the political left, is that it would reduce the number of victims of violent crime. What has happened since? Nationally, 5378 first strikes and 76 second strikes have been given, but no third strikes.

Evidence of Success?
Labour Party justice spokesperson Jacinda Ardern said she did not accept figures showed the bill worked, and that more specific research should be done. Ha! Well, she is right that simple data like this does not demonstrate the success of the Three Strikes Law – there may be other confounding factors and trends. But what you cannot deny is that it is highly suggestive. Nobody yet has battered or murdered their way into a third strike sentence. The burden of proof has shifted to opponents of the bill.

Dreaming
Labour should be saying they will now support this law, at least until they see some better analysis demonstrating little, or a negative, impact from the new law. But of course they would never say that.

Bowally Road
We noticed a recent item on Chris Trotter’s Bowally Road blog, where he tried to figure out what Mathew Hooton might have been up to in suggesting that National have abandonedneoliberal policies and hurtled to the left, and had suggested that Labour should try and outflank National on the right. As usual Chris overcomplicates things. There is an old saying in politics that runs along the lines, “there is no greater pleasure in politics than giving potentially fatal advice to your political opponents”. We think that’s all there was to it.

Neoliberal?
The word “neoliberal” is no more than a term of abuse beloved of the left, just a verbal tic. Try and describe what it means and it deflates like a burst balloon. Chris describes
he so-called neoliberal consensus as having these elements: price stability; labour market flexibility; an open competitive economy; broad-based, low-tax structure; government surpluses and debt repayment. That list is better described as a middle-of-the-road OECD consensus. It’s Policy 101.

From Labour’s Leaked Campaign Review
“Labour has still to define positively and confidently convincing, alternative macro-economic policies, which also respond to wider social and environmental issues, despite emerging international challenges to neo-liberal orthodoxy.” Good grief, who writes like that? And there’s that word again. Told you it was a verbal tic.

Crocodile Dundee and ACT Policy
You call that neoliberal? This is neoliberal!

ENDS

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