Pattie O’Boyle - Straight Up

01/09/2026

I read this on FB earlier

It makes both sense and cents

Isn’t that what we should be aiming for? Sense and cents?

“The problem with Labour, the Greens, Te Pāti Māori and, increasingly, TOP is that they keep looking at the world through the lens of intentions rather than incentives.

They genuinely believe that if government taxes something, regulates it, subsidises it or redistributes it, the desired outcome will simply follow.

But economies don’t work according to political intentions. They work according to incentives.

Tax alcohol because you want less drinking.
Tax to***co because you want less smoking.
Tax carbon because you want less emissions.

Fine. There may be legitimate reasons for all of those policies.

But then apply exactly the same logic to work, investment, enterprise and wealth creation.

If you tax work heavily, make employing people more expensive, increase compliance costs, penalise investment and continually expand the state’s claim on the fruits of private enterprise, you shouldn’t be remotely surprised when people respond to those incentives.

People work less.
Businesses invest less.
Entrepreneurs take their capital elsewhere.
Employers hire more cautiously.
Productivity suffers.
And eventually there is less wealth available to tax and redistribute.

This isn’t complicated economics. It’s human behaviour.

Thomas Sowell put it perfectly: economic policies should be judged by the incentives they create, not by the hopes that inspired them.

And that’s where the modern left repeatedly gets it wrong.

Labour, the Greens and Te Pāti Māori increasingly argue as though wealth is something government can simply allocate rather than something that first has to be created.

And TOP, despite presenting itself as economically sophisticated and evidence-based, needs to answer the same fundamental question: what incentives will your policies create for the person actually making the investment, starting the company, employing the staff or working the extra hours?

Because you cannot endlessly increase the rewards for not participating while simultaneously increasing the cost of participating and then act surprised when participation falls.

Government doesn’t create prosperity by redistributing an ever-larger share of a shrinking pie.

Prosperity comes from people taking risks, building businesses, investing capital, working, innovating and creating things other people are willing to pay for.

That’s why the Venezuelan lesson matters. And no, New Zealand isn’t Venezuela. That’s a lazy argument.

The lesson is much simpler:

Economic systems produce the outcomes their incentives encourage.

If you want more investment — reward investment.
If you want more businesses — make it easier to build businesses.
If you want more employment — make employing people attractive.
If you want people to work more — make work financially worthwhile.
If you want higher productivity — reward productivity.

And if you want less of something, tax it or penalise it.

It’s remarkable that governments understand this perfectly when it comes to alcohol, to***co and fuel — yet seem to completely forget it when it comes to work, enterprise and wealth creation.

That’s the contradiction at the heart of the modern socialist/redistributive agenda.

You cannot tax your way to prosperity. You have to create the conditions in which prosperity is created in the first place.

Politics runs on incentives.

Pretending otherwise doesn’t make the economics disappear. It just makes the consequences more expensive.”

01/09/2026

This election feels different.

And I like it.

For farmers and landowners, 2017, 2020 and 2023 often felt like we were the political football - battered around, sucked in, spat out and used as an easy target whenever water, methane, climate or environmental politics needed a villain.

This time feels different.

The centre-right parties are being much clearer that New Zealand needs a vibrant, successful and included farming sector - not one constantly under attack or treated as the country’s biggest problem.

Because farming isn’t a problem to be managed out of existence.
It’s still one of our greatest economic strengths - and a huge part of the solution.

We can care deeply about our environment and still have profitable, productive farms. In fact, we need both.

After years of being treated like political footballs, it’s refreshing to feel like we’re finally being seen as part of Team New Zealand and NZ Inc again.

Let’s recognise the difference.

Let’s back policies that value production, exports, regional communities and good environmental stewardship.

And let’s make sure farming retains a strong voice at the table, not a target on its back. 🇳🇿

29/08/2026

Damian raises plenty of good points about tax, and the hidden but not so helpful downstream effects!

Higher taxes can leave jobs undone, firms without work and investment on the sidelines, writes Damien Grant.

20/08/2026

Starter for 10

If the roughly 110,000–120,000 businesses who typically employ 3+ employees, were to create just ONE additional job, NZ could , effectively, absorb a very large proportion of the people currently unemployed.

Could every NZ business - manufacturers, retailers, farms/orchards, vets, plumbers, builders, roading contractors, trucking etc etc employ JUST one more?



Pass it on

Pattie O'Boyle

17/08/2026

Apparently, New Zealand isn't actually falling off a cliff…who knew??!!

If you listened continuously to some of the mainstream media, political commentators and the more relentlessly gloomy voices on the Left, you could be forgiven for thinking New Zealand's economy was somewhere between a basket case and the Titanic. 😂

But perhaps it's worth occasionally looking beyond the headlines.

Roger J Kerr has just done a stocktake of the actual economic fundamentals - and there's rather more to feel positive about.

Employment has been growing. Job advertisements are up 6.2% year-on-year. Export values are up 25% in the year to June. Trade surpluses have strengthened dramatically. Retail spending has started to recover. Commodity prices are strong. Business and consumer confidence are improving. And S&P has just upgraded its forecasts for NZ growth to 2.4% in 2026 and 2.5% in 2027 - with Kerr arguing even those numbers may be too conservative.

Perhaps most interestingly, the economic recovery isn't necessarily happening where the cameras are pointed. The regions are doing considerably better than Auckland and Wellington, helped by our export economy, rising incomes and employment. Workers are actually moving towards the regions where the jobs are.

And therein lies a bit of a problem with how we measure "success". We seem obsessed with house prices - particularly in Wellington & Auckland - as though buying and selling houses to one another is economic wealth creation. IT ISN'T. Building businesses, producing things, exporting, earning more and investing is wealth creation.

So yes, there are real problems. Unemployment is still too high, the public finances need work and parts of the economy remain weak. We shouldn't pretend otherwise.

But perhaps we could also acknowledge that NZ is recovering, our export economy is performing strongly, and there are some genuinely encouraging signs underneath the gloom.

A little more balance wouldn't hurt.

Because if you consume enough economic misery every day, you might start looking for the cliff.

It turns out we might just need to look at the numbers instead. 😉

Pattie O'Boyle

17/08/2026

I don’t think anyone should be shamed or prevented from having children because they’re poor.

But I do think we’ve become strangely reluctant to talk honestly about the responsibilities that come with bringing another human being into the world.

Choosing to have a child is one of life’s BIGGEST decisions.

Surely it’s reasonable to encourage people to think carefully about whether they have the stability, resources, relationships, time and capacity to give that child a really good start in life.

Pattie O'Boyle

16/08/2026

Hopefully Jack Tame's more robust Q&A interview of Opportunity Party's Qiulae Wong (often referred to a "Q") this morning is the start of NZ media finally beginning to properly "interrogate" political parties.

Opportunity must surely get an E for Effort, but whether they deserve voter's ticks to enter Parliament - well, that's another whole matter!

Some of their policies are downright daft, and worse still, dangerous - including knowingly creating even greater "dependency", with their UBI, in this great little country's citizens is beyond comprehension!

However, one of the biggest concerns I have with a broad land-value tax is what it means for asset-rich but often income-poor New Zealanders - particularly superannuitants who own their homes or farms outright. Under TOP's proposal, the annual tax would be 1.75% of urban land value and 0.5% of rural land value. So a retired homeowner with $1m of land value could face a $17,500 annual bill; a retired farmer with $5m of land value, $25,000. If they can't afford to pay it, deferral simply moves the problem into the future: $17,500 a year becomes $175,000 after 10 years or $350,000 after 20, before any interest. TOP says exemptions and deferrals may apply to people who are “land rich, cash poor”, but deferral doesn't make the tax disappear.

And that's what troubles me. These are people who may have spent 30+ years paying off their home or building a farm asset to provide not only food, jobs, export income, taxation, but also security in retirement. They may have substantial equity but very little disposable income. A deferred land tax effectively places the Government in the position of a creditor against that equity - rather like a reverse mortgage, except the owner isn't receiving money to enjoy during their retirement. Their asset could even fall in value as the new tax is capitalised into land prices, while the tax debt accumulates against it. There may be a legitimate economic case for taxing land, but surely we need to ask whether it is fair to make today's retirees pay for a tax system they never planned for, simply because their wealth happens to be tied up in the land they already own.

I can see why the National Party has ruled Opportunity Party out - they are just so philosophically distant it's not even funny!

And I can see why the Labour Party is not fully committing to them as yet - they too would rather do without them, than with them.

It defies belief that they are getting anywhere near 5% support, let alone that supposed 8%. I guess the only poll that counts (on 7 Nov) will prove the actual support they've garnered through a advertised & recruited leader, a huge lot of significant donations (that they propose banning other political hopefuls in the future from receiving, once they are in!!) and a starting lineup of idealistic academics and the "odd" farmer wannabe.

It's not hard seeing left and right leaning voters starting to lean back into the two major parties as we hurtle towards that early November date - after all it's these two parties that will ultimately call the shots. Kingmaker or not, the Opportunity Party fell flat on their face this morning on Q&A. The shallowness of their policies and their grasp on real-life means it's all starting to catch up on them.

Pattie O'Boyle

In less than a year, Opportunity have gone from sub-one percent sup...

14/08/2026

What if you could name four things that have made New Zealand FAIRER, SAFER, FREER or simply more SENSIBLE - and then ask: who actually did the mahi to make them happen?

Who helped give New Zealanders the right to choose an assisted death when facing a terminal illness — taking End of Life Choice from a private member’s bill, through Parliament and a binding referendum, to legislation? ACT. 65.1% of New Zealanders ultimately voted Yes. (Elections NZ⁠)

Who pushed to bring back charter schools, giving parents and educators more choice and schools more freedom to do things differently?

Who fought to restore Three Strikes, putting tougher consequences back in place for repeat serious offenders?

And who made reversing Labour’s blanket speed-limit reductions a coalition priority — so that sensible speed limits could be restored where appropriate?

Four big, practical changes. Four things that affect thousands — in some cases millions — of New Zealanders.

And the interesting bit?

ACT was behind all four.

It’s easy to forget just how much influence a small party can have when it knows what it stands for, sticks to it and is prepared to do the mahi.

And they’re not finished.

More sensible regulation.

Better medicines access.

Stronger law and order.

Less red tape.

More choice and personal responsibility.

You don’t have to agree with ACT on everything to recognise this:

Over the past decade, ACT has punched well above its weight - and delivered a surprising amount of good, solid, common-sense change.

Pattie O'Boyle

13/08/2026