Posted on 12/24/2007 7:14:31 PM PST by george76
A FORMER New Zealand prime minister once joked the migration of his citizens to Australia increased the IQ of both countries.
But a study shows the joke is on NZ. Australians are far more productive and earn much more than their Kiwi cousins.
This is intriguing, because both nations enjoyed the same level of income for most of the 20th century...
Australia's GDP $41,760 per capita vs NZ's $31,668 .
Senior accountants make up to $50k a year more in Australia .
Mr Rennie ruled out laziness as the reason for NZ falling behind.
Australia was more productive because its companies had invested more money in machinery and technology than NZ.
"Prosperity does not come by accident,''
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
Well with Rudd taking over as the PM of Australia I look for the Aussie’s to slip back to the level of New Zealand.
Just what I was thinking.
Probably not. It used to be that like Canada and the US, NZ distinguished itself from Australia by being more British. Of late, in both cases, the smaller country seems to make a point of distinguishing itself from its larger neighbor by being further to the left. Rudd’s election will just let the Kiwis go off the deep end.
“A FORMER New Zealand prime minister once joked the migration of his citizens to Australia increased the IQ of both countries.”
They used to say the same thing about the Okies moving to CA.
A certain irony, as Milton Friedman points out that at the start of the 20th Century Australia had the highest standard of living in the world. They fell behind the United States because they adopted British style socialism. If they embraced neo-socialism, they’ll regress.
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From what I understand, NZ is very, very liberal. If that encompasses the same things as it does in the US, I imagine many NZ’ers detest capitalism and would, therefore, not want to invest in capital equipment because that’s helping a capital system to grow and prosper.
Better, in a liberal’s mind, to just give the money away to layabouts rather than “waste” it on a capital enterprise.
> From what I understand, NZ is very, very liberal.
2008 is an election year, we have had three terms of Helen (which is a thorough gutsful) and the pendulum is probably about ready to swing...
Watch this space.
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