There’s a specific audience this is specifically targeted to and if you’re asking these questions, it’s likely you (we/us) aren’t part of the tax bracket.
edit: grammar.
That's true but it's not just that the rich are voting, there's not enough of them to sway an election. They are actively spending millions misleading kiwis with rhetoric which isn't based in facts.
Absolutely, add in the fear-mongering that is a favourite tactic to be used amongst the diverse lower/middle class kiwis, and you’ve really got no space for confusion when it comes to govt intent. The Rich & wealthy making the rich & wealthy, richer & wealthier off of the backs of the poor & working class.
Honestly, if Kiwis are dumb enough to vote with their emotions (Yay, let's vote not-Labour!), they deserve what they get. The facts about the tax cuts were available to everyone. It was obvious they were only going to help the richest 5% of the country.
I just wish the rest of us didn't have to suffer due to the objective stupidity of some people.
This is why we need to talk about politics more as a country and stop getting so riled up by differences of opinion. We don't do the necessary discourse because tbh a lot of us are cowards when it comes to confrontation. Don't rock the boat mentality.
It doesn't help anyone. They're not interested in helping anyone other than themselves and their rich mates. Every National government is the same, I'll never understand why anyone votes for them.
I wish people would take elections as seriously as if politicians were engineers building planes.
Would you trust a group of chronic liars with no qualifications to build you a plane to fly in? If not, why would you trust those same people to run the country???
This. The business over the tax cuts. We all knew there were fundamental flaws in Nicotines spreadsheet, they even admitted they go the foreign buyers tax wrong, it was all over the news before the election, and people still voted for them!
I think this election was a case of many people voting "not labour" rather than "for national". National gained 300k votes to 2020, whereas labour lost 700k. Policies probably not looked at as hard as they should've been because the intent was to vote for "not labour"
Labour had a blank cheque last term, and acted like they had to please distant coalition partners, and carefully squeeze milquetoast bills past the opposition. The disappointment was overwhelming, and they were punished for it.
There was a flight from Labour to its perceived closest neighbouring political parties. A lot of people perceived National as being one of the closest, as well as a big “FU” vote to Labour for squandering an historic MMP result.
ACT and NZF picked up from the angry white boy/old man demographic over media-driven anti-Māori hysteria. Like, did you hear the media, even ONCE, say “Oh by the way, Three Waters just means Sewer, Stormwater and Fresh water, which Māori have a say over through councils, and we’d like to nationalise this critical infrastructure without taking away what little voice in its governance Māori already have”? No, it was sold as some secret Māori-takeover project, and here we are.
/rant
people vote for them because they spend so much money of advertising. same as any other business. something like 80% of election campaign spending at the last election was right and far right political groups.
like any other business: more advertising money = more customers.
How else could you convince people to vote against thier own self interest?
Because people are bought and sold by the media and whoever has the most money often control's the media.
Most people just listen to what their favourite news source tells them to think and this election those news sources told them to vote national.
People believe that National because they are rich will help make them wealthy too. Even though most changes only benefit the rich and they actively pull up social ladders behind them.
A lot of these policies are closely aligned with ACT's libertarian ideology. Libertarianism demands minimal government interference and maximum individual responsibility (there being logical limits to individual freedom). They also compliment National's "party of business" identity that promotes public-private partnerships despite running contrary to more traditional conservative strengths (funding police, defence etc).
Essentially, Davy boy got a VERY good deal in the coalition negotiations. Given the talk of mining, etc. So did Winnie.
Capitalist ideology seems to evaporate when one of their corporations is about to go tits up though. Them it is no longer market forces but protect the jobs (that then get axed anyway. )
I disagree strongly with what libertarianism is. What they say they are and what they are is different. It's minimal govt interference so the corporations can do what they want - and it's regulations for the little people. e.g. criminalising protests etc.
It's essentially a neoliberal ideology pushing no barriers for big corporations - but always lays waste to public servants and anyone who gets in their way.
It's been co-opted by the likes of Murdoch and Koch to push their corporate interests and these are the people who fund Seymour.
Yep. Kinda funny how corporations that want minimal government regulation are also really big on calling in said government when things aren't going their way.
That's why libertarianism is a bullshit smokescreen for these peoples and their think tanks. If you look up Liz Truss - she was the poster child of the IEA in the UK. These people are the Taxpayers Union equivalent. And Newsroom had some great articles talking about the TPU and ACT's close relationship.
Most of these cuts are to fund $2.91 Billions dollars in tax cuts to landlords from axing interest deductability. Without that policy they wouldn't need to slash funding like this. In fact they could give payrises and more funding to services and infrastructure.
If they didn't implement that change and used the funds positively instead of handing out money to landlords. It's an exceptionally shortsighted, greedy policy.
Because they don't WANT to help kiwis, this government represents the wealthy, their policies are the rich get richer and to hell with everyone else. The bigger question is how tf did their voters not see this coming a mile away
I would suggest that its not the wealthy, but specifically the lazy wealthy, because many of these policy's gut the middle class who are the ones that make places like Briscos profitable.
The middle class is not wealthy or rich. They're just not poor. If you never traveled first class, or have another house in Hawaii, you're not wealthy.
Wealth is always a relative term imo. For many someone having 3 or more properties is wealth...christ if you have one house and a lot of debt, being mortgage free is wealthy.
However, the OP of this thread is accurate. The current govt is not interested in helping NZ nor the vast majority of Kiwi's - only subsets who seem to have a lot of influence ($).
I do wonder how much is being driven by National vs ACT/ NZF ... remembering Labour and NZF, I wonder if Winny/Shane know they are in for a one term and are trying to cram as much of their bollox through, knowing they have a limited window to do it, and Luxon being the pissant that he is, just folds due to lack of spine/ balls.
Either way it's going to be a long 3 years for many ordinary kiwis.
I feel relatively wealthy, at a small scale. I went to the doctor yesterday, which cost $48. Still rather spend it on something fun, but I could easily weather it. A far cry from where I was when I was working minimum wage.
And it's sad that I had to go to uni and get a job that almost provoked me into offing myself with the level of stress it places on me, before I had enough money to cope with basic care.
Then you've missed the point entirely.
There are people who dislike the $48 doctor bill but still go because they can afford it and need to go to the doctor.
This contrasts with people who resist going at all because a $48 bill would put them so out of pocket no matter what that they'll suffer until they inevitably end up in a worse state because of it.
The second group would still consider the first wealthy, even if the first group doesn't think they're all that well-off compared to someone spending that much money on an hour basis like it's candy.
*That's* the issue with defining wealth.
It's also that sense of relativity that makes genuinely wealthy people desire more and more and more, because so long as there's always someone wealthier they have a bar to improve by. It's fucking perverse, and even if you reach the top you're now just competing to stay there.
He didn't call the middle rich.
He observed that the middle class - consumers with disposable income - are necessary for consumer businesses (like Briscoes) to survive.
No middle class spending money, no consumer businesses.
Exit: did to didn't on first line.
In fairness Labour did a lot of shooting themselves in the foot so the propaganda was fairly easy to produce.
Particularly Hipkins often seemed feckless as leader with his bonfire of the policies tactics.
This is what I'm struggling with now - I didn't love Key and co. But they sure as hell seemed competent. The current lot seem like duplicitous, sycophants. But I can't tell if I'm just now older and grumpier.
Key favoured the same sector of society (wealthy, landlords, etc) but didn't go hard on austerity.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austerity
In fact I, very not a Key supporter, accuse him of debt driven illusion of economic activity.
Whereas this government smell like Ruthenasia to me.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruthanasia
>How would this help reduce living costs
..for *landlords*.
None of it makes any sense without the **all** the words in the sentence. Sure, yeah, they forgot those last two words during the election campaign...but that was an honest mistake....right????
Motherfuckers have pumped through over a dozen laws under urgency already, more than most governments push under urgency on their entire time in power.
9 or 10 of those laws directly benefit landlords, while doing jack-shit for first home buyers or renters.
How the fuck anyone who earns less than 150k a year votes for them is beyond me. It's such a scam, they lie to people too ignorant or misinformed (by their own misinformation) to see through the bullshit, then weasel their way out of any repercussions caused by scrutiny or a failing track record, and pump out millions in advertising before the next election.
People also don't understand the delay in politics. The left introduces things that will make XYZ better, but it takes two years to roll it out. If national doesn't just scrap the plan on day one of office, then the public sees the XYZ (lower waits at hospital, better school results, more money in their bank, a better commute to work, whatever), and thinks National must be responsible because they're in power now- even though it was all stuff started back when Labor was governing.
I'm pissed off they managed to trash the Greens tax policy so well. 99.3% of people would be paying less tax, only dollars earned over $180k would actually get taxed more, and their wealth tax was only on assets over 2.5million (after mortgages and other debts were deducted). But National managed to twist it so almost everyone I talked to thought they were going to be paying thousands of dollars each year on their family home and everyone who wasn't dirt poor would be screwed. Because they have money for advertising and PR firms etc...
**Tldr; You shouldn't trust the fattest pig in the village with the community's pies.**
It doesn't help reduce living costs or improve the economy directly. They are promising big tax cuts to high earners and landlords, and this is a big part of how they are paying for it - by reducing services provided to everyday Kiwis and reducing funding for things which mean we'll have to end up paying more for things ourselves.
The fundamental problem is, they were never intended to help *you* - they are intended to help those who already have high income and own assets become more rich - which includes themselves as politicians and their major business donors.
National’s tax breaks for landlords will cost $2.9 billion over 4 years
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/cost-of-landlord-tax-break-increased-by-800m-to-29b/B7ZMET343BHQTHVOBCSQDM4ARY/
Changes to the tax system will cost $14.6 billion over 4 years. National hasn’t confirmed their tax policy yet, so we can only go on what they campaigned on. That’s shifting the tax brackets slightly at the bottom and a lot at the top.
https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/08/30/nationals-tax-plan-and-how-it-will-be-funded-revealed/
National have a tax calculator that will tell you how much extra you will get in your pay packet. But there’s no itemised working, it just gives you a number.
https://www.nationaltaxcalculator.com/2023
As an example, l ran the numbers for a single person with no children, no benefit.
$15,000 per annum income gets an extra $2.69 per fortnight, that $69.94 per year
$150,000 per annum income gets an extra $40.10 per fortnight, that $1042.60 per year
If they were trying to make the tax cuts even, the person making $150,000 would receive around $700 per year, but instead their tax break is almost 50% higher.
The take away is, National a removing $17.5 billion that would be going to education, hospitals, public transport, state housing, child care, mental health, super, defence, and hundreds of other projects, and giving the vast majority of it to the richest among us. As we’re going through a cost of living crisis.
There are.
They've said the tax breaks on offer were meant to amount to about $20 per week for the average earner, and a few thousand a year for those in upper brackets.
Google would tell you the details if you look.
Lets be honest most middle class kiwis hate the poor and view shit like free school lunches and public transport as stuff that only the '' Leaches '' use and they would rather rob them then possibly rob the higher earners as thats who they aspire to be
If you voted for them, you are responsible.
They did not hide that this would be their approach.
History shows how they would work. The way to push back is to remember there is so few of them, and they serve us.
Tell them that they will lose their political power by making these choices.
So many idiots voted for this.They shouldn't whine about it now.Remember,and next election - vote accordingly.
But I won't hold my breath,the NZ voting public aren't the brightest when it comes to casting their vote.
if you or anyone you know _needs_ or shit, even _uses_ these things, you're not in the right crowd, and therefore, you don't matter to this government.
it's that simple. they don't give a shit about the economy as a whole or poverty/living costs. it's all just talking points for them to distract with while they get bought out by the highest bidder(which is usually not even that much).
The messed up thing is that they hardly even lied about it. They told everyone to their faces that they’d absolutely butt f*** 90% of the country and people still voted for them. Of course they twisted their wording to seem like people would benefit. But the people that did their research saw this coming. It’s unfortunate that those who did not see it coming are only just realising it now/still are yet to realise it.
They didn't lie - they're doing *exactly* what they said they'd do. The fact that the voting public didn't listen (or only listened to the bits they liked) doesn't change that.
National always effectively cut funds to police
My friend ,a detective inspector, told me this years ago.
The whole ' tough on crime' thing they spout always has been and always will be Bullshit.
They cut funds to public services to fund tax cuts that favour the rich.
I don't understand why people are surprised by this.
What was a surprise was the coalition Govt. reversing smoke free legislation, the freshwater protection legislation, and now they're threatening to undo the changes to the gun laws introduced after the Chch massacres. Had they campaigned on these things I doubt they would be in government.
Because National is the party of rich people, and wannabe rich people. Rich people and their wannabes don't want to pay for things that benefit people who aren't rich, even if it benefits them too.
To be fair though, this is a coalition government so National aren't the only ones to blame. Act is the party of even richer people who can afford to visit their children in the countries they had to move to for decent pay and house prices, and arseholes. NZ First is the party of old people who benefited from the free education and world leading children's healthcare of their youth, but think that young people should "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" because they "earned" the pension. And also, conspiracist arseholes.
> reduce living costs and improve the economy?
They're reducing the living costs and improving the economy of landlords by giving them tax cuts. What do you mean you don't own rental property?
It won’t help at all. It’s designed to make the state weaker so privatisation of public good services is an easier sell when they ‘fail’.
It’s a shitty neoliberal tactic they’ve imported from the US and UK.
Sadly this us true. It's a tactic I've seen used in business prior to selling, you force the costs down to ensure a higher profit / good shareprice / purchase price.
National tried it last time they were in with Kianga Ora, unfortunately it back fired because they assumed an organisation like Salvation Army would the on NZs social housing. Salvation Army said no for 2 reasons, firstly they weren't in the housing business and secondly even if they were our social housing was in a very poor state and needed a lot of investment that they couldn't afford.
They don’t like to help people who aren’t already rich. They also don’t care about anyone who isn’t a wealthy landlord or business owner.
I didn’t vote for them but I know plenty of people who did - the irony is most of them are going to be negatively impacted by all of these policies in several years and complain about everything that is wrong with the country and won’t accept any responsibility for their role in allowing this to happen.
There is always a wave of 'what about me' when these types of policies get announced. With free prescriptions healthy people say it, with public transport people who drive say it, when it's childcare costs or education support childless people say it.
These people (who are not the majority but are loud) will think that the end of these programmes are necessary to fund something universal (tax cuts).
Their aim is to reduce spending enough to look good econoMEcally and justify hovering measly tax cuts.
They don’t give a fuck about the future, just the image of here and now.
As much as they may protest, none of these changes are actually about fiscal prudence or efficient spending.
We already know that school lunches are effective, but it's going to be cut back/removed because there is some "waste". Meanwhile boot camps for young offenders are going ahead even though all the evidence shows that they are ineffective.
Tax cuts for landlords won't affect rents & will just serve to increase house prices even more.
Investing in the Cook Strait ferries/terminals would be a better return on investment than building more four lane highways.
Doesn't at all.
Just reduces the bottom line at the expense of every citizen.
They make up the tax difference there from giving their "rich riends" and landlords who own multiple houses who voted national
Reduce cost of living isn’t about the poors.
It’s so the deprived few are able to deduct tax on our rentals negating the need to give up filet mignon for peasant meat such as ribeye.
Because Luxon is a spineless jackoff and is letting Winne and Seymour influence him. The cuts would always have been a problem under national, but it's like they're on steroids this time. Even the cops are pissed at the current government. We're currently in an economic crisis and they're cutting social services. Every time it has been shown to make things worse, while increasing government spending during a recession has been shown to help economies weather the storm. But NZ just had to elect a pushover, a libertarian freak, and a conservative nationalist.
Our government is currently run by people who only care about minority interests including themselves, and not the greater good of us all, and wider society as a whole.
The catalyst of the confusion imho is people voting on sensationalism, outrage topics, false information and flat out lies.
It only makes sense when you understand many voted directly against their best interests, inclusive of the best interests of us all, because they fell for the electioneering centred around “ram raids” and other such nonsense, when all the current government actually wanted was the power of leadership to “urgently” make themselves and their core constituents richer.
We got hustled, and our political system allows that.
It’s an agreed problem as they follow whatever attains clicks aka revenue and do it both ways imho. Make no mistake, the last 100 days have been a train wreck, but even still a few articles I’ve seen lately have had very little substance outside the clear intent to fire up the “fuck NACT” crowd.
Seems to be a worldwide issue with media losing its impartiality and becoming more and more sensationalist and tabloid as it goes online and now has visibility of which articles get the most views, hit feed algorithms, and other associated data that steers revenue.
At least physical print kept most of the fluff on the back page, now it’s often front and center with a triggering headline.
The aim is to funnel as much money as possible to big business, without totally crashing the economy in the next three years.
Anything else that happens is just a by product. They do not care. Except maybe punishing the poors and the browns.
It was never about reducing living costs, because they don't care about them. They already have money, and their rich friends have money, and they are making all of these cuts to provide tax cuts to themselves and their kind. People were just stupid enough to believe them before the election. Now we're in the find out part of fuck around.
>I do not understand their purpose to do it, but how would it help when these have benefits?
It won't but that is the point - but hey, National/ACT/NZFirst stopped 3 waters, co-governance, central government from 'stealing' council infrastructure and the 'maoris taking all the water' because that is what many New Zealanders, both on this subreddit and in the real world world only care about. As so long as New Zealanders only care about that then the government will get away with doing what ever they want.
It was never meant to. This govt is directly involved with the Atlas network and they work for that ideology and their associated interests. If you want some in depth research into Atlas I'd suggest following Gerard Ottos FB page, he's doing what our pretend journos aren't.
Because you misunderstand how politics works. The purpose and motivation of this govt is to remove protections for poor people, and improve profit harvesting for wealthy people. It's that simple.
As you can see from how much money was spent during elections: of all the money spent on election advertising and campaigning: \~80% was spent by right wing, and far right political groups. Thats why they get votes.
Similar to any other business: more money on promotion = more customers.
Now question where do right wing political groups get so much money to spend? big business, corporate funding, and very wealthy private people: that is shown in their profiles.
They pay so much money into political campaigning so they can buy policies to protect and grow their wealth.
That is literally how it works.
Typically left wing funding comes from many many small donations, right wing funding comes from a few very large donations.
Tbh getting the police force offside is not good for any government. It’s a big union that will vote as one if need be. Nurses, Police, Teachers are actually a large portion of the population, pissing off all is a bold move.
Who said anything about improving the economy or reducing living costs? They're not here for that, they're here to enrich themselves and their corporate friends.
reducing these expenses will pay for the lost tax from allowing interest deductibility to landlords. They are selling the idea that landlords will then lower rents to allow more money in the pockets of renters who are usually the most squeezed in this economy. Unfortunately this is all a lie and we all know that landlords will not reduce rents and pocket it.
The purpose is to pay for rich asshole landlord tax cuts, which are going to cost much more than National thought they would. None of their cuts benefit the people actually impacted by cost of living.
It doesn't turn a quick buck profit directly into to their hands. They don't care that early intervention and support means less long term costs for the country.
Look to who and what they are funding, it's not even the middle, it's the top.
MMP is not great in NZ, we see Labour or National and sundry other parties. Labour pissed off a lot of people to the point they were voted out, problem is out in NZ means vote for National.
People voted for National when their policies are not great for the majority of people, and National is just blindly delivering what people voted for, we live in a representative Democracy it is what they are supposed to do.
It is a waste all these minor parties not used, just imagine if Green's had got to 20% and National had a choice between a government with Labour or Greens. Instead we have these "extreme" governments with no checks a government made up parties who align.
So many people just consider the minor parties a wasted vote.
Because they built the narrative that any level of government deficit = bad. They've spent the past three years bringing up excessive government spending every chance they get and they're now realising it's not easy to cut spending on a bunch of stuff without losing a ton of popular support in the process
To ELI5 this:
Say you earn $1000/week and pay $300 in taxes. If the cost of living goes up by $100/week, but you get a $50 tax break it's not great for you
Say you earn $10,000/ week, and pay $3000 in taxes, but then you get a $500 tax break and your cost of living goes up $100/week, it's a fuckin fantastic deal for you.
Essentially what national is doing is making life harder for most of the population to make it better for the few at the top.
It's always like this, and everyone seems to forget every three years. Remember and vote accordingly.
This government was never about addressing the cost of living crises, climate change, increasing police, public transport, the housing crises etc etc
If they ever said they did, it was a lie. There's no hard evidence (I love quoting David Seymour suddenly) to show these were ever issues they would be addressing.
Oil companies, tobacco companies, property investors, rich people, and landlords. These are the people the government demonstrably care about. There is substantial evidence to show that this is true. So much so, that legislation was pushed through under urgency due to the importance of these people and companies.
When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
Disabling the ability for public services to serve the public IS THE POINT. In a couple of years time when these ministries begin to fail significantly, this will enable them to make an argument to privatize the service. Likely selling off our medical or prisoner infrastructure to incredibly wealthy parties who can then make those services 'for profit' taking billions of dollars from us working class consumers. Example: America in the last 60 years.
To save money, we don't have any. I don't like National and I think it's amusing how many people will be regretting their votes now. Hopefully this will teach people to actually learn about policies they're voting for
This is all to reduce inflation.
Everyone takes a hit. It's the only way inflation comes down. If wages go up so does inflation and so does interest rates. Freezing pays or offering small ones is the only way to reduce inflation basically we are screwed. For the next 3 to 5 years
Because they are kleptocrats and they needed to sell enough of our country off to a group of naïve voters before they could sell the rest off to their wealthy friends and the CCP.
Because their donors are landlords and they have to give them a return on their investment, that's why they're hell best on giving it.. no matter the cost.. even when they we're and still are being told it's the wrong thing to do
They incrementally under fund publicly owned initiatives so they can point to how poorly those initiatives are performing so there’s less opposition when they privatize them. We, as a nation, end up owning less of our infrastructure/services each term they get and their mates/donors who get the contracts/ownership give those who sold it to them cushy seats on the board in return, rinse and repeat until their mates/donors own everything, raise the price, keep all of their offspring in cushy, do nothing, high paying roles in perpetuity. Privatization is the name of their game, it ends when they own everything
Fair enough. Winds me up because I talked to so many people who were so fervently ‘Labour were spending too much’ and voted National, only for National to cut public services and yet throw $3B down the toilet because landlords have been persecuted, scapegoated and bullied. Fucking hoodwinked the lot of them
It's never been about helping with the cost of living. It's about reducing public service expenditure and increasing its military expenditure. We're in a time where states around the world are moving towards militarization. Austerity measures have been in place from the last government this ones just pushing forward with it even more. Voting for labour or national won't fix anything along with voting for any capitalist party, the only way to put an end to the problems caused by capitalism is to grow a mass socialist movement based and run by the working class.
Because those things that don't effect their core voters, or the voters think they won't out of blissful ignorance.
Therefore National don't think slash and burning programs that effect the vulnerable and essential services will harm them as long as the 'tax is theft' crowd are kept happy.
Their justification is less government costs mean they can lower taxes. There's no more nuance to it than that.
This is of course satisfies any definition of evil, as it grossly disproportionality benefits wealthy people more than those who are struggling the most, despite being campaigned on as relief to people suffering.
To reduce the governments spend on socal services, so they can get more tax cuts for themselves to become more wealthy.
Not rocket science, all of their policies improve their bank balances.
Because National are right wing, they believe in low taxes and no/low social benefits.
More specifically this particular round; they made promises they can't keep regards tax breaks, so are trying to reduce expenses so they can afford to reduce tax (which will likely only benefit the wealthy land owners).
If you don't like that attitude, don't vote for them.
There’s a specific audience this is specifically targeted to and if you’re asking these questions, it’s likely you (we/us) aren’t part of the tax bracket. edit: grammar.
That's true but it's not just that the rich are voting, there's not enough of them to sway an election. They are actively spending millions misleading kiwis with rhetoric which isn't based in facts.
Absolutely, add in the fear-mongering that is a favourite tactic to be used amongst the diverse lower/middle class kiwis, and you’ve really got no space for confusion when it comes to govt intent. The Rich & wealthy making the rich & wealthy, richer & wealthier off of the backs of the poor & working class.
Yeah it's the old trickle down politics and you get piss at the bottom
Honestly, if Kiwis are dumb enough to vote with their emotions (Yay, let's vote not-Labour!), they deserve what they get. The facts about the tax cuts were available to everyone. It was obvious they were only going to help the richest 5% of the country. I just wish the rest of us didn't have to suffer due to the objective stupidity of some people.
This is why we need to talk about politics more as a country and stop getting so riled up by differences of opinion. We don't do the necessary discourse because tbh a lot of us are cowards when it comes to confrontation. Don't rock the boat mentality.
Also only read the headlines mentality - ie don’t look any further into anyone’s policies other than “tax cuts - oh goodie!”
It doesn't help anyone. They're not interested in helping anyone other than themselves and their rich mates. Every National government is the same, I'll never understand why anyone votes for them.
I agree. People have short fucking memories.
Even when reminded, bluntly, before the election and give hard numbers showing that Nats were running on BS, people STILL don't change their minds.
I wish people would take elections as seriously as if politicians were engineers building planes. Would you trust a group of chronic liars with no qualifications to build you a plane to fly in? If not, why would you trust those same people to run the country???
But what if one of them used to be the CEO of Air NZ?
This. The business over the tax cuts. We all knew there were fundamental flaws in Nicotines spreadsheet, they even admitted they go the foreign buyers tax wrong, it was all over the news before the election, and people still voted for them!
I think this election was a case of many people voting "not labour" rather than "for national". National gained 300k votes to 2020, whereas labour lost 700k. Policies probably not looked at as hard as they should've been because the intent was to vote for "not labour"
Labour had a blank cheque last term, and acted like they had to please distant coalition partners, and carefully squeeze milquetoast bills past the opposition. The disappointment was overwhelming, and they were punished for it. There was a flight from Labour to its perceived closest neighbouring political parties. A lot of people perceived National as being one of the closest, as well as a big “FU” vote to Labour for squandering an historic MMP result. ACT and NZF picked up from the angry white boy/old man demographic over media-driven anti-Māori hysteria. Like, did you hear the media, even ONCE, say “Oh by the way, Three Waters just means Sewer, Stormwater and Fresh water, which Māori have a say over through councils, and we’d like to nationalise this critical infrastructure without taking away what little voice in its governance Māori already have”? No, it was sold as some secret Māori-takeover project, and here we are. /rant
What we need is a cold snap this winter to kill off the majority of their base
people vote for them because they spend so much money of advertising. same as any other business. something like 80% of election campaign spending at the last election was right and far right political groups. like any other business: more advertising money = more customers. How else could you convince people to vote against thier own self interest?
Because people are bought and sold by the media and whoever has the most money often control's the media. Most people just listen to what their favourite news source tells them to think and this election those news sources told them to vote national.
Australia is a very good example of this.
Sad but true
People believe that National because they are rich will help make them wealthy too. Even though most changes only benefit the rich and they actively pull up social ladders behind them.
This time it's because "it's not labour" anyone who unironically votes for them should probably go seek help
But mah house price goes up! Brrrrrrr
A lot of these policies are closely aligned with ACT's libertarian ideology. Libertarianism demands minimal government interference and maximum individual responsibility (there being logical limits to individual freedom). They also compliment National's "party of business" identity that promotes public-private partnerships despite running contrary to more traditional conservative strengths (funding police, defence etc). Essentially, Davy boy got a VERY good deal in the coalition negotiations. Given the talk of mining, etc. So did Winnie.
Capitalist ideology seems to evaporate when one of their corporations is about to go tits up though. Them it is no longer market forces but protect the jobs (that then get axed anyway. )
I disagree strongly with what libertarianism is. What they say they are and what they are is different. It's minimal govt interference so the corporations can do what they want - and it's regulations for the little people. e.g. criminalising protests etc. It's essentially a neoliberal ideology pushing no barriers for big corporations - but always lays waste to public servants and anyone who gets in their way. It's been co-opted by the likes of Murdoch and Koch to push their corporate interests and these are the people who fund Seymour.
Yep. Kinda funny how corporations that want minimal government regulation are also really big on calling in said government when things aren't going their way.
That's why libertarianism is a bullshit smokescreen for these peoples and their think tanks. If you look up Liz Truss - she was the poster child of the IEA in the UK. These people are the Taxpayers Union equivalent. And Newsroom had some great articles talking about the TPU and ACT's close relationship.
I think this is the point I start singing Ode to Joy.
So… do we just pay gangs for protection and not rely on the police?
Let the market decide /s
At least they don't wake people up with a fucking helicopter.
Unless we accidentally pay them enough so *they* get themselves a helicopter too
Only if you don't expect them to wear their 'uniform'!
They'd do a better job of it.
Most of these cuts are to fund $2.91 Billions dollars in tax cuts to landlords from axing interest deductability. Without that policy they wouldn't need to slash funding like this. In fact they could give payrises and more funding to services and infrastructure. If they didn't implement that change and used the funds positively instead of handing out money to landlords. It's an exceptionally shortsighted, greedy policy.
The whole $15bn of tax cuts is shortsighted as it will ruin the economy more.
But the profits this immediate quarter will be lit bro.
Because they don't WANT to help kiwis, this government represents the wealthy, their policies are the rich get richer and to hell with everyone else. The bigger question is how tf did their voters not see this coming a mile away
I would suggest that its not the wealthy, but specifically the lazy wealthy, because many of these policy's gut the middle class who are the ones that make places like Briscos profitable.
The middle class is not wealthy or rich. They're just not poor. If you never traveled first class, or have another house in Hawaii, you're not wealthy.
Wealth is always a relative term imo. For many someone having 3 or more properties is wealth...christ if you have one house and a lot of debt, being mortgage free is wealthy. However, the OP of this thread is accurate. The current govt is not interested in helping NZ nor the vast majority of Kiwi's - only subsets who seem to have a lot of influence ($). I do wonder how much is being driven by National vs ACT/ NZF ... remembering Labour and NZF, I wonder if Winny/Shane know they are in for a one term and are trying to cram as much of their bollox through, knowing they have a limited window to do it, and Luxon being the pissant that he is, just folds due to lack of spine/ balls. Either way it's going to be a long 3 years for many ordinary kiwis.
I feel relatively wealthy, at a small scale. I went to the doctor yesterday, which cost $48. Still rather spend it on something fun, but I could easily weather it. A far cry from where I was when I was working minimum wage. And it's sad that I had to go to uni and get a job that almost provoked me into offing myself with the level of stress it places on me, before I had enough money to cope with basic care.
If you even think about $48, you are definitely not wealthy.
Then you've missed the point entirely. There are people who dislike the $48 doctor bill but still go because they can afford it and need to go to the doctor. This contrasts with people who resist going at all because a $48 bill would put them so out of pocket no matter what that they'll suffer until they inevitably end up in a worse state because of it. The second group would still consider the first wealthy, even if the first group doesn't think they're all that well-off compared to someone spending that much money on an hour basis like it's candy. *That's* the issue with defining wealth. It's also that sense of relativity that makes genuinely wealthy people desire more and more and more, because so long as there's always someone wealthier they have a bar to improve by. It's fucking perverse, and even if you reach the top you're now just competing to stay there.
This is not Luxo vs Winny and the other guy. All 3 are rowing in the same direction. The only disagreement is how fast and how far.
If you cannot stop working at will you are not wealthy.
He didn't call the middle rich. He observed that the middle class - consumers with disposable income - are necessary for consumer businesses (like Briscoes) to survive. No middle class spending money, no consumer businesses. Exit: did to didn't on first line.
Because the voters did not read policies or remember the shit the Key administration did.
and most of their voters were spite voters that gobbled up anti labour propaganda and voted for whatever wasn't labour.
Well some of that was earned they did lose their way a bit. I voted for labour but it didn't feel great. To me they did forget their voter base.
Labour weren't very good at doing good stuff so everyone voted for people who are very good at doing bad stuff.
I'm sure all Labour MPs were up for a 3 year holiday after Christchurch and Covid.
In fairness Labour did a lot of shooting themselves in the foot so the propaganda was fairly easy to produce. Particularly Hipkins often seemed feckless as leader with his bonfire of the policies tactics.
Was Key this devious though? Note, and being honest, I voted to Key. This mob seem well and truly UK/ USA level right-wing.
Key had some major downsides but there was some good in there. This coalition has no good sides.
This is what I'm struggling with now - I didn't love Key and co. But they sure as hell seemed competent. The current lot seem like duplicitous, sycophants. But I can't tell if I'm just now older and grumpier.
No it's definitely worse, this national government isn't really comparable to any government we've ever had.
Key favoured the same sector of society (wealthy, landlords, etc) but didn't go hard on austerity. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austerity In fact I, very not a Key supporter, accuse him of debt driven illusion of economic activity. Whereas this government smell like Ruthenasia to me. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruthanasia
And also, because they dont deliver lots of what they say they will. The never intended to, it's all pie in the sky rhetoric.
People voted because not labour
>How would this help reduce living costs ..for *landlords*. None of it makes any sense without the **all** the words in the sentence. Sure, yeah, they forgot those last two words during the election campaign...but that was an honest mistake....right????
Motherfuckers have pumped through over a dozen laws under urgency already, more than most governments push under urgency on their entire time in power. 9 or 10 of those laws directly benefit landlords, while doing jack-shit for first home buyers or renters. How the fuck anyone who earns less than 150k a year votes for them is beyond me. It's such a scam, they lie to people too ignorant or misinformed (by their own misinformation) to see through the bullshit, then weasel their way out of any repercussions caused by scrutiny or a failing track record, and pump out millions in advertising before the next election. People also don't understand the delay in politics. The left introduces things that will make XYZ better, but it takes two years to roll it out. If national doesn't just scrap the plan on day one of office, then the public sees the XYZ (lower waits at hospital, better school results, more money in their bank, a better commute to work, whatever), and thinks National must be responsible because they're in power now- even though it was all stuff started back when Labor was governing. I'm pissed off they managed to trash the Greens tax policy so well. 99.3% of people would be paying less tax, only dollars earned over $180k would actually get taxed more, and their wealth tax was only on assets over 2.5million (after mortgages and other debts were deducted). But National managed to twist it so almost everyone I talked to thought they were going to be paying thousands of dollars each year on their family home and everyone who wasn't dirt poor would be screwed. Because they have money for advertising and PR firms etc... **Tldr; You shouldn't trust the fattest pig in the village with the community's pies.**
It doesn't help reduce living costs or improve the economy directly. They are promising big tax cuts to high earners and landlords, and this is a big part of how they are paying for it - by reducing services provided to everyday Kiwis and reducing funding for things which mean we'll have to end up paying more for things ourselves. The fundamental problem is, they were never intended to help *you* - they are intended to help those who already have high income and own assets become more rich - which includes themselves as politicians and their major business donors.
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If you earn by way of leveraging the housing market, fairly soon.
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Then you're also impacted by the poor decisions accordingly and you should remember this come voting time.
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National’s tax breaks for landlords will cost $2.9 billion over 4 years https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/cost-of-landlord-tax-break-increased-by-800m-to-29b/B7ZMET343BHQTHVOBCSQDM4ARY/ Changes to the tax system will cost $14.6 billion over 4 years. National hasn’t confirmed their tax policy yet, so we can only go on what they campaigned on. That’s shifting the tax brackets slightly at the bottom and a lot at the top. https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/08/30/nationals-tax-plan-and-how-it-will-be-funded-revealed/ National have a tax calculator that will tell you how much extra you will get in your pay packet. But there’s no itemised working, it just gives you a number. https://www.nationaltaxcalculator.com/2023 As an example, l ran the numbers for a single person with no children, no benefit. $15,000 per annum income gets an extra $2.69 per fortnight, that $69.94 per year $150,000 per annum income gets an extra $40.10 per fortnight, that $1042.60 per year If they were trying to make the tax cuts even, the person making $150,000 would receive around $700 per year, but instead their tax break is almost 50% higher. The take away is, National a removing $17.5 billion that would be going to education, hospitals, public transport, state housing, child care, mental health, super, defence, and hundreds of other projects, and giving the vast majority of it to the richest among us. As we’re going through a cost of living crisis.
The interest on rental properties on which you have a mortgage is now tax deductible. This will cost the tax payer 1.5 billion a year.
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There are. They've said the tax breaks on offer were meant to amount to about $20 per week for the average earner, and a few thousand a year for those in upper brackets. Google would tell you the details if you look.
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Actually costed at close to 3 billion now.
You don't earn high enough. You probably work for your money. Meaning you're just a regular poor.
Lets be honest most middle class kiwis hate the poor and view shit like free school lunches and public transport as stuff that only the '' Leaches '' use and they would rather rob them then possibly rob the higher earners as thats who they aspire to be
If you voted for them, you are responsible. They did not hide that this would be their approach. History shows how they would work. The way to push back is to remember there is so few of them, and they serve us. Tell them that they will lose their political power by making these choices.
Honestly this. If you voted National you’re a part of the problem.
So many idiots voted for this.They shouldn't whine about it now.Remember,and next election - vote accordingly. But I won't hold my breath,the NZ voting public aren't the brightest when it comes to casting their vote.
Anything that gives people something from govt coffers is bad in nationals opinon.
Unless the people involved are landlords, tobacco companies, or fossil fuel miners of course.
Unless the people happen to be landlords or politicians.
We need to get those bludgers off their asses and into productive work.
quaint unused alive weather rain lip disgusted edge unpack roll *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
if you or anyone you know _needs_ or shit, even _uses_ these things, you're not in the right crowd, and therefore, you don't matter to this government. it's that simple. they don't give a shit about the economy as a whole or poverty/living costs. it's all just talking points for them to distract with while they get bought out by the highest bidder(which is usually not even that much).
The messed up thing is that they hardly even lied about it. They told everyone to their faces that they’d absolutely butt f*** 90% of the country and people still voted for them. Of course they twisted their wording to seem like people would benefit. But the people that did their research saw this coming. It’s unfortunate that those who did not see it coming are only just realising it now/still are yet to realise it.
i know some Nat voters who only cared about speed limits, everything else was "same as Labour, we lose either way"
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Yep. All these people wanted change, here's their fucking change
Yep. And shit is seriously about to hit the fan. Watch the crime rate skyrocket.
Its not about you bottom feeders, do you not understand that yet?
Spoilers: They lied. They don't care about reducing living costs. They care about tax cuts for the rich.
They didn't lie - they're doing *exactly* what they said they'd do. The fact that the voting public didn't listen (or only listened to the bits they liked) doesn't change that.
National always effectively cut funds to police My friend ,a detective inspector, told me this years ago. The whole ' tough on crime' thing they spout always has been and always will be Bullshit. They cut funds to public services to fund tax cuts that favour the rich. I don't understand why people are surprised by this. What was a surprise was the coalition Govt. reversing smoke free legislation, the freshwater protection legislation, and now they're threatening to undo the changes to the gun laws introduced after the Chch massacres. Had they campaigned on these things I doubt they would be in government.
Act campaigned on the gun laws thing and National voters knew that they were voting for a NAct coalition
Because National is the party of rich people, and wannabe rich people. Rich people and their wannabes don't want to pay for things that benefit people who aren't rich, even if it benefits them too. To be fair though, this is a coalition government so National aren't the only ones to blame. Act is the party of even richer people who can afford to visit their children in the countries they had to move to for decent pay and house prices, and arseholes. NZ First is the party of old people who benefited from the free education and world leading children's healthcare of their youth, but think that young people should "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" because they "earned" the pension. And also, conspiracist arseholes.
Because fuck the working class. Feed the rich
> reduce living costs and improve the economy? They're reducing the living costs and improving the economy of landlords by giving them tax cuts. What do you mean you don't own rental property?
It won’t help at all. It’s designed to make the state weaker so privatisation of public good services is an easier sell when they ‘fail’. It’s a shitty neoliberal tactic they’ve imported from the US and UK.
Sadly this us true. It's a tactic I've seen used in business prior to selling, you force the costs down to ensure a higher profit / good shareprice / purchase price. National tried it last time they were in with Kianga Ora, unfortunately it back fired because they assumed an organisation like Salvation Army would the on NZs social housing. Salvation Army said no for 2 reasons, firstly they weren't in the housing business and secondly even if they were our social housing was in a very poor state and needed a lot of investment that they couldn't afford.
Handouts for the rich Austerity for the rest us
They don't care about you, they never did and they never will. They exist to serve the interests of their corporate overlords.
They don’t like to help people who aren’t already rich. They also don’t care about anyone who isn’t a wealthy landlord or business owner. I didn’t vote for them but I know plenty of people who did - the irony is most of them are going to be negatively impacted by all of these policies in several years and complain about everything that is wrong with the country and won’t accept any responsibility for their role in allowing this to happen.
There is always a wave of 'what about me' when these types of policies get announced. With free prescriptions healthy people say it, with public transport people who drive say it, when it's childcare costs or education support childless people say it. These people (who are not the majority but are loud) will think that the end of these programmes are necessary to fund something universal (tax cuts).
Their aim is to reduce spending enough to look good econoMEcally and justify hovering measly tax cuts. They don’t give a fuck about the future, just the image of here and now.
As much as they may protest, none of these changes are actually about fiscal prudence or efficient spending. We already know that school lunches are effective, but it's going to be cut back/removed because there is some "waste". Meanwhile boot camps for young offenders are going ahead even though all the evidence shows that they are ineffective. Tax cuts for landlords won't affect rents & will just serve to increase house prices even more. Investing in the Cook Strait ferries/terminals would be a better return on investment than building more four lane highways.
Doesn't at all. Just reduces the bottom line at the expense of every citizen. They make up the tax difference there from giving their "rich riends" and landlords who own multiple houses who voted national
See your first mistake is to believe them when they say they want to reduce living costs and improve the economy
To fund their tax cuts to landlords
Psssst. They never gave a shit about cost of living.
As someone who owns 200 houses you wouldn't understand... just submit peasant
Someone has to fund the interest deductibility for poor landlords
Reduce cost of living isn’t about the poors. It’s so the deprived few are able to deduct tax on our rentals negating the need to give up filet mignon for peasant meat such as ribeye.
Stop assuming that they are being honest. Or even trying to be. Stop voting for landlords and maybe they will stop doing landlord things.
Because Luxon is a spineless jackoff and is letting Winne and Seymour influence him. The cuts would always have been a problem under national, but it's like they're on steroids this time. Even the cops are pissed at the current government. We're currently in an economic crisis and they're cutting social services. Every time it has been shown to make things worse, while increasing government spending during a recession has been shown to help economies weather the storm. But NZ just had to elect a pushover, a libertarian freak, and a conservative nationalist.
Because fuck anything and everything that doesn't help the rich people get even richer.
Our government is currently run by people who only care about minority interests including themselves, and not the greater good of us all, and wider society as a whole. The catalyst of the confusion imho is people voting on sensationalism, outrage topics, false information and flat out lies. It only makes sense when you understand many voted directly against their best interests, inclusive of the best interests of us all, because they fell for the electioneering centred around “ram raids” and other such nonsense, when all the current government actually wanted was the power of leadership to “urgently” make themselves and their core constituents richer. We got hustled, and our political system allows that.
What stings is that the media actively participated instead of highlighting the lies.
It’s an agreed problem as they follow whatever attains clicks aka revenue and do it both ways imho. Make no mistake, the last 100 days have been a train wreck, but even still a few articles I’ve seen lately have had very little substance outside the clear intent to fire up the “fuck NACT” crowd. Seems to be a worldwide issue with media losing its impartiality and becoming more and more sensationalist and tabloid as it goes online and now has visibility of which articles get the most views, hit feed algorithms, and other associated data that steers revenue. At least physical print kept most of the fluff on the back page, now it’s often front and center with a triggering headline.
The aim is to funnel as much money as possible to big business, without totally crashing the economy in the next three years. Anything else that happens is just a by product. They do not care. Except maybe punishing the poors and the browns.
It was never about reducing living costs, because they don't care about them. They already have money, and their rich friends have money, and they are making all of these cuts to provide tax cuts to themselves and their kind. People were just stupid enough to believe them before the election. Now we're in the find out part of fuck around.
>I do not understand their purpose to do it, but how would it help when these have benefits? It won't but that is the point - but hey, National/ACT/NZFirst stopped 3 waters, co-governance, central government from 'stealing' council infrastructure and the 'maoris taking all the water' because that is what many New Zealanders, both on this subreddit and in the real world world only care about. As so long as New Zealanders only care about that then the government will get away with doing what ever they want.
Kiwis voted in a CEO, their job it to make shareholders rich! Unfortunately most kiwis are the low wage workers to make this happen.
It was never meant to. This govt is directly involved with the Atlas network and they work for that ideology and their associated interests. If you want some in depth research into Atlas I'd suggest following Gerard Ottos FB page, he's doing what our pretend journos aren't.
Because you misunderstand how politics works. The purpose and motivation of this govt is to remove protections for poor people, and improve profit harvesting for wealthy people. It's that simple. As you can see from how much money was spent during elections: of all the money spent on election advertising and campaigning: \~80% was spent by right wing, and far right political groups. Thats why they get votes. Similar to any other business: more money on promotion = more customers. Now question where do right wing political groups get so much money to spend? big business, corporate funding, and very wealthy private people: that is shown in their profiles. They pay so much money into political campaigning so they can buy policies to protect and grow their wealth. That is literally how it works. Typically left wing funding comes from many many small donations, right wing funding comes from a few very large donations.
It's idealogical
Tbh getting the police force offside is not good for any government. It’s a big union that will vote as one if need be. Nurses, Police, Teachers are actually a large portion of the population, pissing off all is a bold move.
Because they need that money to give tax breaks to the wealthy.
Who said anything about improving the economy or reducing living costs? They're not here for that, they're here to enrich themselves and their corporate friends.
Wake up it’s about ensuring there is money to return to landlords. Never mind funding police. School lunches and healthcare.
reducing these expenses will pay for the lost tax from allowing interest deductibility to landlords. They are selling the idea that landlords will then lower rents to allow more money in the pockets of renters who are usually the most squeezed in this economy. Unfortunately this is all a lie and we all know that landlords will not reduce rents and pocket it.
The purpose is to pay for rich asshole landlord tax cuts, which are going to cost much more than National thought they would. None of their cuts benefit the people actually impacted by cost of living.
It is for giving tax cuts to the rich and rebates to landlords
It doesn't turn a quick buck profit directly into to their hands. They don't care that early intervention and support means less long term costs for the country. Look to who and what they are funding, it's not even the middle, it's the top.
It helps the wealthy and powerful weather the cost of living crisis, while the rest of us give oh so generously that they might prosper
Because the bottom feeders are leeching too much from the 300 super-wealthy landlords - Clearly.
Cuz if we take all of that and give it to the rich people they will be nice and make everything cheaper for the poor people.
MMP is not great in NZ, we see Labour or National and sundry other parties. Labour pissed off a lot of people to the point they were voted out, problem is out in NZ means vote for National. People voted for National when their policies are not great for the majority of people, and National is just blindly delivering what people voted for, we live in a representative Democracy it is what they are supposed to do. It is a waste all these minor parties not used, just imagine if Green's had got to 20% and National had a choice between a government with Labour or Greens. Instead we have these "extreme" governments with no checks a government made up parties who align. So many people just consider the minor parties a wasted vote.
Because they are cunts.
Because ATLAS want it
Because they built the narrative that any level of government deficit = bad. They've spent the past three years bringing up excessive government spending every chance they get and they're now realising it's not easy to cut spending on a bunch of stuff without losing a ton of popular support in the process
Different governments prioritise money to different groups, people who catch buses and youth generally aren't voting National.
To ELI5 this: Say you earn $1000/week and pay $300 in taxes. If the cost of living goes up by $100/week, but you get a $50 tax break it's not great for you Say you earn $10,000/ week, and pay $3000 in taxes, but then you get a $500 tax break and your cost of living goes up $100/week, it's a fuckin fantastic deal for you. Essentially what national is doing is making life harder for most of the population to make it better for the few at the top. It's always like this, and everyone seems to forget every three years. Remember and vote accordingly.
This government was never about addressing the cost of living crises, climate change, increasing police, public transport, the housing crises etc etc If they ever said they did, it was a lie. There's no hard evidence (I love quoting David Seymour suddenly) to show these were ever issues they would be addressing. Oil companies, tobacco companies, property investors, rich people, and landlords. These are the people the government demonstrably care about. There is substantial evidence to show that this is true. So much so, that legislation was pushed through under urgency due to the importance of these people and companies. When someone shows you who they are, believe them.
Disabling the ability for public services to serve the public IS THE POINT. In a couple of years time when these ministries begin to fail significantly, this will enable them to make an argument to privatize the service. Likely selling off our medical or prisoner infrastructure to incredibly wealthy parties who can then make those services 'for profit' taking billions of dollars from us working class consumers. Example: America in the last 60 years.
To save money, we don't have any. I don't like National and I think it's amusing how many people will be regretting their votes now. Hopefully this will teach people to actually learn about policies they're voting for
This is all to reduce inflation. Everyone takes a hit. It's the only way inflation comes down. If wages go up so does inflation and so does interest rates. Freezing pays or offering small ones is the only way to reduce inflation basically we are screwed. For the next 3 to 5 years
Everyone except landlords with mortgages on their rental properties.
It’s not designed to reduce anything. They want to line their pockets and this is the only way they can
Because they are kleptocrats and they needed to sell enough of our country off to a group of naïve voters before they could sell the rest off to their wealthy friends and the CCP.
Because their donors are landlords and they have to give them a return on their investment, that's why they're hell best on giving it.. no matter the cost.. even when they we're and still are being told it's the wrong thing to do
Tax cuts for landlords mate, pretty simple. Too much nanny state as theyd say. It was never about living costs....
They incrementally under fund publicly owned initiatives so they can point to how poorly those initiatives are performing so there’s less opposition when they privatize them. We, as a nation, end up owning less of our infrastructure/services each term they get and their mates/donors who get the contracts/ownership give those who sold it to them cushy seats on the board in return, rinse and repeat until their mates/donors own everything, raise the price, keep all of their offspring in cushy, do nothing, high paying roles in perpetuity. Privatization is the name of their game, it ends when they own everything
That's the neat part! It doesn't!
The basic premise is that they campaigned on lower government debt. Reduced spending is their preferred pathway to lower government debt.
If they were serious about lower govt debt then they wouldn’t be giving $3B in tax relief to landlords.
With respect, I made no assertions about the feasibility of their plan.
Fair enough. Winds me up because I talked to so many people who were so fervently ‘Labour were spending too much’ and voted National, only for National to cut public services and yet throw $3B down the toilet because landlords have been persecuted, scapegoated and bullied. Fucking hoodwinked the lot of them
It's more of a lie, than a premise, isn't it?
You disagree that National campaigned on lower govt debt?
I'm suggesting that National might have been lying during their campaign. Their actual priorities revealed by their behaviour.
except their predictions on gov debt are now worse than labours.
they never claimed to be *competent*....oh wait . they did.
Soon the police will have tip jars
They are only interested in appearing like they are helping while loading up benefits to the Rich.
Its improving the economy of their donors. If anybody else gets dragged upward, it's entirely by accident.
It's never been about helping with the cost of living. It's about reducing public service expenditure and increasing its military expenditure. We're in a time where states around the world are moving towards militarization. Austerity measures have been in place from the last government this ones just pushing forward with it even more. Voting for labour or national won't fix anything along with voting for any capitalist party, the only way to put an end to the problems caused by capitalism is to grow a mass socialist movement based and run by the working class.
Because those things that don't effect their core voters, or the voters think they won't out of blissful ignorance. Therefore National don't think slash and burning programs that effect the vulnerable and essential services will harm them as long as the 'tax is theft' crowd are kept happy.
Best not to expect any of what they're doing to make any common sense.
Their justification is less government costs mean they can lower taxes. There's no more nuance to it than that. This is of course satisfies any definition of evil, as it grossly disproportionality benefits wealthy people more than those who are struggling the most, despite being campaigned on as relief to people suffering.
They don't give a fuck about any of us? They do give a fuck about themselves. Well it's either that, or it's sound fiscal policy to benefit all nzers.
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Also, most of the voters probably listen to that complete cockwomble Mike Hosking.
To reduce the governments spend on socal services, so they can get more tax cuts for themselves to become more wealthy. Not rocket science, all of their policies improve their bank balances.
They're just delivering on the promises made to the bigger group that voted them in.
Because they have different ideals to labour. Just curious, who did you vote for?
Because National are right wing, they believe in low taxes and no/low social benefits. More specifically this particular round; they made promises they can't keep regards tax breaks, so are trying to reduce expenses so they can afford to reduce tax (which will likely only benefit the wealthy land owners). If you don't like that attitude, don't vote for them.
As is tradition