Monthly Archives: July 2002

Corporate Chaos: Is the Collapse Of Enron and Worldcom the Beginning Of an End?

This entry was posted in Business & Finance, Listener, Macroeconomics & Money on by .

Listener 27 July, 2002.

Keywords Business & Finance, Macroeconomics & Money

Because there is no coincidence of wants, money acts as an intermediatory in the conversion of something we have (including our labour) into something we want (perhaps the groceries). This role can be summarised as C→M→C* where a commodity (C) is converted (sold) into money (M), which is used to purchase a different commodity (C*). In this way money facilitates the specialisation of production upon which modern standards of living depend, because it enables each to concentrate on producing one thing well, and convert it into all the other things they want to consume.

The Historical Context Of the Woodhouse Commission

This entry was posted in Political Economy & History, Social Policy on by .

Revised version of paper for Looking Back at Accident Compensation: Finding Lessons for the Future. Victoria University of Wellington Law School: 2-3 August: 2002. [1]

Keywords Political Economy & History, Social Policy

Although it is rarely presented this way, policy making is a problem solving exercise. At the heart of the success of any solution is how well the problem is addressed.[2] This approach, analogous to Karl Popper’s approach to the development of science requires us to be ‘as clear as you can one can about the problem, and watch the way it changes’.[3] A task then, of an historian, is to identify the problem or problems which drove a solution.

The Debt Burden on Students

This entry was posted in Education, Regulation & Taxation on by .

Revised version of paper to NZUSA Student Debt Summit, July 23, Auckland.

Keywords Education, Regulation & Taxation

Substantial tax reductions for the rich, if they are not to be fiscally irresponsible, require cuts in government spending and the raising taxation on those who are not rich. Thus the generous lowering of income tax on top incomes of the late 1980s required others to take a larger burden – including directly: social security beneficiaries, wage earners, many public servants and government employed professionals, and tertiary students, and indirectly the social wage and those who benefit from it.

Marshall and Sutch

This entry was posted in Political Economy & History on by .

Letter in New Zealand International Review, July/August 2002, Vol XXVII, No 4, p.33.

KeywordsPolitical Economy & History

In his review of Keith Eunson’s Mirrors on the Hill, Bruce Brown asks ‘who reads [Jack] Marshall’s autobiography?’, and answers ‘the two volumes are an excellent source of much recent political history (for example on Bill Sutch).’ (NZIR May/June 2002) They may be source of political history but the coverage of Sutch is inaccurate, imbalanced, and unsatisfactory. Many of the errors are addressed by Sutch’s widow, Shirley Smith, in a letter deposited at the Alexander Turnbull Library. My concern here is the balance.

A Beautiful Theory: But It Is Only a Game

This entry was posted in History of Ideas, Methodology, Philosophy, Listener on by .

Listener 13 July, 2002.

Keywords History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy

The film A Beautiful Mind was another version of Love Story. Instead of the lovers having to overcome health, race, other obligations, or location, this time the obstacle was mental illness. Ultimately John and Alicia Nash triumph, with a Nobel Prize in economics to boot. The true story is far more complicated, and in some key places different. More disappointing, the film made only the feeblest attempt to explain what Nash actually did. Hollywood must have thought the concept too difficult for the average film-goer. Let me accept the challenge.