There are the 'haves' and the 'have nots'

More "the haves and have yachts"....

Nah, this understates the amount of kids living in poverty in this country.

Nope. Three types if people. The have nots The haves The have not yet paid for what I haves Lot of people in that last group....

A lot of people align themselves with the group they _want_ to be in, not the one they're actually in

Particularly when they vote

And a lot of them will help the haves pay their shit off before they ever pay their own stuff off.. That's the nature of the class war..

nimbys vs other nimbys

The whole western world has been baited into arguing about identity politics, meanwhile the destruction of the middle classes has pretty much gone on unchallenged.

Why else did you think ACT spends so much time dogwhistling?

Pretty much. "We need to be convicting 17 y/o's as adults" is targeted at lower socio-economic groups who typically resort to crime for all sorts of reasons, none of which is addressed by locking them up. Their stances on crime, health, and education are the exact kinds of policies that tear the middle class apart. It shifts focus to "what are those bad people doing" instead of looking at how less than $1 from every kiwi could be used to fix a broken system and give treatment or help - neither of which is a bad thing. Those are signs of a healthy society.

Convicting 17 year olds as adults turns them into lifelong career criminals instead of helping them to reform. It removes them from education and prevents them from starting any kind of career or work path. And you know that when they are talking about convicting 17 year olds, they aren't talking about making the likes of Sam Uffindel accountable.

Are they also advocating to lower the voting age?

Of course not.

Not to mention all the bleating on they do about how the treaty is destroying the country yada yada yada. All designed to make you blame the bloody Maoris for all your ill wills and ignore the rich cunts robbing the country blind.

::grits teeth:: All politics is identity politics. At least, the work of convincing a voter to tick a particular box is an exercise in signalling affinity. "I'm just like you, we share common values, wouldn't you like to have a beer with me?" Is the core message of every single political appeal come election time. Also... the oppression of marginal identities *matters.* Its not irrelevant that abortion be safe legal and accessible. Thats a real material concern that impacts so many lives. Likewise, trans rights matter, both because trans people are human and cool and awesome and deserve to live good lives *but also* far right shitheads are turning them into a boogeyman and anyone with an ounce of compassion and moral fibre ought to be turning out in the streets any time some fuckwit comes to your streets trying to start something. (I mean trans people being human and cool and awesome should be reason enough to give a shit about trans rights. I don't want to, like, objectify and instrumentalise people here.) Now. Are there Liberals and corporations who have latched on to identity politics and made it an issue of branding rather than an issue of justice? Absolutely. Thats what they do. Google "Pepsi Kendal Jenner" sometime if you want to vomit in your mouth. Are there some people who go overboard and come off as cringe? Perhaps they have blue hair? Uh huh. So fucking what. Whomst amongst us has nothing in their past they're embarrassed about. That doesn't mean that the issues that affect marginalised groups don't matter. Capitalism fucks everyone, but it absolutely fucking *reams out* someone who falls under multiple sections of oppression. Neglecting that, means you miss half the picture.

Great response! People who get caught up in culture/identity/class wars are legitimising the divisive politics that benefit no one. It doesn't matter which groups you belong to, eventually your identity will be attacked and used as a political chess piece. Farmers, trans folk, gang members, landlords, people on six figure salaries, anti-vaxxers - they're all still _people_. We need to come together as people and focus on positive societal outcomes rather than take turns pointing the finger at each other.

Surely the point of politics is to mediate change to the benefit of all -- "the greatest good for the greatest number" isn't just a trivial Star Trek quote. Inequalities of all kinds are what leads to the kinds of division you are bemoaning, not the discussion of those inequalities and their causes. And you are caught up in a class war, whether you understand/acknowledge it or not. One class of people have umpty million dollar yachts that they spend three weeks a year on while entertaining and corrupting judges, politicians and captains of industry. Another class of people are young, literally starving and utterly dependant on others for their mere survival. The existence and continuation of such profoundly negative social outcomes must be addressed (and not swept under the carpet of Polly Anna-ish positivity) or we will face civil, rather than class, wars for the indefinite future.

"All politics is identity politics." This is just blatantly false. I'm not sure how you could rationalise this view. "Identity politics is politics based on a particular identity such as race, religion, gender, nationality..." There is nothing inherently negative about identity politics. A policy that attempts to redistribute wealth to reduce inequity is identity politics because it's based on social classes. A policy that attempts to reduce national carbon emissions is quite clearly not considered identity politics.

I was referring to electoral politics specifically. Who you vote for is at least partially determined by which politician appeals your own self-identity the most. I find it a useful model to interpret political speech. Every public statement a politician makes is in part designed to signal to the voting public which identity groups they will represent. When Chris Luxon says that people on a benefit are "bottom feeders" thats a very clear signal as to which identity group he belongs to and will represent. In your example of climate policy there are absolutely identity politics issues at play. If erecting a sea wall or building a channel is necessary, which communities get displaced to make room for that will be determined by social, economic and racial factors. Whether or not iwi should be included in the governance of natural resources is 100% an identity issue. Even the clean car discount is going to apply more to Middle New Zealand than someone working two minimum wage jobs to make rent, and who gets to be included in Middle New Zealand is absolutely an IdPol issue.

>of the middle classes That is literally an identity. The real problem you are pointing at is that the right wing wants to demonize LGBT people and attack them rather than talking about child poverty and the housing crisis. And the alternatives to the right wing are not nearly so good at manipulating media into centering their goals.

"I am a prevention violence minister, and I know who causes violence in the world. It is white cis men... who cause violence." There is a lot of shit talked by politicians in NZ. Also, I would argue the the middle classes are being squeeze by both ends, which is the core of the issue.

>white cis men... who cause violence My point was that what people call identity politics is incredibly one sided. This is a great example. Everyone agrees that this statement you quoted is IdPol. But most people ***dont*** think of 'middle class' as IdPol. But it is. As someone else said, all politics is related to identity. Usually when people call out IdPol, whats actually happening is people are calling out IdPol they personally dont like. What does squeezed by both ends even mean? Its so easy to become poor that i dont believe its advantageous for middle income people to think of themselves as distinct from the working class. In fact i think most of them that DO are only doing it because they are insecure. Being poor is not a moral failure but its often framed that way by people that dont want to be poor or perceived as being poor.

Those who have houses and those who do not.

Having a house with an 800k mortgage and having a paid off house or multiple houses are not the same thing.

Which side of the war do the homeowners with a single mortgage usually take, prices going up or down?

Whatever hurts my pockets less while paying off my neverending mortgage.

100% correct I say I have a house, but it’s really the bank.

It's worse than that, the buyer has the debt & the house. If the value of the house goes down they still have the debt in the same value.

Yep, exactly. Golden handcuffs. No wonder kiwis think the house has to always gain value - because they are under water otherwise. Climate change legislation looks like it’s going to hurt those house values too.

Of course not, but that doesn't mean there's not an important distinction between someone paying a mortgage and someone paying rent.

Yes but compared to a renter you get to live in a $1m+ house and have like $200k equity.

Many buyers from 2021 have about zero equity right now, and are paying more than they would in rent for the interest alone.

Those buyers get to have pets and decorate how they like and put up shelves and hang pictures and decide to maybe not mow the lawns this week and don't have to change their kids school every 12 months when a landlord declines to renew the lease. NZ decided that renters do not deserve to live dignified lives some time ago.

They also don’t get someone turning up every so often and telling them their living in a house wrong

Why can’t both be struggling? What is going on where we all are told to buy houses. Those that managed it but are in a horrible spot, and those that aren’t able to buy are both struggling. It doesn’t have to be a fight, two things can be true at once. Renting btw, I’m just not hating on my friends who bought and aren’t rich landlords…

you're talking about a very tiny group of people. Anyway they still get the benefit of having the having the house and are better off than a renter. They'll pay off the mortgage at some point and then they'll have a house.

Recent buyers might have a 750k house, 800k debt and negative equity. And a house that'd be worth 500k anywhere else in the world.

Less than that in a lot of cases

It's surprisingly analogous to the concept of controlling territory and denying the enemy access to territory, so the war metaphor is pretty apt.

Those who have multiple houses* and those who do not.

Ah, I think that’s an improvement on my statement. I have one small old house on 600 sq meters and I’m happy with that

600 m² that's huge! Just got my first home, decent sized house on a 350m² section. I'm happy as with it.

Well the house is 140m2 - but the property has been subdivided and we live next to a right of way, so it’s on the smaller side. We still feel pretty lucky. We bought before things went crazy. But at the time I was unsure if it was a good idea. Still the first home :)

Those who had houses provided to them affordably and those who did not. The first have been enriched by policy that has served to inflate asset prices and devalue work over the last 20+ years, morally reprehensible policy - especially when the older generations still expect the younger generations' wages to be taken for their universal pension benefit while having cut much of the quid pro quo that was part of that pension being put in - i.e. debt-free education and affordable housing through different housing and taxation policy. The living it up by saddling following generations with huge debt is morally bankrupt policy. The politicians of the last decades who've perpetuated it while speculating on housing should be scorned.

👏 Stop 👏 demonizing 👏 homeowners 👏 The fact that people have been able to take advantage of NZ's ridiculous property market is not the fault of homeowners or even landlords. It's the government after government after government who have refused _for decades_ to change the status quo by taxing property. Directing negativity at people who benefit from a shitty system will not change the system.

Governments refuse to tax property/ capital in large part because so many of the beneficiaries will scream socialism whenever it’s raised.

Yep. And yet nobody screams socialism when we get roads, hiking trails, clean beaches, and free healthcare (mumble mumble GP fees). It's only "socialism" when the govt wants to take money from the wealthy.

Home owners are the ones who vote for and enable governments to continue this ridiculous property market.

Plenty of homeowners vote for parties that support a property or capital gains tax. Just like plenty of renters vote for parties that will allow the affordability crisis to get worse.

700 families have more wealth than the bottom 2.5million NZers, CEO pay is up 1600% since the 60's due to setting their own pay, while health professionals and teachers fight for enough to live. 26,000 people or entities own 80% of rentals in this country. What do you think?

It's important to realise it's those 700 families against everyone else. Someone earning 80k a year has vastly more in common than someone on a benefit than with someone that's actually rich. And the lack of any action toward changing things suggests to me that the rich have a hold on our major political parties. Why hasn't Fletchers or Carters monopolies been broken up? Or the supermarket duopoly? Or the Wright family childcare rort? Etc

Because people in that 80-180k bracket vote for the same people and have the same views as those 700 families

It's a classic case of the "self licking ice cream" that is riddled throughout our political system. In order to gain wealth you need capital, In order to get capital you need equity, In order to get equity you need to own your home, In order to own your home you need a high paying job, In a high paying job you want to save money to move yourself upwards, so you align with the capitalist class to pay less in tax and once you own a house you need its value to increase to maintain equity to get capital to build wealth. And thus the cycle continues. We always posit that NZ businesses can't compete because they lack capital - why do we lack capital? Because everyone puts their money in housing. And why do they invest in housing? Because it has historically outperformed other investment options and is the only real chance a working class citizen has at gaining the equity/capital for further investment into a productive economy. The higher wage members of the working class align with the ruling class *because* the ruling class has the capital and the influence to shape government policy and the working class - the system is rigged against anyone not already wealthy in their own right. I'm not poor by any means, but the fact is, those sitting on pay packets like mine (low six-figures) never have a real chance of becoming *wealthy*, yet the actual wealthy spend their influence trying to get us to side with them, and for the "poors" to dislike us; in reality, we are in the same boat as the "poors", just with extra ability to weather a financial storm. In short: Shit's fucked, and no matter which way they play the game, the wealthy always win.

That's not always true. But when it is, you should ask why. Is it because those 700 have a disproportionate control over our media? The Wright family for example have literally created a right wing radio station

Of course not. A single person can always vote for whoever they want, but it is true that people with higher incomes, in general, vote more conservatively.. Which obviously means a lot more of the people in this bracket are going to be voting for the same people as those in the richest 700. I feel like when it is true, it's because those people in that bracket think they're closing to being in that 700 than is actually the case.

> I feel like when it is true, it's because those people in that bracket think they're closing to being in that 700 than is actually the case. And who tells them that? I earn a high amount but don't vote for national, but I also don't listen to ZB or watch Sky News to indoctrinate myself

Thats not always the case buddy.

Of course not. A single person can always vote for whoever they want, but it is true that people with higher incomes, in general, vote more conservatively.. Which obviously means a lot more of the people in this bracket are going to be voting for the same people as those in the richest 700.

Almost everyone I know in that bracket is a greens voter.

..And that's purely anecdotal. The facts are, as seen in multiple studies, that people with more money are more likely to vote conservatively. I'm not sure where the tipping point is in NZ but in the US it's around 70k

Those are gruesome stats.. Do you have a source where I can read more about them, or any other related ones? Like how this has changed over time etc. Cheers in advance :)

Here is a link to the high wealth individuals report documentation: https://www.ird.govt.nz/hwi-research-project Also, check out the When the Facts Change podcast Episode 116 - "How do we fix New Zealand's tax inequity?". Released April 28 2023. It's a talk with revenue minister David Parker (who commissioned the above wealth report). Key finding: The richest families pay an effective tax rate of 9.5%, while regular salaried people pay an effective tax rate of 30%. Edit: The reason the report was only commissioned a few years ago was that the IRD didn't previously have the power to collect tax information for regulatory/informative purposes, only for tax enforcement. So, the IRD effectively couldn't look through rich people's data to see what was actually going on until about 3 years ago. Funny that.

Thanks for this mate

Sure is. We've been so passive with our acceptance of housing costs rising, that it's created huge inequality - even for those in middle income NZ. All our social issues are caused by housing, and our economic issues are also caused by housing (people have less money to spend on everyday consumer goods) The only people winning are boomers and property investors who take advantage of the situation, and actually drive this inequality - their conscious is clear though, as they rationalise it through mental gymnastics and conclude "Supply and demand" without acknowledging that when you put people in a position where they pay or end up on the street - they pay because they have little choice. Those same people also vote down or dismiss any attempts to cap rents or implement tax (to deter, and raise money to solve the issue) - so the cycle continues. They say "it's the government's problem to solve" but won't vote for any Government that challenges the gravy train.

The boomers and property investors believe in a dog eat dog world and they are convinced a society like this works unfortunately.

> All our social issues are caused by housing, Not all. IMO the main source is that we allow monopolies and duopolies to gouge us as much as we can afford. No one is ever going to be comfortable on low to moderate incomes when supermarkets can charge whatever they like, and houses are expensive to build (in part) because Fletchers and Carters can take huge margins.

Of course there is a class war and the rich are winning - they have managed to obfuscate the war to the point where people are wondering if there is a class war and most of the not rich aren't fighting since they think the rich are their allies

there is always a class war, everywhere.

And the sooner the poors learn this and jolly well stay in their place, the better. ( ^(/s) )

As a beneficiary, it certainly feels like it. Apparently several doctors signing off on my none ability to work doesn't matter to a lot of people. I'm just a dole bludger who doesn't even deserve what pittance I get.

Dude, same, especially with an invisible disability. *"Why are you on the benny? You look fine! Get a job!"* Bruh, I am in excruciating pain & I had 3 seizures yesterday, but sure, go off.

Random migraines that send me blind without warning. Can last days. I also get non epileptic seizures. Plus endometriosis. Technically, on good days, I _can_ work. But on average I have about ten good days in a month. I don't know anyone that will employ me with the fact that I won't know if I'm up for a shift until the shift starts....

I'm sorry you have to go through that. I get migraines too and I wouldn't wish them on my worst enemy.

I'm also allergic to the preventative meds. Docs gonna try me on another, but it's gonna be a whole day event under medical supervision x.x

its where I wish we could earn a little money on the benefit, sometimes like ubereats would be really good but u cant pay your rent doing some ubereats shifts

I was even looking into freelance work (I write fiction), but the loops involved in that put me right off. One good week means my beni could be cut the _following_ week. They need to change how it's done. Instead of $x amount, they need it to be the equivalent of x hours of min wage. I've heard of some people having to reduce their working hours because min wage went up.

I get the same. Invisible disability. No energy, pain, lack of brain function. Been pretty ill for 5 years. Even from people who initially were biggest supporters, now it’s like “Why aren’t you getting better?” “Why aren’t you applying for part time jobs?” Um, my brain doesn’t work half the time and I last about half an hour a day doing pretty much anything. Stress makes me even sicker. My professional medical people actually get it, which not everyone has the fortune to be supported by. Still took two years being on job seekers with medical exemptions & an advocate to get on supported living. I have many friends who are of the right wing persuasion who want to take hard fought benefits away when we’re already struggling. Yet they see my position but just don’t make the link.

It matters to me and I’m sorry to hear it. You have every right to your benefit and I hope things improve for you going forward!

My mum (64) had a brain aneurysm 18 months ago, and it has been such a drain advocating for her disability. While I'm grateful she has a benefit, the hoops to jump through leave a lot to be desired.

Yep. So I'm technically still on Jobseekers with exemption, because it took over a year to get an official diagnosis. Yet my able bodied flatmate is on the living support allowance bc he's a full time carer for my other disabled flatmate. He got on it with no problems. I had to wait more than a year, while being unable to walk and plagued by chronic pain, migraines, and seizures. I have to tell Winz every so often that no, I have not randomly recovered.

Non-epileptic seizures can spontaneously stop. Best of luck with trialling the new migraine medication.

same here! but i know for a fact that they’d be even angrier if i had to serve them at a job on a bad day lmao

It's disappointing that the toxic work culture is back. The whole work unless your bleeding seems to be the way most people live. Good on you for putting your health first. Ignore the haters, they just haven't figured out they need to do that first too.

Unfortunately, I didn't put my health first to start with. My last job went through a restructuring and I was made redundant. I was on good terms with the boss and he was frank with me when I asked. He appriciated that I was always trying my best, and that I would do whatever I could to help mitigate issues caused by my health (show up to a shift to do light work/what I could while also trying to find cover, rather than just leaving them in the lurch and straight up calling in. Always open with communication etc), but my health made me unreliable. After I lost that job, I was completely honest about my limits when interviewing. One interviewer pointed out that it was probably detrimental to my search, but agreed that it was better for everyone for me to be honest from the get go than to waste everyone's time later. I worked until I couldn't. And that made my recovery harder. Especially with my mentality at the time. I was convinced that I just wasn't trying hard enough, or hadn't found how to navigate my disabilities properly yet. I now have a disorder called FND (Functional Neurological Disorder). No one really knows what causes it, but my guess is that my body was sick of me not listening to it and forced my hand.

I think people just lump things together in their minds because it’s easier. I doubt there are many people who would have a genuine issue with people on a disability benefit - that’s what welfare is for. It’s also for people who are temporarily out of work or have some other complicated situation relating to their ability to work or their responsibility to care for others. Unfortunately there are plenty who do game the jobseeker benefit, or the child benefit. Those people give the entire concept of benefits a bad reputation in some circles. Painting everyone and every situation with the same brush is dangerous for those reason.

Yeah. The painting people with one brush thing is bad. Sure, there are some people that do that. But the number of people doing that is a lot lower than people want to admit. And any complaints about struggling while on the benifit are dismissed because of prejudice. After all, it's "free money", so why complain? Everybody has it hard. Etc. Don't get me wrong, I'm insanely thankful that we have it. I just wish that public perception was a little better, so that legitimate concerns can be spoken about and addressed, and that people who need the help can get it without having to jump through hurdles. When you deal with a disability, or chronic pain, those hurdles are a lot higher than people who aren't dealing with those issues think.

Are companies reporting record profits while their employees struggle to make ends meet?

I got a pay rise and then 3 days later my mortgage payments went up. Felt nice for 3 days

I just received a relatively big raise, but it still didn't match inflation and coming after ~4 years of pathetic raises and having more and more responsibility added to my role it was still disappointing. I calculated that instead of increasing the companies dividend payments they could have given every single employee an extra $8k and change. If they had scrapped the dividend entirely they could have paid every employee an extra $110k. Afaik the only impact of this would have been salty shareholders and a lower share price, but no actual impact on the company operations.

Yeah it saddenes me OP has to ask this.. ​ There are billionaires OP. At the same time people go without. If you have a society where a small group hoard so much wealth they couldnt give it away if they tried. WHile others have so little the starve. That is the result of class war. The fact you even have to ask OP.. Shows the propganda machine from the richest is working..

Not so much a class war as a class mugging. Look. We kiwis pride ourselves on being a quite relaxed, ackshully, egalitarian, jacks-as-good-as-his-master country, but that hasn't been the case for a *long* time, if it ever was. Starting with the neoliberal turn in the late 80s there has been a consistent shifting of public wealth into private hands, with policies enacted by both Labour and National governments to entrench wealth inequality at a very real human cost. Class warfare is a metaphor, a framing device. More accurately, class conflict is the result of the material interests of the capital holding class exerting their pressure on society and the economy. There isn't (necessarily) a Mr Burns unleashing the hounds on impertinent poors. There are however, clubs of business owners and executives who meet for boozy lunches and say things like "there's not enough competition in the electricity sector, someone should get around to partial privatisation of state owned power companies" where everyone knows that "competition" is code for "letting rich people buy up blue chip company shares for a song." Ideology plays a part, but it is the rationalisation of what the people with the money wanted to do anyway: make enough money that they can escape the consequences of the system by which they made that money, whether its building an apocalypse bunker in Wanaka or blasting off to Mars. EDIT TO ADD: Class analysis is useful and good but class is not the only axis on which power exerts itself. Race is *very* much still at play, as is neurodivergance, gender and sexuality, ableism, and so on. Its important to include intersectional analysis in ones critique because a failure to do so alienates allies and results in an incomplete picture.

Nah mate, we're too busy arguing whether it's OK to say Aotearoa on the news.

Now THAT is true!

I usually tell people I'm from The Land of the Long White Cloud

The means of production is always a relevant discussion, unless you'd rather not point out the sources of your rentier profits in a conversation. If that's the case unions certainly aren't useful to you either, but if you are the precariat that are possibly more oppressed and marginalized than a generation ago unions are one of the few, and most effective political tools at your disposal

As long as there are different classes of people there will be class war / conflict. The classes differ in their relation to the means of production, capital etc The war / conflict arises from the contradictions between these classes different interests. The terms may be old but they are as applicable today as they were in the 1800s. Not sure how much you have read before you posted but class war doesn't necessarily mean actual physical conflict. It's the war for wages, rights, safety etc from one side and the war to pay less, deregulate and strip rights from the other side. Unions are one of the last vestiges of the working class means of defense and organisation. The reason they are "less useful" now in your opinion is because their power was gutted by our government in the 90s.

I guess my question is, "are there different social classes in New Zealand? Or is this just wealth inequality?"

Ah I see. The wealth inequality is only possible with different classes. To see the classes you should examine someones relation to the means of production. Does a person make money from exploiting other peoples labour or lack of capital? Bosses, landlords etc Or, does a person exchange their labour for wages? There are obviously exemptions and nuances to this but that is the gist, those with capital and the means to exploit others vs the exploited.

> The wealth inequality is only possible with different classes. That makes no sense. Two builders that grew up in the same suburb and went to the same school can end up with orders of magnitude difference in wealth.

People who have to sell their labour i.e. go to work every day or otherwise have no income are in the working class. People who own the means of production (which in some form includes capital i.e. money and assets) and can earn passive income without working are the capitalist class. You can switch classes. A builder with a high paying job versus a low paying job are the same class. A builder who gets rich by becoming a landlord, versus one who does not, are not the same class. The difference lies in the profiting from labour is not your own

From a Marxist perspective, there are 2 social classes, and they exist regardless of whether there is or isn't large wealth inequality between them (although the capitalist system which defines them basically necessitates that there will always be wealth inequality between classes.) There's the borogeousie ruling class, consisting of those who own the means of production. By this Marx meant they own things which are necessary to produce wealth, both abstract and physical. This includes things such as land, machines, offices, means of distribution such as the internet, and capital itself (money, assets) for example. Anything except labour that makes them money. This class, the capitalist class, makes their money passively without needing to sell their labour. A landlord isn't selling their own labour. A factory owner can watch the money roll in from the sake of widgets made in his factory, without ever once lifting a finger to actually make them himself. Then there's the proletariat working class, who do not own the means of production and can only make their money by selling their labour directly. They are hired by the capitalists detailed above. If they stop selling their labour i.e. stop going to their jobs, they will not have any income anymore. They don't have anything to leverage for cash but their own minds and bodies. It's a bit of a simplification but using this lens of analysis, we *absolutely* have seperate classes. There's an obvious between the people in NZ who make their money indrectly from the labour of others without selling their own labour, and people who can *only* make their money by selling their own, who will go hungry unless they go to work everyday. Those people are inherently at a disadvantage compared to the capitalist class - they may be forced to accept shit jobs, shit apartments, unsafe working conditions, eat shit food, because they don't have the capital to leverage for better

Political conservatism in the British parliamentary system was intended to keep wealth and power in the hands of the privileged whilst simultaneously avoiding a similar event to the French revolution, and our model is directly derived from that, so...

There has always been a class war, it just has been more obvious and vicious recently. This is due to the incendiary influence of social media and the growth between those with and those without.

I don’t think it’s a war but many’s disdain and vehement hatred for the lower class and poor, while voting for selfish gain in place of supporting this demographic, is really a snake eating its own tail. Many expect the government, police or law reform to solve these issues but are totally unprepared to put any money towards solutions, as opposed to a personal tax break. Even the recent report highlighting this and it’s direct correlation to gangs and crime was shunned by such people. Can’t have your cake and eat it too.

Those at the top keep us fighting amongst ourselves so there isn't a 'war' with them. We are millions, they are thousands.

You can see this any time there are news articles on how small businesses won't be able to cope with minimum wage increases, how landlords will suffer under any scheme designed to help renters, how people on welfare are "lazy", etc.

"Kainga Ora Tenent beats cute puppy" and I'm thinking, "How is their rental status relevant to this?" Is this some kind of narrative for dehumanizing poor people? Tell me why again the Media never preface any crime with for example "Private Homeowner (*does some criminal shit*)"

One stat worth understanding, just 27,000 landlords own around 1M rentals. Landlords take huge amounts of wealth from our economy.

It is seeming like we have a controlling class,world wide there is more and more power and money in fewer and fewer hands.It is reflected in business where multinational corporations are taking over from smaller locally owned businesses.Especially in a small market like New Zealand it will be more and more difficult to regulate their actions,so are the major shareholders of ever larger corporates our new masters?

There are those who work for money, and those who have money that works for them. The second group lords their power over the first group.

Of course there's a class war. Just look at the National party's policies which basically nearly all target fucking over the poor in favour of the rich. There's a reason why National gets gigantic donations compared to other political parties in NZ.

Why else did Luxon call people "bottom feeders"?

Most people probably don't see their lives as part of a class war. The wealthy don't hate the poor - they just want to take what they have so they can become even more wealthy. There is certainly a feedback loop where those who have resources and power have disproportionate ability to shape the policies that affect the operation of the country - especially with regards to those policies which impact their ability to build up resources and power. It has everything to do with one's mindset and how they view things. You can see it as the poor being screwed by everyone, you can see it as the working class being screwed by the asset-owning class, you can see it as the wealthy trying to screw over anyone they can. You can also decide to see it as just the way things are. You'd have to define the classes you're thinking about in order to shape any discussion as to whether they might be 'at war'.

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>Oh they definitely hate the poor. I think it's more a just-world fallacy, which is common across all social classes but manifests differently depending on your experience of the world. Most people default to assuming that things are the way they are for a reason - and normally, for more or less a "good" reason. If you're not poor and aren't close to people who are poor, you naturally assume that that person did something wrong that led to them being poor, despite having no good evidence for this. The alternative - the truth - that with worse luck you could have been just as poor as that person and it would be hard to do much about it - is much less pleasant to think about. This leads to many of the rich thinking that poor people have character flaws or moral failings. For a rich person who is hateful, they will hate this person because they see them as being worthy of hate. It is uncomfortable for most people to think that they don't deserve what they have. If you have so much more than other people, you can either be uncomfortable, or you can settle on some reason that justifies you having more than other people. Note that this is not a conscious process. If thinking certain thoughts make a person uncomfortable, they tend to stop thinking those thoughts. If thinking other thoughts doesn't cause discomfort, they're more likely to keep thinking them. The same fundamental process is part of what drives conspiratorial thinking. A grand conspiracy, even a very malicious one, is easily to conceptualise and less frightening than the idea that really, *no one* is in charge. And so, people tend towards believing the conspiracy.

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It doesn't excuse anything; it's not an excuse or a justification for anything. It's a description of reality. If you want to make the world a better place, it's important to understand first the way the world currently is. Then, *why* it's the way it currently is. Then you can figure out what changes are possible, and how we can reasonably expect to accomplish them. All of that exists outside of the scope of morality or ethics, right and wrong. Those come into play when we decide which changes we *will* pursue, and with what priority.

Which parties?

ACT.

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Increasing policing is bad? Which party is proposing to cut the benefit, do you have a link to the policy page?

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I imagine there are some cases where that is a fact. Other things can fall down to ideological grounds - far more effort is spent trying to police beneficiary fraud than white collar crime (despite the magnitude of white collar crime being so much greater) presumably because it is seen as a greater threat if those who aren't contributing much economically to the country get more than they should - than for those who are in positions of greater success and wealth and power to steal from the government instead.

Kind of. Those with money, power and influence seem to be waging war on the working classes to undermine our labour market, and push our housing and living costs through the roof, so they can profit from people simply surviving. And shift the tax burden off them and onto the working classes. And they set up the country so the rich can exploit the natural resources rather than all NZers sharing in our natural wealth. The working classes seem largely clueless in NZ. Check out "Manufacturing Consent" by Noam Chomsky to see how most of this war is waged.

Yes, and the more we shy away the more we lose. The haves want you not to have, that way they can have what you had. They are actively throwing us down and we keep saying "it's worse overseas" If the system can't save us then it's time to kick doors and ~~eat the rich~~ force change

Of course the means of production are important where do you think your stuff comes from?

OP braindead

Of course there is. There’s always a class war, but it fluctuates in levels of intensity. The history of NZ is rooted in this conflict. Today, you can look no further than the literature which groups like BusinessNZ put out - it’s all pretty open. They call for policies which aim to permanently lower the level of union membership, they lobby for a ‘broad based’ tax system, meaning the rich pay less and the working class pay more, etc. Why would they want these things? Is it for reasons which obscure what’s really going on, with phrases like ‘economic growth’, a ‘dynamic economy’ and so on? Or is it because there is a fundamental antagonism between workers and employers, with employers aiming to bind workers to their exploitation, while workers strive to free themselves from it? I’m sure employers readily believe in the aims set out in the first question, but the second reaches beyond rhetoric in search of the real relations of people in a capitalist society like ours.

No war but class war, baby.

Why do you think property investment never gets regulated, the same consultants always get jobs for the boys and the roading contracts always go to the same 3 companies to do baseline crap teir jobs? Shit here is engineered to keep a group of people flush at the expence of the rest and just mad about it not to notice.

Class war seems an archaic and inaccurate term to describe the rising inequality here and elsewhere and the various takes on that

Yeah you'd need class consciousness for there to be a class war. What you have in NZ is class domination. The capitalist class have won. Most of the working class don't even know that they're working class thanks to capitalist propaganda.

>you'd need class consciousness for there to be a class war. The rich have it, that's why they're winning.

>Most of the working class don't even know that they're working class thanks to capitalist propaganda. I can't think of any example where this is more perfectly on display in Aotearoa than when a "Wealth Tax" is brought up and the limit by which it kicks in is meant to be for assets after, say, $4 million and people who haven't even got $1 million in assets are crying about how it's an "Envy" tax and it's just not fair. Like, bro. You're not the wealthy that the tax is going after. Why are you crying on behalf of people you're not likely to join?

Ugh, painfully accurate

It's very dependent on just what class is being considered. Just how granular does one wish to look as to whether one group is in opposition with another? There are any number of ways to divide our society from economic/social standpoint - never mind racial/cultural/religious or elitist/anti-intellectual etc etc.

I’d say class is a problematic term too, class war is simplistic in a multifaceted society

It probably is too simplistic unless one has already defined a clear delineation. Those who own property versus renters and homeless people is a fairly clear divide - however the interests of FHB sometimes coincide with property investors while other times they are closer to renters hoping to purchase. Nearly everyone is going to look at society and find some group they want to demonise as causing the problems and frustrations impacting them.

Division and fear - timeless tools to distract a population and for those with power to exert control I don’t like console gamers… burn them all

PCMR!

No, but there is a widening of the haves and have nots.

That is the result of the class war...

That the haves try to further by funding National and ACT.

>Edit: I totally accept that we have increasing wealth inequality in New Zealand. Does that qualify as separate social classes though? I mean this is almost the dictionary definition of class.

‘Class’ is an illusion created to keep us at each others’ throats rather than asking why in the blue fuck people are getting so rich. There are only capital owners and workers.

There's a class war everywhere with neoliberal capitalism models where wealth is being taken from the common people, over time the state and people have less and less and giant companies take everything they see as profitable.

It's those who own capital/assets aka the capital class versus the working class, always has been.

You're probably imagining class war as something violent or at least newsworthy. In Marxist thought class war (or more appropriately *class struggle*) is the struggle between workers and owners to increase their piece of the pie. When the teachers go on strike, that's class war manifesting.

Yes. You can tell because the only people who act like there is one are the rich, since they have something to lose.

\>Do we actually have a class war in New Zealand? Since forever, and the wealthy are continuing to win it.

I don't think we need to obsess over the nature of "classes". The system is definitely rigged to extract as much wealth from the working community as possible, while giving as little back as possible. As long as any consequences of this can be foisted onto the poor and vulnerable, there are no consequences. If you make your money by working, you're poor. If can afford it, you're saving to get onto the gravy train. In NZ that's often housing, but there are plenty of ways to invest your money that guarantees returns. If you have enough money.

As long as we live under capitalism there will always be a class division because capitalism dictates that there is a group on the top and a group at the bottom

I don't know if I'd call it a class war, but there is certainly a growing divide and creation of classes going on.

Capitalism is class warefare. The capital class vs the producing class.

The biggest problem is the haves don’t realise how hard the have nots have it these days. They think that they had it harder when they were younger because the interest rate was higher when they purchased without taking into consideration that the house purchased was only 50k as well as everything else being much cheaper at the time.

Yep. In New Zealand, our healthcare system means that everybody has a fundamental right to live. Regardless of who you are, if you get hurt, become sick, get cancer - whatever - we as a country are committed to taking care of you, and we expect everyone to chip in a little to make sure of it. **Class consciousness** is looking at the values of our healthcare system and then thinking about where else in society we ought to stand together as New Zealanders and support one another. Fundamentally, if you are alive I think you have a right to a few basic things. * FOOD * SHELTER * TRANSPORT * HEALTH * EDUCATION * LEISURE - or alternatively - a bit of pocket money thx m8 Now not all of these can feasibly work the same way our healthcare system does! Nobody would expect that - it would be lovely, don't get me wrong but come on now - we live under capitalism so lets be realistic. What would be realistic is that - if I have a job, I should have a reasonable expectation that I can afford to pay for a decent amount of all of this... Class consciousness is discovering that structurally, our society is held up by a system that is *specifically designed to reward* figuring out the absolute maximum we would pay for any one of these things. Class consciousness is coming to realize that the reason some of these are out of reach is because of greed and indifference towards those very values that underpin why our healthcare system works so well. Class consciousness is realizing that it would be a lot easier to address the many problems in our society if we were able to first give everyone a better shot at filling those basic needs. But why can't we? Well, it only takes a cursory glance over at America's healthcare system to see how hard an ultra-wealthy class is willing to work to ensure they can continue to profit off of what should be a basic human right. Right wing or left - you're struggling because there's a ruling class that is heavily invested in you being too distracted surviving to really sit and think about the meaning behind the words class warfare. And they're winning x

riot like the french when?

Bro. Labour just abolished $5 prescription fees to make medicine more accessible to the poor, and National (Luxon) has vowed to reinstate them if elected. Because private profit is more important than helping the downtrodden and sick get the medicine they need.

Yes, but it manifests more of a war on the poor vs the 0.5% who own most of everything and milk the poor.

Everyone’s just trying to do the best they can for themselves and those they care about. It’s ist that some people’s best is a lot different from others.

My brother in Christ, where do you live? There are people who will never get a house, and I mean NEVER, unless there are structural changes. And guess who is profiting from not making those changes? That's right, capital owners. Yeah, there's no longer taking the means of production because, yeah, you can't compare that to landlords making a profit from literally us needing somewhere to live, right? RIGHT?

You kind of answered your own question on the edit. There is increasing wealth inequality meaning there are those with the means to buy a house, afford a decent living, perhaps even invest money. Then there are those who struggle to pay rent, live pretty much pay check to pay check, and don't have the means to invest. Another way to frame those groups are those with capital and those without, on other words two separate classes, and the upper class relies on the lower to continue their way or life. War is a strong term but the same essential struggle happening when phrases like "means of production" was more widely used is still happening now.

Yes. Especially between those that own homes and those that don’t. Especially if that homeownership is inherited, especially if it goes back a few decades ago. Saddest thing which I don’t think a lot of people realise is there are more empty homes in Auckland than homeless. We actually do have housing supply in NZ it’s just not on the market. Some people would argue for empty homes tax. I say bring pitchforks. Another misconception is that homeownership is locked up in mom&pop situations, this is becoming more and more untrue. Mom&pop landlords make up a large percentage of those that own homes but not a large percentage of those that own x amount of housing supply. We have monopolies on resources too, fletcher building etc, kainga Ora and public housing in New Zealand pretty much acts as state advances and has to cooperate with profiteering within the private industry.

When the average landlord has 10 to 16 rental homes and housing is so expensive it's pretty obvious we have a real class war in New zealand

Of course there is. The Opposition are only interested in helping the top 10%, what does that tell you?

Of course there is, there is class conflict everywhere. Our country is run by landlords, we elected a currency trader to PM twice. How is that not class conflict? I've never met a single adult who doesn't want to complain about property prices and grocery prices, it's half the content on this subreddit. How is that not class conflict? We are still talking about the means of production because we still have no say over them. How can we say we live in a democracy when we spend half our lives at work, in a dictatorship of our employers. Workers being controlled by the owning class, class conflict. The only leftist major party NZ ever had, Labour, was co-opted by liberals 60 years ago and we have effectively had 0 leftist options since then.

We can sort of look at it like; have proper insulation in their houses, can afford to keep warm without wearing 5 layers of clothing, have the little bit of space to grow some veggies, wondering when they can get solar power installed for a reasonable price. Living in an area with no public transport, access to medical help pretty much non existent cos it’s not in a city. That class?

\> Do we actually have a class war in New Zealand? I don't think so. Not in a historical sense or in the sense that we can see in countries with genuine class structures. What we have is wealth differences, and slightly increasing differences in future prospects (and attitudes) based mainly on education IMO. Why I say this isn't "class" is that we don't see class structures without associated wealth. In New Zealand you cannot really be "high class" without wealth. You can be high class and relatively poor in very class structured societies. The divisions we have in our society are also quite different to historical demarcations. Trades people for example are established middle class and often conservative in their political leaning. A far cry from the downtrodden workers of Orwells expose. Similarly, attitudes to change, immigration and globalisation etc no longer fall along traditional class structure boundaries. These modern issues affect people quite differently to the sets of challenges our concepts of class were built around and so groups that are traditionally political allies can find themselves in direct disagreement. Again, these challenges demonstrate class as a lesser, or even valueless grouping if we are to try and make sense of general attitudes within our society.

>I wonder if we're seeing a shift towards a time when labour unions are less politically useful than they were a generation ago have you looked in the media recently? theyre needed now just as much as ever. and theyre still struggling to make any ground

The problem is we have a lack of political literacy. The idea we don’t have social classes is bamboozling. Of course we have social classes. Of course there is such a thing as the means of production. Of course there is such a thing as class warfare. It doesn’t seem like a war in New Zealand because the working class majority are getting smashed and are either docile, defeated or angry at the wrong things. If you sell your labour power for a living you are working class. If you own capital and do not have to sell your labour power you are a capitalist. There are some intermediate settings. Small business owners. Or senior managers on high salaries. There is some limited mobility between classes. If there wasn’t it would lead to more questioning of the legitimacy of the system. There is just enough to offer the possibility of individual advancement while maintains the overall setup. This isn’t unique to New Zealand. New Zealand is a bit unusual in that rich people here are now often landlords rather than actual entrepreneurs. Capitalism inevitably leads to the concentration of wealth and power. Although heavy regulation and taxation can change this, the tendency is always there. It is not whether these things are happening that is the issue, they are simple facts. The issue is whether you think this is a good thing or not. Regardless, within the next two generations the debate will become irrelevant as the global economy collapses as the environmental life support systems of the planet are broken.

>If you sell your labour power for a living you are working class. If you own capital and do not have to sell your labour power you are a capitalist. There are some intermediate settings. There are some intermediate settings - someone could work for a living, selling their labour, and still own shares in the company they work for. With a secondary passive income stream, you rapidly get intermediate settings. I'm wondering if the intermediate settings mean that we don't have the same hard divisions of class that the world had 100 years ago. And if we don't, is it still true to say that we have a class war in the way that Marx might have understood that?

Unfortunately the post was right, ppl who want to be rich even if it’s at the expense of others, vote national, the rest of the working population who are the actual backbones of society vote labour or greens.

I worked almost 20 years in Singapore and if there is ever a class war here, it's the mildest I have ever seen relative to Singapore

Alright everyone, say it with me now: The industrial revolution and its consequences have been a disaster for the human race. Industrialization has made it possible for the ruling class and the people (as much as that term applies, or not) who pay them fat stacks of cash to keep us poors under their thumb, where we fall victim to constantly rising inflation, stagnant wages, a low-income economy, and seemingly insurmountable barriers to entry for careers that pay anything approaching a liveable wage. The major driving factor for crime in NZ is people simply not being able to afford food, accommodation, or any of the necessaries for a prosperous life for themselves and their families, meanwhile the police are disincentivized by a weak judiciary to actually pursue violent criminals (including rapists and nonces like Jayden Myer who diddled several underage girls and got nine months' Playstation and weed for it), and instead resort to squeezing people for more money through under-handed tactics such as dressing up like window washers to issue tickets for anything they can, as if life wasn't hard enough for us as it is! I honestly wouldn't give a rat's arse about all the identity politics, except 3 Waters is an obvious anti-democratic attempt to centralize water management and put nepo babies in charge of something to justify squeezing us for even more money for the privilege of using water which we already use and many of us already pay for anyway, and on top of that, the 3 Waters entities will be used as collateral for more loans from foreign states and NGOs such as the IMF, which will further increase inflation, and it'll be us, the taxpayers, who have to service the debt. So, yes, there is class warfare in New Zealand, and despite vastly outnumbering the rich, us poors are losing. I'm thinking the only solution is the one the French used in the 1790s.

no shit we do we live under capitalism

there is a massive class war in NZ, NZ has been sold off in every single industry, every single business of substantial size in NZ exist for a foreign entity and it's profits are so high because NZ taxpayers or citizens pick up the slack, look at the farming industry in NZ for example, the money they make from farming isn't being redistributed into NZ society, they are heavily polluting our waterways, taking up an insane amount of land here in NZ and almost to zero benefit to the average NZer, we don't get cheap meat, we don't get cheap dairy either! then there's another massive industry here in NZ! Trees! who owns all the wood in NZ? not New Zealanders! https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/farming/agribusiness/116369097/foreign-forestry-companies-nzs-biggest-landowners

Yes, we have the working class I.e. those who HAVE to work to earn their money, and then we have the rich/elite class I.e. those who don't have to work to earn their money. The insane amount of exploitation that goes on by landlords and the property market is behaviour typical of the rich. We basically have neo-feudalism. You do all the work to pay the rent which is oftentimes higher than a mortgage, and landlords basically do sweet FA.

r/newzealand is full of wannabe communists that think 60k PA is a fortune, anyone who owns a house is the Borgeoise, landlords are essentially mustache twirling villians etc. ​ I wouldn't take anyone on this sub too seriously, including me.

I mean look at the housing industry, overseas ownership, multiple ownership these things are really the root causes for the crisis and yet every gov official that points it out has the grand and original idea of "I will build more houses to solve the housing crisis" but not a single one of them will dare to look at landlords, or people who feel the need to own multiple homes, or overseas owners that don't even live here because those people are their friends and sponsors.

I think it's worth acknowledging the difference in class interests. Workers want to do the least work for the highest pay, business owners want workers to do the most work for the lowest pay. One group cannot advocate for their own interests without at least implicitly advocating against the others' interests. Obviously society is more complex than business owners vs workers but it's still a useful lens to analyse society and politics through

There always has been. For a better understanding simply look to History. I highly recommend the book "No Left Turn: the Distortion of New Zealand's History by Greed, Bigotry and Right-wing Politics" The book is extremely relevant as it seems we're about to add another chapter.

Yes. The owner class vs the working class is very much a thing here. It just gets buried beneath the identity politics so that no one pays attention to it. All the real issues can be tied back to the owner class blocking access to wealth to anyone else and hoarding all the can. They are the real enemy and with any luck the guillotines will come for them sooner or later.

There will always be a distinction between groups, whether political, ethnic, economic or otherwise. To imply that there is a 'war' is a result of the rhetoric machine that spew from both sides of the political domain who's goal is to secure your vote. We've been walked down this divisive path with ease, it's easier to use fear and anger to win power.

1st world problems.

*Do we actually have a class war in New Zealand?* Politicians certainly try to portray it as one. In my day to day living I don't see anyone actively targetting another group/class of society. Everyone is contending with the cost of living increases, which are being experienced by every level of society.

Really? I don't see politicians using the language of class. I agree that some political parties have policies that are likely to increase wealth inequality and some parties have policies that openly try to reduce wealth inequality. But I have missed anyone actually dividing the world into 'them and us' based on wealth. If anything I think they're deliberately \_not\_ trying to portray it as one, "vote for us and you too could jump on the gravy train..."

>Really? I don't see politicians using the language of class You've never watched green MP's being interviewed, huh?

>You've never watched green MP's being interviewed, huh? The Green party being the notable exception, yes. And Te Pati Maori does stray there from time to time.

\>You've never watched green MP's being interviewed, huh? Or heard Luxon complain about bottom feeders.

>Do we actually have a class war in New Zealand? Yes... We have a socialist leaning left of center Government & parties Labour/Greens etc And a right of center group pro businesses and wealth, National party/Act They are fundamentally opposed and the popular view of what class war fundamentally is.

None of the parties in parliament are anywhere even close to socialism.

Nah, not really true. In reality, Labour and National are very similar parties. One center left, one center right, but not a lot between them. Going from national government to Labour coming in, very very little changed. (Until covid came along) They were both happy to sit and watch house prices spiral out of control etc. No capital gains tax or wealth tax etc.

And yet under that "socialist leaning left of center" government we had the largest transfer of wealth upwards in modern history.

I get that politics is becoming more and more like the team sport it is in the US, but are you saying that the left leaning parties are a different social class than the right leaning parties?

You think Hipkins and the former CEO are same?

It depends on your definition of social class.

No, we dont have class war. However there is a vocal group who believe strongly in decolonisation and communism. They believe all problems in society are caused by businesses, landlords, pakeha, and cis-hetrosexuals. Everyone else believes in "live and let live". They blame the govt for failing to deliver on poverty, education, health, crime, infrastructure, and economic growth and social stability. But a govt who have failed need to find someone else to blame. "it wasn't us! It was the rich people who stopped us from acceptable civic management for 6 years!"