Latest publications / Insights (6)

Social investment - new right agenda or new wine in old bottles? NZIER Insight 67

Social investment is the new Prime Minister’s signature policy The Prime Minister, in his first press conference, signalled his commitment to continuing to drive the government’s ‘social investment approach’ and followed this up with the appointment of Amy Adams as the first ever Mini … Read more

Tsunami risk: do we learn our way forward, or repeat the mistakes of the past? NZIER Insight 66

New Zealand has just had a ‘near miss’ with tsunami risk – for the second time in the last three months. Read more

Trumponomics : risks to the New Zealand economy - NZIER Insight 65

It looks more likely that Donald Trump could be elected as President of the United States (POTUS). Predictions now give Trump a 20-30% chance of victory, though these numbers are changing daily and who knows what scandals might surface between now and polling day on 8 November. We are … Read more

A learning system for evidence informed social policy - NZIER Insight 64

Effective social policy and service delivery requires a learning system. Imagine if…New Zealand had an effective learning system to generate and capture evidence to inform spending decisions for social policy. A good learning system will include evidence about ‘doing the right things’ … Read more

Tsunami risk : more needs to be done - NZIER Inisght 63

The recent earthquake and associated small tsunami provide a timely wakeup call. New Zealand needs to take the opportunity to learn from this ‘near miss’, and to invest in some ‘quick wins’ that can reduce our huge exposure to tsunami risk at low cost. Read more

Improving local government needs better policy advice - NZIER Insight 62

Local government regulatory activities have an important effect on local and regional economic growth and, ultimately, national economic growth and community wellbeing. This places a premium on local government organisations having high quality policy advice and decision-making proces … Read more

The high cost of (not) stopping people getting high - NZIER Insight 61

In this Insight, we bring the techniques of policy analysis to the issue of whether prohibition is the best way to reduce harm from using marijuana. Read more

Do you think you're better off alone? Impacts of Brexit on New Zealand - NZIER Insight 60

Recent polls suggest the chances of Brexit is a 50-50 call. This means we have to start contemplating what Brexit might mean for New Zealand. Read more

The road less travelled - NZIER Insight 59

The announcement that central government is prepared to fund the construction of Auckland’s City Rail Link (CRL) has, once again, placed the issue of how to pay for infrastructure onto the public policy agenda. Read more

How would you spend a half-billion dollars on arts, culture and heritage? NZIER Insight 58

The government spends a half billion dollars on arts, culture and heritage each year but has little indication of what the public actually wants from public expenditure. At present mainly 'experts' decide what cultural goods and services should be supplied from the public purse. Read more

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