by frog
Unemployment has hit a ten year high of 168,000, or 7.3 percent of the labour force, according to the December 2009 Household Labour Force Survey released today. This is far worse than the 6.8% or 6.9% that many commentators were forecasting.
Unlike many other countries that implemented economic stimulus packages to cushion employment against the effects of the recession, New Zealand’s National-led Government adopted a ‘do nothing’ approach, seemingly not caring if unemployment were to increase.
How different it could have been if the Government had been prepared to buy into the Green New Deal package proposed by the Greens. Stage 1 of the Green New Deal would have given us 43,000 new jobs over 3 years from $1 billion investment in energy efficiency, transport efficiency, protecting waterways, building more homes (the construction industry is where there are the worst job losses) and waste minimisation.
Stage 2 of the Green New Deal would also have been starting to give us a further 50,000 jobs over 10 years from less than $500 million investment forestry, animal pest control, and wilding conifer control.
Green New Deal jobs are not make-work schemes, but a part of a programme that has long-term economic and environmental benefit to New Zealand.
But John Key and Paula Bennett prefer to sit on their hands waiting for the “market” to deal with the problem of job losses. Which it eventually may, but when, and at what human cost of people being cast onto the unemployment scrapheap?
Update: Big ups to Andrew Campbell for giving the Green New Deal a plug at The Standard today.
Published in Economy, Work, & Welfare by frog on Thu, February 4th, 2010
Tags: green new deal, john key, Paula Bennett, unemployment
on the trolls and those who are unable to keep on topic
The number of people receiving the unemployment benefit rose by 3 per cent, last month to 68,369. The forecast for the end of January was 70,000.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=10 624095
Anyone know why some are using the above figure (those on the UB) and others are using the 168,000 figure? What group(s) makes up the the difference between the numbers?
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Unlike many other countries that implemented economic stimulus packages to cushion employment against the effects of the recession, New Zealand’s National-led Government adopted a ‘do nothing’ approach, seemingly not caring if unemployment were to increase.
Where the the US go wrong with their stimulus package?
Also not like I keep track of these things, but didn’t the govt at least bring forward a bunch of infrastructure spending?
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You might also want to take a look at the “sickness” benefit….
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BP
I think this link should put an end to the hand wringing of the Greens.
http://lindsaymitchell.blogspot.com/2010/02/changing-face-of-unemploym ent-and.html
It is high time we started slashing benefits or at the very least putting a six month time limit on them.
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Yeah so why does Mitchell use the 70,000 figure?
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Key was relaxed about the expected unemployment figures,
Nowhere near the 7% the scaremongers are claiming, he confidently opined.
Nowhere near. Smile smile smile .
Little Billy English was at his side, smiling too.
Smile smile smile .
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@StephenR 3:40 PM
Some people who are unemployed don’t apply for benefit because they have their own resources and don’t need it. Others have a partner in work, so are ineligible for a benefit. Others have eligibility for the DPB because they are single parents so claim that rather than the UB. Others have a partner already eligible for another benefit like sickness or invalid’s benefit, so that benefit is claimed rather than the UB.
And before you start, BluePeter and big bro, in the case of the last of those categories, the unemployed partner is required to be seeking full-time employment.
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Toad
“Some people who are unemployed don’t apply for benefit because they have their own resources and don’t need it. Others have a partner in work, so are ineligible for a benefit.”
And nor should they apply for a benefit if they have their own resources, the same applies for those who have a working partner.
“Others have eligibility for the DPB because they are single parents so claim that rather than the UB. Others have a partner already eligible for another benefit like sickness or invalid’s benefit, so that benefit is claimed rather than the UB.”
You seem to be suggesting that it is a bad thing to require the partner to be looking for employment.
Like Mitchell I see the DPB, Sickness and Invalids benefit as far more serious than the numbers on the dole, the DPB is a lifestyle choice, the sooner we take away that lifestyle choice the better, these people are the real parasites in our society.
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@big bro 4:19 PM
And nor should they apply for a benefit if they have their own resources, the same applies for those who have a working partner.
Those who have a working partner can’t already, unless they are on a very low income. Even when I didn’t have a working partner and was out of work I didn’t apply for the dole for 3 months because I had sufficient to get by on until then.
You seem to be suggesting that it is a bad thing to require the partner to be looking for employment.
Not at all. It would only be a bad thing if the incapacitated partner was sufficiently impaired as to need his or her partner at home as a caregiver. Otherwise they should be looking for work.
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“And nor should they apply for a benefit if they have their own resources”
I guess Roger Douglas will refuse to use the benefits he will have available to him when he
is turfed outretires from politics.He’ll have the fortune he made as a pig
exploiterfarmer to live on, after all.Like or Dislike:
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Not sure, ‘fly – remember his pig farm went broke.
Mind you, he probably sucked it dry through dividends before it went into receivership.
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bigbro
LM claims little expertise on the matter of SB and IB – their rates are increasing worldwide.
Indications are that the levels on these benefits will continue on a rising trend whatever government policy is in place to manage the numbers down. This is a factor of the aging of baby boomers, a higher retirement age and over the last 20-30 years long periods of unemployment and poverty (consequences include addictions and mental health issues) and health problems resulting from smoking and dietary trends (which while reversing have left many in poor health).
A more sustainable way of our living – to maintain our health is required, public health education is an economic investment in the next generation.
The DPB is a non issue. It’s hard for one parent families to manage work and child-raising without free public childcare provision. Free public provision needs to be supported by available jobs.
Thus the ultimate welfare issue is, where are the jobs and where is the free childcare?
The lack of eligibility of the non working partner to the dole is also a problem. Without the dole, the parent soon chooses to provide childcare assisted by WFF. They do not improve their financial status, but they at least are no worse off and the non working partner may as well rear children while they are out of the workforce. If it’s an incentive to increase our population you want, lack of the dole to the non working partner is a good way of going about it.
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Toad – quite the manager then, was he? Encouraging that he’s on the board of National Ltd then!
Noble of him though, to offer to never touch those benefits!
Man of Honour.
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Amazing how “sick” people are getting. To think, there were few sick people after the war, but now, with advanced medical technology, high food quality, knowledge about diet and fitness…
…there are increasing waves of fat, idle, KFC-stuffing good-for-nothing bludgers stealing off workers, claiming to be “sick”!
Wonder how that happened?
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‘fly, I forgot to mention that Douglas would probably have extracted a healthy sum in directors fees as well.
@BluePeter 5:02 PM
And you supported Tolley getting the junk food back into schools, didn’t you?
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BluePeter wrote:
“Amazing how “sick” people are getting. To think, there were few sick people after the war, but now, with advanced medical technology, high food quality, knowledge about diet and fitness…”
advanced medical technology is keeping many sick people alive when they would otherwise have died.
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Obesity is a major problem in New Zealand.
Self-inflicted.
Which is what happens when you give brain-dead bludgers free money, and attach no responsibility to the spending thereof.
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There is nothing wrong with one burger.
There is a lot wrong with ten burgers, two large helpings of fries, oh, and a diet coke. And a sundae.
What’s the difference, hmmm?
Personal responsibility.
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BP
Still trying to convert us to share your prejudices about others?
You have no evidence as to the employment status of people on SB and IB prior to their going onto these benefits.
Then you go on to imply it’s only the amount of intake people can afford which is the problem – the people on the dole cannot afford the American size portions.
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Somehow, National allowed David Farrar to frame their policy on obesity and suddenly, it doesn’t exist! No such thing! Personal responsibility, that’s all it takes to avert a bloated population and the down-stream health issues that follow – problem solved (watch Tony Ryall’s lips not move when he says it). We are, each and every one of us, our chosen weight.
Hurrah!!
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No policy to downsize the numbers who are unemployed and no policy to reduce obesity apart from banning profile mirrors.
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Thanks toad.
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Any pro-’Green New Deal’-ers want to have a go at the question of why the US stimulus package is not so much great success? It wasn’t absolutely ‘green’ but did please a few people of that persuasion…
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- “Green New Deal jobs are not make-work schemes”
Yes, they quite literally are: they are the very definition of make-work schemes. You are just using the recession as a pretext to tax and borrow vast amounts of more money and spend it all on your pet schemes.
How many real jobs would your recklessness cost as you take money out of the hands of people in the real economy and throw it at your indulgences?
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wat’s in a name..?
wat dabney keeps on asking for some kind of assist.. I mean.. just look at his take money out of the hands of people in the real economy and throw it at your indulgences?
well wat you finally struck seam.. check out the eco2 crowd in vanuatu.. or Colo, or California. they lookee like the very thing for yo..
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Should we really be making a song and dance about 7.3% unemployment though? The last recession we went through (the 1998 one), saw unemployment reach similar levels, and then let us not forget the recession of the early 1990s.
While it is obviously irritating to those who have to suffer through it, I think that we can be proud that our unemployment rate has stayed relatively low given the recession that we have experienced. Let us not forget that in the US and Europe, unemployment has hit double digits, with parts of Europe having unemployment edging on 20%.
Finally, I think the government did the right thing by not having a massive stimulus package; things didn’t warrant it, and at least we don’t have an inflation ticking time bomb like the one that faces the US.
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NATIOANL STANDARDS IN NUMERACY NEEDED FOR GREEN PARTY
$1B over three years will pay 43,000 workers $3.70 per hour – that’s if you spend every cent on wages.
Do you intend to drop the minmum wage?
However that’s generous compared to the second green scheme. $500m for 50,000 jobs for ten years – thats an hourly rate of 0.48 cents per hour (if every single dollar of the $500m goes into wages $500,000,000/10 years/50,000 workers/52 weeks/40 hours = 48 cents/hour).
If they need equpment, vehicles, offices – then that will have to come out of the 48 cents.
Bring on the National Standards – soon please.
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Photonz
Please say you are just taking the piss and you don’t really think that investment to create jobs is just money to pay peoples wages.
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SPC – if you intend to create 50,000 jobs in forestry, wilding pine control, and pest control, then there’s very little income from any of those professions, at least not for the first 25 years.
So where are the wages going to come from for the first 25 years until the trees grow?
The amount needed over that period, for wages alone, (not counting the huge cost of land for the forestry, equipnment, training, vehicles etc) – is under-calculated by a factor of 30.
Similarly with stage 1, the jobs are either ones that will not generate an income, or ones that are simply replacing existing workers jobs (i.e. building houses).
Good on the Greens for trying to come up with ideas, but they need to think of ones that ADD to the economy, and pay tax TO the government – not suck billions more FROM taxpayers with an overall substnatial negative economic effect.
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Stephen R
Eric frickberg (?) made a comment on Morning Report about the “168,000 on the dole.”
http://static.radionz.net.nz/assets/audio_item/0012/2204202/mnr-201002 05-0809-Unions_call_on_government_to_do_more_to_create_jobs-m048.asx
He should have said, “168,000 are unemployed.”
http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/work_income_and_spending/Emp loyment/HouseholdLabourForceSurvey_MRDec09qtr.aspx
SPC, I have addressed your comment here;
http://lindsaymitchell.blogspot.com/2010/02/growth-in-incapacity-isnt- just-factor.html
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Why has no-one mentioned immigration? There was a net migration gain of 20,000 people in the year to November 2009. I do about four or five immigration medicals a week, the majority of occupations are potential immigrants in service occupations, cooks / chefs, masseures, waiters, hotel workers etc. (When I say the majority, I mean over half and I also concede a fair number might be under a temporary work permit – but see below). It is my belief that New Zealand doesn’t really have an immigration “policy”, just an ad hoc and ill thought-out political convenience to encourage people to come here, with the hope of boosting domestic demand, keeping the construction industry happy (which is an important part of our domestic economy) and making the economy seem more active. It is going to prove a painfully costly presumption that it doesn’t matter how many people come to New Zealand, there’ll always be something for them to do.
It seems wilfully self-indulgent of this country to allow so many non-skilled people into New Zealand, to compete in a tight job market with citizens who have been here many years or who are native born. In addition, there is no such thing as a “service economy”, it is an oxymoron, as the UK and the US are now finding out to their cost.
The “recession” as it is so comfortingly mislabelled is not a recession in the ordinary term, in fact our economic travails have scarcely even begun. The likelihood is that another year or two of this artificial boost in economic activity will have petered out and the global economy will come crashing to the ground. Our present “low unemployment rate” that john-ston says we should be proud of is the effect of New Zealand’s continued artificial boost to our domestic economy. Whilst it is true the government hasn’t directly borrowed to spend, it has allowed the country to do so privately, from the time the last Labour administration came to office to when they were voted out in 2008, our overseas indebtedness doubled, from a bit over 100 billion dollars, to well over 200 billion dollars. Well, any economy can be made to look good if you only look at the black figures, and pay no heed to the red ones. We have been running an unsustainable economy for 20-30 years, (when was the last time New Zealand actually paid its way?) and we are now a seriously indebted and vulnerable nation, with a badly distorted economy, where increasing swathes of our productive endeavours are owned by overseas interests. How many wealthy economies do you know, that when the economy does well, the balance of payments plummets, or when it does badly, the balance of payments improves (as it has done in the last year since the “recession”)
This is not a time to be inviting semiskilled people to work here, it is unfair on them and it is unfair on us. (Also very unfair to immigrants is the “temporary work permit scheme”, this is a mean spirited con act perpetrated on many unsuspecting immigrants and their families, who give up their own homes and lives for several years to come and live and work here, and then are likely to be told they are no longer needed and should go home. This scheme should be scrapped forthwith) New Zealand’s population growth rate of 1% or more is not sustainable, and needs to be reduced. This would also have the beneficial effect of reducing demand for housing, lowering house prices (which are still grossly overvalued by any historical calculation), keeping interest rates low, and reducing our over-valued dollar and boosting the truly productive export sector.
No talk about unemployment can possibly be comprehensive without discussion immigration and population issues, I am surprised that this posting discussing these issues is the first in this thread.
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PS In case there’s any dispute about the latest migrant figures, the figure of 20,000 gain in net migration comes from the Dept of Statistics report which can be found here http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/population/Migration/Interna tionalTravelAndMigration_MRNov09.aspx
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jock,
How is it that semi-skilled foreign workers, possibly not speaking very good English, are able to secure jobs in NZ, yet thousands of people born here and having received the benefit of ten years of state education are not?
I suspect that many Kiwis simply prefer the dole to those jobs.
So it’s a good thing all round that poor foreigners come here: good for them and their families, and good for NZ consumers. Ultimately it’s not for you are I to say where other people choose to live and work. Good luck to them wherever they end up. Ditto for all those born in NZ who now live and work overseas.
- “In addition, there is no such thing as a “service economy”, it is an oxymoron, as the UK and the US are now finding out to their cost.”
That would be the same US which is the world’s largest manufacturer, would it?
- “We have been running an unsustainable economy for 20-30 years, (when was the last time New Zealand actually paid its way?) and we are now a seriously indebted and vulnerable nation”
You have to separate out private debt from government debt. If government debt is growing then the solution is to cut state spending and reduce the government payroll to ease the burden on the productive sector. Good luck making that argument on this blog.
- “How many wealthy economies do you know, that when the economy does well, the balance of payments plummets, or when it does badly, the balance of payments improves (as it has done in the last year since the “recession”)”
In fact, the behaviour you describe is quite typical, although “improves” is not an accurate word since there is nothing inherently wrong in a current account deficit.
- “This is not a time to be inviting semiskilled people to work here…”
Nobody invited them. They made their own decision in their own self-interest.
- “…it is unfair on them and it is unfair on us.”
No it isn’t. What is unfair is discriminating against someone on the basis of their place of birth.
I do agree, though, that the temporary work permit scheme should be scrapped: as should all other limitations on the free movement of people.
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