The Welfare State

In that case they can get the advantages of a low population and few of the disadvantages. NZ infrastructure is poor as the population density is even lower than most Scandinavian countries, we don't have close proximity to Europe, no large natural resources and we haven't had centuries to build infrastructure.
The geographical location I'm not going to argue against :)
Apart from, it seems like maybe the move away from relying on agriculture happened quite late in NZ. In the global economy of today you've got to decide who you're competing against. Are you going to go low tech or high tech?

Using CIA factbook, here's the lists of natural resources on your country and mine.
natural gas, iron ore, sand, coal, timber, hydropower, gold, limestone
timber, iron ore, copper, lead, zinc, chromite, nickel, gold, silver, limestone
Centuries to build infrastructure?
I just spent a little bit of time on a quick read up on the NZ history, why don't you do the same to Finnish history.
I don't see an advantage of centuries.
 
THe Soviet Union went from a mainly agricultural economy to an industrialized one in roughly 20 to 30 years, depending on how succesful you view the new factories. With a better starting base than Russia, outside influence, and a democratic society you could do a far better job than the USSR did at industrializing fast without the massive artificialy induced famines; although those might just mainly be from the failure of collectivising the farms which never worked and was a perrenial problem in the USSR.
 
The geographical location I'm not going to argue against :)
Apart from, it seems like maybe the move away from relying on agriculture happened quite late in NZ. In the global economy of today you've got to decide who you're competing against. Are you going to go low tech or high tech?

Using CIA factbook, here's the lists of natural resources on your country and mine.

Centuries to build infrastructure?
I just spent a little bit of time on a quick read up on the NZ history, why don't you do the same to Finnish history.
I don't see an advantage of centuries.

We have those resources but they're not exactly extensive espicially when compared to Aussie or Norway or South Africa. We're not poor by world standards, but don't have the population or resources to fund the level of the welfare state various european countries have. I think we do have lower unemplyment than most of them though as the government deregulated in the 80's.
 
So it's a kind of double edge sword.

And yes, we all wish we had Norway's oil resources.

It has more to due with more resources per person. In most Scandavian countries, the resources are so extensive that there is excess to sell. This excess of resources(such as oil for Norway) probably goes quite a ways into funding the system there. Most developed countries do not have that luxury. Despite this, none of the Scandanvian countries are truly socialist. There are no real socialist states in the world that I know of. Every socialist state in the past tried it, survived for a short period of time, and then imploded or was toppled by outside factors. But people continue to think that if we try it again, it will somehow magically work.

Most of Europe tries to run the Scandanavian model to some extent, but are just not as successful at it. If you look at the European countries in terms of population vs. GDP per capita(when adjusted for the price of living), you will see a very negative correlation between size of a country's population and GDP per capita. City-states are always at the top of this chart while larger countries such as Germany and France are towards the bottom.
 
THe Soviet Union went from a mainly agricultural economy to an industrialized one in roughly 20 to 30 years, depending on how succesful you view the new factories. With a better starting base than Russia, outside influence, and a democratic society you could do a far better job than the USSR did at industrializing fast without the massive artificialy induced famines; although those might just mainly be from the failure of collectivising the farms which never worked and was a perrenial problem in the USSR.

I don't see anyone willing to build car factories (or other such high value added heavy industry) in NZ any time soon. The geography is just too isolated and the local market too to small. They might do better to concentrate on software/programing & banking as both can easily be relocated and have high value added. If NZ adds lots of that to the traditional agriculture and resource extraction industries then they can live a nice first world life style well into the future with a solid economy.
 
They used to assemble cars here but its uneconomic to do so and the last factory closed in the 90's IIRC.
 
The great right vs left debate at CFC. Most of the time it seems that you're a communist or sell your grandmother for a buck neo nazi or something.

In general I believe in capitalism. No its not perfect and yes someone is going to probably get exploited somewhere but so be it. Leaving everything up to the free market however is a big mistake. The free market isn't good or evil but is totally amoral. Some services will never make money but are still required so the government or local council will need to fund them- firemen, police, the military etc.

You are also going to need some level of the welfare state. Historically countries almost never have full employment. The few rare exceptions include Nazi Germany and the USSR which both had massive and unsustainable levels of government spending, or the 50's in the aftermath of WW2 when millions died and europe needed rebuilding. New Zealand had less than 100 people unemployed while the USA didn't have to compete with China, Japan, Germany or Europe in general.

I live in a welfare state. The stereotype of the welfare quuen more or less doesn't exist. I have only meet one person who had basically said they don't want to work and want to raise a family on welfare. Alot more commen are women who don't care if they get pregnant due to the welfare state- the more kids you have the more $$$ you get.

We also have "free" healthcare paid for by taxes and you can go private if you want and health insurance isn't that expensive. Tax is high by american standards, low buy europe standards. Corporate taxe tops out at 33% IIRC while personal tax is around 17-39% although a right wing government has cut that to 33% which takes effect soon- a left wing government put it up from 33%-39%. A government service tax (GST)of 12.5% (rising to 15%) exists on all goods and services sold.

We have universal welfare- if you're over 18 you can get it automatically and for as long as you need it. I personally know people who have been on it for over 20-30 years. In some cases however you can get more on welfare than by working espicially if you have a large family. Its also not to hard to claim he DPB benefit while having a "border" who is actually your de facto partner. Other couples have "separated" and have split the family apart as 2 benefits pay more than a parent working and a parent staying at home in alot of cases (depending on income).

Most people I know who have been on welfare rip the system off to some extent. I don't mind if its in a minor way get an extra $20-$50 a week to survive on by babysitting or whatever but some live reasonably good lifestyles beyond what they could support by actually working. Selling pot is another great pocket money earner as you have the available time and guranteed income to do it.

In any event though the system isn't sustainable. Every political party knows this, but in order to win an election they tend to bribe the electorate usually by tax cuts (right) or increased social spending usually targeted at various groups (minorities, low and middle income earners-left). The problem is of course the demographs. New Zealand has an aging population and you get the pension at the age of 65 and the government has to support an old person for 20 odd years maybe more and pay the health costs as well. Putting up taxes only goes so far as a large number of skilled NZer's already leave the country and go overseas which offer higher wages and less tax. There is more or less a permanent shortage of health workers and teachers. They cut the top tax in the 80's from 66% to 33% and the tax intake actually went up.

In the 70's they brought in the domestic purposes benefit (DPB) the intent was to allow women in abusive relationships to leave the husband and support the children. They assumed about 4000 women would require it. However they didn't restrict it to married women only. Before the DPB was brought in NZ had about 3000 adoptions per year. 35 years later we know have around 100 000 people permanently on the DPB which has actually magnified the problem and created a permanent underclass here. In less than 40 years some of those familes are onto their 3rd generation of welfare dependency. If you have 1 child every 5 years and end up with 3 children you can collect welfare for 33 years. Welfare queens as such don't exist but there is actually financial incentive to have more children. The worst poor families have the extra kids but spend the extra $$$ on booze, drugs and tobacco. NZ has some of the worst child abuse statistics in the world. If you're rascist and leave out certain ethnic groups it is comparable to Europe though. You can get more ont he DPB than by working a oow income job and don't have to worry about paying for transport or childcare. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

A simialr deal also exists with sickness benefits and invalids benefits. You can get one ofr having depression. Apparently the amount of people here requiring them made NZ statistics look worse than a warzone. When unemployment fell below 4% the numbers on these benefits almost double IIRC. Creative book keeping on the governments behalf. I'm on welfare and I'm depressed- here have a sickness benefit (pays more) and you're no longer counted as unemployed. Genius:rolleyes:

When you add it all up around 3rd-4th of the population recieves money from the government with an aging population. The baby boomers are starting to retire now and it is estimated that the social security net will start to collapse in 10-20 years time. From a population of 4 million almost 2 million will require government aid, and 400 000+ live in Australia with tens of thousands more living in the UK. Over 10% of the population mostly highly skilled and/or university educated live overseas.

Basically I think we're screwed long term mostly due to socialism such as it esists here. Old people also vote in the greatest numbers and we have a proportional voting system and they are going to make up the largest voting demograph as well. The systemwill collapse and it doesn't seem to be a question of if but when. The government won't have enough money and they can't stop the brain drain as skilled young NZer's can, and will leave the country and have been doing so for decades. At some point someone, sometime is going to hae to dismantle the welfare state or cut it back drastically as it will essentially collapse and NZ will go the way of Greece.

OK I have picked myself up off the floor and wiped away the tears of laughter.
What you did not point out in your rant is that you are a welfare queen yourself.
You are at university bludging off hard working NZ taxpayers like myself.
And no you did not pay enough tax while working to cover the cost of your education.
Also sunshine you were careful not to point out that you are on a students allowance, which makes you no better than those whom you want thrown off benefits.
Like you I am doing a degree but the difference is I am paying the full cost of it and no I am not bludging a students allowance.
So why are you OWED taxpayers money ?
Should we stop your student allowance and interest free loans tomorrow ? if not why not ?

Do they no longer teach any modern history at school ? it was the Labour government of 1984 who dropped tax to 39% and opened up the NZ economy while conservatives of your ilk were ranting that farmers needed taxpayer handouts to survive.

Another fact, average time on the DPB is three years, Key's mum was on the DPB, care to compare with what he has paid in tax ?
Yep, I will be on government super shortly, I believe I have earned my super, and no doubt you will complain about the extra I will get above most aged 65.
Might I suggest you start these types of posts by stating you are on welfare.
 
The geographical location I'm not going to argue against :)
Apart from, it seems like maybe the move away from relying on agriculture happened quite late in NZ. In the global economy of today you've got to decide who you're competing against. Are you going to go low tech or high tech?

Using CIA factbook, here's the lists of natural resources on your country and mine.

Centuries to build infrastructure?
I just spent a little bit of time on a quick read up on the NZ history, why don't you do the same to Finnish history.
I don't see an advantage of centuries.

You are bang on, I myself would love to see NZ move to the Finnish model which would not take long as unlike Finland NZ was not ravaged by war as Finland was in 1945.
Just comparing our lack of engineering companies with Finland should be enough to make our politicians get the idea that we can not rely on agriculture and tourism alone.
We should be pushing for high value products to be made which will overcome our liability of distance.

We have to change our education model, we turn out too many lawyers, accountants, art type etc etc and no where near enough with science, engineering etc degrees.
In some ways though I wonder if we should open the country up to more immigration, a population of say twelve million would give us a damn sight more scale without packing the country out.
I admire the Finns, blokes/blokesses who were prepared to fight to the last man if need be.
If you have not read, A Winter Hell , grab it from the library.
 
I have a student loan if you really must know. $15-18K this year is the estimated cost and as I have previously stated I have actualy worked and paid around 13-15K a year in tax for the last 10 years, and I worked part time from the age of 13 onwards. Theres also a finate timeline where I well be getting money form the government as well as I'm aware and grateful that the government is actually payig most of the cost for the course fees. I also became a student as I was laid off, couldn't get welfare, and I even applied for a job at McDonalds(and didn't get one).

I'm also against welfare for farmers and only believe in handouts for banks because the alternative is worse. If the banks go uner it makes the problems worse for everyone. I have no issue with people who go on welfare if they lose their job, a spouse dies, or they have an accident or whatever. Last time Icollected unemployement I think was for 6 weeks, before that around 4 weeks and the last 2 times I got made redundent its been my bank account not the tax payer that has supported me. Last year I was made redundent on the monday, was at the temp agency Tuesday and was working on the Thursday.

Ergo I practice what I preach. Welfare is fine as a safety net, not as a lifestyle choice which some have used it for never having worked at all or spending several decades on it. THis recession should only last a few years so I don't even particuly care if someone spends several years on it if they can't get a job. If I hadn't paid tax and had that money myself I wouldn't need to go to uni, or borrow money to pay for it.


BTW its really hard to get a job in NZ with a science degree. Engineering not so much. Our engineers like it or not have to compete with Germans, Japanese, American etc who can doeverything we do but on a larger scale. Would you like to borrow my economis 104 textbook which gives plenty of example why your stupid ideas won't work in the real world or will have horrific side effects.
 
I have a student loan if you really must know. $15-18K this year is the estimated cost and as I have previously stated I have actualy worked and paid around 13-15K a year in tax for the last 10 years, and I worked part time from the age of 13 onwards. Theres also a finate timeline where I well be getting money form the government as well as I'm aware and grateful that the government is actually payig most of the cost for the course fees. I also became a student as I was laid off, couldn't get welfare, and I even applied for a job at McDonalds(and didn't get one).

I'm also against welfare for farmers and only believe in handouts for banks because the alternative is worse. If the banks go uner it makes the problems worse for everyone. I have no issue with people who go on welfare if they lose their job, a spouse dies, or they have an accident or whatever. Last time Icollected unemployement I think was for 6 weeks, before that around 4 weeks and the last 2 times I got made redundent its been my bank account not the tax payer that has supported me. Last year I was made redundent on the monday, was at the temp agency Tuesday and was working on the Thursday.

Ergo I practice what I preach. Welfare is fine as a safety net, not as a lifestyle choice which some have used it for never having worked at all or spending several decades on it. THis recession should only last a few years so I don't even particuly care if someone spends several years on it if they can't get a job. If I hadn't paid tax and had that money myself I wouldn't need to go to uni, or borrow money to pay for it.


BTW its really hard to get a job in NZ with a science degree. Engineering not so much. Our engineers like it or not have to compete with Germans, Japanese, American etc who can doeverything we do but on a larger scale.

No, you do not practice what you preach, you are suggesting that all that tax money you paid should be put against your education, so you believe you should not have paid your share of hospitals you might have needed, the military ,police etc etc.
If you are going to rant about welfare fine, but it may be a good idea to point out that you believe in welfare for you while you are at university.
And no, there is NO NEED for you to attend university for your degree, you could have done it online while working like I am doing.
Might I suggest you look up some of the Finnish engineering companies such as Sako, Lupua, etc etc.
Finland has a population of five million.
There are a hell of a lot of high value products that we could make if we change our educational system.
We need accountants why, in my case it is only because of the NZ taxation system, if we changed to a consumption only tax we see a lot of accountants and tax lawyers rattling a tin on the corner.
 
No, you do not practice what you preach, you are suggesting that all that tax money you paid should be put against your education, so you believe you should not have paid your share of hospitals you might have needed, the military ,police etc etc.
If you are going to rant about welfare fine, but it may be a good idea to point out that you believe in welfare for you while you are at university.
And no, there is NO NEED for you to attend university for your degree, you could have done it online while working like I am doing.
Might I suggest you look up some of the Finnish engineering companies such as Sako, Lupua, etc etc.
Finland has a population of five million.
There are a hell of a lot of high value products that we could make if we change our educational system.
We need accountants why, in my case it is only because of the NZ taxation system, if we changed to a consumption only tax we see a lot of accountants and tax lawyers rattling a tin on the corner.

See, but getting a degree will actually help him get a job so he will pay more taxes in the future. Having 8 kids and livings off welfare of having more kids is not getting anywhere. One kind is actually productive for the future, one kind isn't.

And he took a student loan.
 
No, you do not practice what you preach, you are suggesting that all that tax money you paid should be put against your education, so you believe you should not have paid your share of hospitals you might have needed, the military ,police etc etc.
If you are going to rant about welfare fine, but it may be a good idea to point out that you believe in welfare for you while you are at university.
And no, there is NO NEED for you to attend university for your degree, you could have done it online while working like I am doing.
Might I suggest you look up some of the Finnish engineering companies such as Sako, Lupua, etc etc.
Finland has a population of five million.
There are a hell of a lot of high value products that we could make if we change our educational system.
We need accountants why, in my case it is only because of the NZ taxation system, if we changed to a consumption only tax we see a lot of accountants and tax lawyers rattling a tin on the corner.

I applied for a job at McDonalds and didn't get one and at various supermarkets. How am I suppoed to work and study part time if I can't get a job to support myself? When I had the money I opted out of the health system by having private insurance anyway and I have hardly touched the public health system.

Finland is alo closer to Europe than we are. We never developed much industry or engineering because for decades NZ got a very good price for agricultural goods. We don't have the $$$ to compete that effectivly agaist other countries that have engineers and anytihg we build is basically outsourced to China anyway. I'll be at uni for 3 years maybe 4 max and I have more than paid enough tax money in previous years to cover it- unless I'm costing the government 200K+ which I doubt.
 
I think those making comparisons with the Nordic countries who bring up the Norwegian oil should pause and reflect a bit. Bully for Norway certainly, but neither Denmark, Sweden or Finland benefit from that kind of advantage.

Sweden has iron ore and lumber, Finland has lumber, Denmark has... pigs?

But, lumber and iron ore? Those in themselves seem like natural competitive advantages enjoyed by the likes of India or Brazil, except lacking their size. I.e a place like Sweden sure as suet can't compete with Brazil or India for cheap iron on the world market, so that's not what it does.

But I will grant that the EU common market is a terrific boon. Everyone should have one.

The population argument, I haven't decided what I think about. Apart from pointing out that Denmark is quite compact and densely populated, while Sweden, Finland, and Norway aren't (and only Norway has oil to pay for things). These three all have to invest in some considerable infrastructure, without having the population to pay for its use and upkeep.
 
Norway is roughly $20,000 per person in earnings above the other countries in that group, thats the effect of the oil.

It may not be a matter of population density as it is about total population. When you look at GDP per Capita adjusted for cost of living. City-states like Luxemburg always are at the very top by a huge margin. Large countries with big populations such as France lag far behind the less population or smaller countries in the westernized world.

http://snippets.com/what-is-the-gdp-per-capita-for-every-country.htm -- click on the "all" button and it will sort out all the world's countries.

Comparing GDP per capita when adjusted for the cost of living, only the United States(excluding city-states of course and extremely small or oil-rich countries) is above most of the Norweigan countries in terms of purchasing power of the individual and we don't run a social democratic system. Larger countries such as France that try to imitate smaller country's systems simply don't do as well.

I don't see a social democratic system really working for larger countries at all. The larger the land area and the more the people, the less efficient your government is going to be. Having a very heterogenious population also makes it harder.

What you notice is that besides the United States, the other countries at the top are all either extremely small in land area or population.

That said I do believe you need some amount of welfare but it has to be limited with strict checks in place to ensure that it isn't being massively abused by people like octomom.
 
Comparing GDP per capita when adjusted for the cost of living, only the United States(excluding city-states of course and extremely small or oil-rich countries) is above most of the Norweigan countries in terms of purchasing power of the individual and we don't run a social democratic system. Larger countries such as France that try to imitate smaller country's systems simply don't do as well.
1. It's called Scandinavia. There's no such thing as the Norweigan countries...

2. If you look at purchasing power of the individual, the average American dosn't strike me as being exceptionally richer than the average French or Britain. The main difference is that you have a small elite of super rich. The differences between our middle classes aren't that big.
 
And before capialism existed you had a very small noble class and a huge number of exploited serfs or a tribal structure which was essentially the same. All of the socialist countires still need capitalism to pay for their social spending, and in most cases they can only afford it due to a variety of factors espicially in Scandinavia's case of low population and high resources.

Where has socialism triumphed?
And, of course, the arguments made in favour of feudalism and demi-feudalism were exactly the same arguments you now lay before us: that all alternatives are either worse, or untested. Put yourself in the mind of a man living in the year 1600. There has been, in all history, no significant parliamentary democracies; all states which have attempted democracy of any sort it have long collapsed or been usurped, and none have yet attempted democracy as we now understand it. And what if some high-minded radical chappy were to come along to him and propose the abolition of the absolute monarchy, universal sovereignty and the legal enshrining of the Rights of Man, what is he to say? Is he to lend his support on an ideological basis? Is he to believe that humanity can achieve something greater than we have yet achieved? Or, like you, should he sneer and cackle and declare that nothing which has not been can be or should be? I wonder.

Catalonia failed though LOL. Got a better example?
I'm not convinced that this is a reasonable description. "Failure" implies inward collapse because of internal faults, which is not what happened in Anarchist Catalonia- it was forcibly broken up and suppressed by a militaristic, para-fascist regime. One would not describe the Third French Republic or the Kingdom of Greece as "failures", after all, so why misuse the term in this case? Because you have some grounds for establishing a fundamental distinction between the fall of Anarchist Catalonia and examples such as those I gave? Or simply because it is ideologically convenient to do so?

2. If you look at purchasing power of the individual, the average American dosn't strike me as being exceptionally richer than the average French or Britain. The main difference is that you have a small elite of super rich. The differences between our middle classes aren't that big.
Yeah, the only real difference is that American suburban properties tend to be bigger than European ones- particularly British ones- and that's simply because so there's so much room. It's not a reflection of any particularly greater wealth; you pay an arm and a leg for downtown New York as much as you do London, Berlin or Paris.
 
It may not be a matter of population density as it is about total population. When you look at GDP per Capita adjusted for cost of living. City-states like Luxemburg always are at the very top by a huge margin. Large countries with big populations such as France lag far behind the less population or smaller countries in the westernized world.

http://snippets.com/what-is-the-gdp-per-capita-for-every-country.htm -- click on the "all" button and it will sort out all the world's countries.

Comparing GDP per capita when adjusted for the cost of living, only the United States(excluding city-states of course and extremely small or oil-rich countries) is above most of the Norweigan countries in terms of purchasing power of the individual and we don't run a social democratic system. Larger countries such as France that try to imitate smaller country's systems simply don't do as well.

The tiny countries have such high per capita GDP because of regulatory arbitrage. I.e., they're tax havens. Look at the Cayman Islands -- $43,800! It doesn't really tell you anything about the countries' approaches to the welfare state.

Likewise, how much of the United States' advantage in GDP is attributable to the stupid healthcare system we have? (I guess around 5% of our GDP, right?) We pay way more than all other countries on healthcare and every extra penny spent on unnecessary and unnecessarily expensive MRIs contributes to GDP, with little or no benefit to the country.

Cleo
 
I see a lot of people in this thread thinking that socialism vs capitalism is 1. a debate between government regulation and free market, and 2. a giant slider of #1, where the more in one direction you are, the less of the other you are. Socialism and capitalism are mutually exclusive. If something is one, it is not the other, by definition. Thus, something like a post-industrial welfare state cannot be said to be both, or even a blend of both, since it must, by necessity, be only one. And if workers are not controlling the means of production, then...
 
The tiny countries have such high per capita GDP because of regulatory arbitrage. I.e., they're tax havens. Look at the Cayman Islands -- $43,800! It doesn't really tell you anything about the countries' approaches to the welfare state.

Likewise, how much of the United States' advantage in GDP is attributable to the stupid healthcare system we have? (I guess around 5% of our GDP, right?) We pay way more than all other countries on healthcare and every extra penny spent on unnecessary and unnecessarily expensive MRIs contributes to GDP, with little or no benefit to the country.

Cleo

We also come up with way more new innovations in Medical Healthcare than any other country because people in out country are willing to pay and hope for Miracle cures much more than other countries. Thats one of the reason medical spending is so high. Eventally these cures trickle down to the middle class and even the lower classes. If the wealthy didn't fund these cures medical science wouldn't advance nearly as fast.

Stuff like Robot arms and legs(which America is digger deeper into now) costs 1000x what regular treatments cost so it will drive costs up. But here's the thing, the rich in America are willing to pay for such cures. Europe generally gets these new treatments a few years later than America but they usually don't have to fund them. They draw our benefits without paying the bulk of the cost.
 
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