Tuesday, April 27, 2004

Free Market New Zealand

This is a remarkable story about how New Zealand slashed its regulatory burden, size of government, and marginal tax rates, and became the competitive, successful economy it is today (although I hear that it has slipped back into its old ways). One interesting fact mentioned at the start of the article is that young people were leaving it. New Zealand is a very small country, and therefore it has less discretion over what it can tax (i.e. supply and demand for everything is very elastic). Countries where people are not very mobile, such as countries within the EU, and the US, can tolerate higher tax rates because people aren't going to vote with their feet and leave.

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