Svoboda | Graniru | BBC Russia | Golosameriki | Facebook

MEASURING INFLATION

Listener 20 January 2001.

Keywords: Statistics;

Statistics New Zealand (SNZ) releases its December quarter 2000 estimate of the Consumers Price Index (CPI) this week. The increase is expected to be a high and, if it is a dull news day, there will be much angst. In fact we have known for some time that consumer prices are increasing more quickly than usual, mainly because the fall in the New Zealand exchange rate will push up the domestic prices of imports which flow on into consumer prices. There is the puzzle of how quickly they will flow through, and the degree to which the New Zealand sellers can and will absorb the import price hikes. There is also an argument about whether the exchange rate will stay down. Everyone expects some recovery – providing the world financial markets remain stable – but some of the predicted New Zealand exchange rate levels, seem fantastical. They would take the pressure of domestic inflation, but the export sector would suffer grievously again.

20th January 2001 | Comments Closed

POLISH SHIPYARDS: Why the Poles have done better than us over the last decade.

Listener 6 January 2001

Keywords: Globalisation & Trade;

I like Warsaw. The young people swing along the street with all the insouciance of Parisians. But the old folk bear their past. One could easily have been ruled by the Russians, the Germans, the interwar Republic of Poland, the Soviet Union, and the communist regime of Poland, without hardly moving residence. And now as age (and some brutal winds from the Steppes) close on them, they are once more in a democratic regime.

6th January 2001 | Comments Closed