IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/nzecpp/v38y2004i2p265-277.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

What's wrong with New Zealand's public benefit test?

Author

Listed:
  • Geoff Bertram

Abstract

New Zealand courts and regulatory authorities have since 1994 adopted an extreme neoliberal version of the public benefit test, treating wealth transfers from consumers to monopolists as welfare-neutral. This abandonment of the long-established consumer-welfare or balancing-weights standards used in most other OECD jurisdictions rests upon a misconstruction of the alleged inability of economists to reach consensus on how to evaluate changes in income distribution. The intellectual cul-de-sac occupied by “new welfare economics” should leave policymakers free to attack monopoly profits without having to endure utilitarian criticisms from neoliberal economists. In doing so. New Zealand policymakers would be acting in accordance with strong economic arguments for restraining monopoly, drawn from the wider mainstream of the economic literature and requiring no utilitarian underpinning.

Suggested Citation

  • Geoff Bertram, 2004. "What's wrong with New Zealand's public benefit test?," New Zealand Economic Papers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(2), pages 265-277.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:nzecpp:v:38:y:2004:i:2:p:265-277
    DOI: 10.1080/00779950409544406
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00779950409544406
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1080/00779950409544406?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dani Rodrik & Arvind Subramanian & Francesco Trebbi, 2004. "Institutions Rule: The Primacy of Institutions Over Geography and Integration in Economic Development," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 9(2), pages 131-165, June.
    2. William Easterly, 2002. "The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures and Misadventures in the Tropics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262550423, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Voxi Heinrich S Amavilah, 2005. "Human Capital and Income across U.S. Native American Reservations and Trust Lands," GE, Growth, Math methods 0505001, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. J.A. Agbor & J. W. Fedderke & N. Viegi, 2010. "How Does Colonial Origin Matter for Economic Performance in sub-Saharan Africa?," Working Papers 176, Economic Research Southern Africa.
    3. Hans Gersbach & Lars-H. Siemers, 2014. "Can democracy induce development? A constitutional perspective," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 159(1), pages 177-196, April.
    4. Hillebrand Evan E & Lewer Joshua J. & Zagardo Janice Turtora, 2011. "Backtracking from Globalization," Global Economy Journal, De Gruyter, vol. 10(4), pages 1-19, January.
    5. Markus Eberhardt & Francis Teal, 2011. "Econometrics For Grumblers: A New Look At The Literature On Cross‐Country Growth Empirics," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(1), pages 109-155, February.
    6. repec:zbw:bofitp:2009_009 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. R. Grafton & Tom Kompas & P. Owen, 2007. "Bridging the barriers: knowledge connections, productivity and capital accumulation," Journal of Productivity Analysis, Springer, vol. 28(3), pages 219-231, December.
    8. Javed, Omer, 2013. "Determinants of Institutional Quality: A Case Study of IMF Programme Countries," MPRA Paper 51344, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    9. Michael R. Cabalfin & Josef T. Yap, 2008. "Sustainable Development Framework for Local Governance," Governance Working Papers 22619, East Asian Bureau of Economic Research.
    10. Julius A. Agbor, 2011. "How Does Colonial Origin Matter for Economic Performance in Sub-Saharan Africa?," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2011-027, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    11. Francesco Pasimeni & Paolo Pasimeni, 2016. "An Institutional Analysis of the Europe 2020 Strategy," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 127(3), pages 1021-1038, July.
    12. Fang, Ying & Zhao, Yang, 2009. "Do institutions matter? : Estimating the effect of institutions on economic performance in China," BOFIT Discussion Papers 9/2009, Bank of Finland, Institute for Economies in Transition.
    13. Vieider, Ferdinand M. & Chmura, Thorsten & Martinsson, Peter, 2012. "Risk attitudes, development, and growth: Macroeconomic evidence from experiments in 30 countries," Discussion Papers, WZB Junior Research Group Risk and Development SP II 2012-401, WZB Berlin Social Science Center.
    14. repec:kap:iaecre:v:12:y:2006:i:3:p:408-418 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Pushan Dutt, 2009. "Trade protection and bureaucratic corruption: an empirical investigation," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 42(1), pages 155-183, February.
    16. Alma Romero-Barrutieta & Mr. Eric V. Clifton, 2006. "Institutions versus Geography: Subnational Evidence from the United States," IMF Working Papers 2006/169, International Monetary Fund.
    17. Miguel Lebre de Freitas, 2007. "Sobre a perda de ímpeto no processo de convergência da economia portuguesa: uma abordagem dogmática," Notas Económicas, Faculty of Economics, University of Coimbra, issue 25, pages 27-41, June.
    18. Ying Fang & Yang Zhao, 2013. "Do Institutions Matter? Estimating the Effect of Institutions on Econo- mic Performance in China," Working Papers 2013-10-14, Wang Yanan Institute for Studies in Economics (WISE), Xiamen University.
    19. Williamson, Claudia R., 2012. "Dignity and development," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(6), pages 763-771.
    20. Miguel Lebre de Freitas, 2006. "Portugal–EU Convergence Revisited: Evidence for the Period 1960–2003," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 12(3), pages 408-418, August.
    21. Nicolai J. Foss, 2012. "Linking Ethics and Economic Growth: a Comment on Hunt," Contemporary Economics, University of Economics and Human Sciences in Warsaw., vol. 6(3), September.
    22. J. Clark & Robert Lawson & Alex Nowrasteh & Benjamin Powell & Ryan Murphy, 2015. "Does immigration impact institutions?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 163(3), pages 321-335, June.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:nzecpp:v:38:y:2004:i:2:p:265-277. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/RNZP20 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.