“Peak Oil: Economic, Political & Environmental Impacts” Monday 26th September, organised by the VUW chaplaincy.
Keywords: Environment & Resources;
When we were young we assumed that our parents will live for ever. As adolescents, we realise they will die one day, but at a time so far in the future it hardly seems relevant. As mature adults we realise that day is closing in, and we wonder what it will be like when they go. And so they pass on, but you survive in the world without them – perhaps, like me, missing them.
Listener: 24 September, 2005.
Keywords: Health;
Although we think of lung cancer as the disease of tobacco, the weed is associated with other cancers, with respiratory disease (such as emphysema), and with heart and circulation conditions (cardiovascular disease). Not only do the chemicals in tobacco smoke trigger mutations within cells that lead to cancer, and damage the lungs, but they also stiffen the walls of the blood vessels. That requires the heart to work harder, so smokers are more prone to coronary heart disease (CHD) and stroke. Stopping smoking is the best way of preventing heart disease.
On Friday 23 2005, this was put on the No Right Turn website . It used the election night seat outruns. I have updated it to the final election seat outturns, and added a subsequent comment.
Keywords: Political Economy & History; Statistics;
One of the advantages of MMP is it enables us to think more systematically about the political process (although given much of the nonsense that is being written at the moment, it does not appear to force us to). What this note sets out is a a mathematical procedure which enables us to think systematically about coalitions (although, and as I shall explain, like most mathematical models it has imitations) .
Revised version of Paper for NZIIA Seminar “The Economic and Social Impacts of Globalisation” 21 September, 2005.
Keywords: Globalisation & Trade; The Economics of Globalisation: An Introduction is a version of this paper with a more detailed economic analysis
Introduction
The Royal Society of New Zealand awarded me a Marsden Fund grant to study globalisation. The study is a continuation of my earlier research program, especially that which is summarised in my book In Stormy Seas with its central message that the fate of New Zealand will be largely a consequence of what happens overseas, together with our ability to seize the opportunities and manage the problems those events create.
Some calculations I did for my own satisfaction
Keywords: Regulation & Taxation;
Forgive my statistical pedantry, but John Key recently stated something like ‘the average earner would getting tax cuts of $25 a week’. What he meant was that ‘on average earners were getting tax cuts of $25 a week’.
Canadian intellectual John Ralston Saul in conversation with Brian Easton about globalism, ideologues and rediscovering moderation.
The full edited version.
Listener: September 10, 2005.
Keywords: Globalisation & Trade; History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy;
EASTON: You are a very cosmopolitan person. Canadian father and British mother. You have a degree in French from London, you’ve worked in Paris. You have a Chinese-Canadian wife. You’ve written successful novels as well as international bestsellers on contemporary issues, beginning with “Voltaire’s Bastards”, through another three to your latest, “The Collapse of Globalism”. Yet you seem to be a Canadian nationalist
SAUL: The non-ideological reality is that people come from somewhere. It is an impossible romantic dream that you can be from nowhere. I’ve always believed that the way human beings really live is that they come from somewhere and it colours or shapes the roots of what they think and then you try to find how that fits into the common good.
This is the full edited version of Canadian intellectual John Ralston Saul in conversation with Brian Easton about globalism, ideologues and rediscovering moderation, from which the Listener version of September 10, 2005 was extracted.
Keywords: Globalisation & Trade; History of Ideas, Methodology & Philosophy;
EASTON: It strikes me that you are a very cosmopolitan person – Canadian father and a British or English mother
Is National pandering to greed or promoting principle?
Listener: 3 September, 2005.
Keywords: Regulation & Taxation;
Other articles on the 2005 Election Tax Debate
In 1957 the Labour Opposition, led by an elderly Walter Nash desperate to have a turn as Prime Minister, ran its election campaign on “Do You Want £100 or not?”, promising to remit up to £100 to each income taxpayer. It was accused of pandering to greed, without any principle. In fact, the National government was offering the same total tax cuts but more directed to the rich and self-employed, whereas Labour has targeted the poor and workers. The cuts were funded by the introduction of PAYE. Without them, taxpayers would have paid double income tax in the first year: PAYE plus the previous year’s income tax.
