Economy coming right, yeah right!
Posted on October 26, 2011 by admin in John Minto, Press ReleasesTreasury “smile and wave” update based on delusion
MANA spokesperson on economic justice John Minto says the government and Treasury are still not coming to grips with reality of the economic quagmire which confronts New Zealand.
“The pre-election Treasury update out yesterday is an attempt to talk up the economy while ignoring the reality of the struggling 99% of New Zealanders.
“Treasury has a habit of deliberately trying to enthuse in the hope their words create the optimism needed for some kind of economic recovery. For example Treasury’s growth forecasts have been so far off they are almost meaningless. From 2008 Treasury claimed we would get 1.5% growth, 2.3% growth and then 3.2% growth. We actually got -1.1% growth, -.4% growth and -.1% growth.
“Meanwhile National continues its weekly borrowing for tax cuts for the wealthy so that the 99% are paying to provide National’s “brighter future” for the 1% (40% of National October 2010 tax cuts went to the top 10% of income earners),” Mr Minto says.
He says Labour offers nothing better than some tax tinkering at the income extremes and a hapless capital gains tax which will have only a minimal impact several years down the track.
“Most of the world is coming around to the idea of a Financial Transactions Tax as a key policy to deal with the crisis. MANA is leading the way in New Zealand in promoting this tax which would stabilize our dollar to benefit exporters while enabling the country to abolish GST entirely.”
For Further Information:
John Minto 021447067
Further details of MANA’s economic justice policy will be released and explained tomorrow (Thursday) morning at 10am in Aotea Square. All media encouraged to attend this briefing.
Note: The Adbusters organization – which started the hugely successful Occupy Wall Street movement – is calling for international action this Saturday to promote a Financial Transactions Tax. In Auckland a march has been organised from the Aotea Square occupation at 3pm and MANA will be there in support.
Graham says:
Post Author October 29, 2011 at 9:17 pmIt really amazes me how much the good burghers of NZ buy into mainstream thinking of National, Labour and the Greens taxation ideology ie; a continuation of the same old same old with only a meaningless tinkering in the case of the latter two. GST is the most regressive tax imaginable-and it was Labour that introduced it. Goff, if you remember, supported it slipping over to the Roger Douglas camp in so doing. To now have some sort of epihany but only go part way on its brutal effects ie: to simply subtract GST from fruit and vegetables, as Labour proposes, is a woeful, half hearted measure that still panders to the well paid and wealthy. Conversely, it ignores the reality of life for low paid workers and those on benefit who need a substantial raise in their weekly incomes just to survive. Many of these are Maori.
From figures I once read, a 1-2% transaction tax would bring in about $ 45 billion more in taxation. The difficulty, not unexpectedly, comes with the rich and powerful who, under current tax regimes, pay nothing or next to nothing. Under a transaction tax they will find it hard to escape . Not unexpectedly, the banks find it repugnant which is a reason in itself to support it given the Wall St experience. Look at Addidas NZ. who paid no tax in the last 3 years-and still bitched about costs during the RWC.
The transaction tax was wiped of the Labour agenda. We expected it of National of course but I thought Labour may have given it a go. How dumb of me to think that eh! A CGT is, again, a half way tinkering sort of thing. I think we need it in some form but, on its own without eliminating GST??? Pathetic.
Finally, a word on Treasury. The neo-liberal academic economists are wasted space. As John says above, they have got little, if anything correct. Weather forecasters do better. About 3-4 months back Key announced, on Treasury advice, that in a few months there would be 170,000 jobs available. A moron with half a brain would know how ridiculous that prediction was. Key promoted it though. Then, last month, that figure had been revised to 45, 000?
Both National and Labour have a wet dream when a number crunching Treasury goon expresses. Treasury, like MSD/WINZ needs an overhaul-real bad and real urgent. So does the tax system. Mana will ensure that.