Scoop has an Ethical Paywall
Keith Rankin
Political Economist, Scoop Columnist
Keith Rankin taught economics at Unitec in Mt Albert since 1999. An economic historian by training, his research has included an analysis of labour supply in the Great Depression of the 1930s, and has included estimates of New Zealand's GNP going back to the 1850s.
Keith believes that many of the economic issues that beguile us cannot be understood by relying on the orthodox interpretations of our social science disciplines. Keith favours a critical approach that emphasises new perspectives rather than simply opposing those practices and policies that we don't like.
Keith retired in 2020 and lives with his family in Glen Eden, Auckland.
Keith Rankin - Latest News [Page 25]
Keith Rankin: Saving Orang-utan
Thursday, 19 July 2001, 8:53 am | Keith Rankin
Recently I saw a television programme about the plight of the orang-utan, whose only remaining habitat is a few formerly protected rainforests in Sumatra and Borneo, in the north of Indonesia. The Indonesian economy is now so weak that, Indonesia's ... More >>
Keith Rankin: An American-Pacific Commonwealth?
Thursday, 12 July 2001, 9:00 am | Keith Rankin
Former Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney wants New Zealand to join the North American Free Trade Agreement (Nafta). The reality is that we are in many respects already an economic province of North America. That need not be a bad thing. We need ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Taxing Questions
Thursday, 5 July 2001, 9:11 am | Keith Rankin
I have received some feedback after last-week presenting an argument in favour of a home equity tax. One responder cannot understand the difference between a home equity tax and a capital gains tax. Another sees the idea of offsetting a tax with ... More >>
Keith Rankin: In Defence Of Equitable Home Tax
Thursday, 28 June 2001, 9:52 am | Keith Rankin
The opprobrium heaped onto the 2001 Tax Review committee for suggesting a home ownership tax was so loud and so righteous that it pre-empted any reasonable public debate on both that issue and the other issues raised by the taskforce. More >>
Keith Rankin: A Classical Retirement Fund
Thursday, 21 June 2001, 7:55 am | Keith Rankin
When we teach economics today, we still contrast the "classical" with the "Keynesian" point of view. The central (though largely forgotten) point of difference relates to the importance or otherwise, to the national economy, of ... More >>
Keith Rankin: A Minuscule Landslide
Thursday, 14 June 2001, 8:45 am | Keith Rankin
Last week I suggested that the result of the British election would be closer than most people expected. I was right, the gap between Labour and the Conservatives was only nine percentage points. What I did not realise, however, is just how much the ... More >>
Keith Rankin: The New Conservative Dragon-Slayers?
Thursday, 7 June 2001, 7:54 am | Keith Rankin
If I was a betting man, and if Ladbrokes was nearby, I would be betting on a "hung Parliament" in Britain tomorrow. I don't think Hague, Portillo, Widdecombe et.al. will lead the Tories to victory. Nor do I think Labour will lose. But I do think ... More >>
Keith Rankin: John Carruthers
Thursday, 31 May 2001, 9:57 am | Keith Rankin
The experience of Christine Rankin in having her job disestablished via an underhand political manoeuvre reminds me of another senior public servant - John Carruthers - who suffered a similar experience in 1878. More >>
Keith Rankin: Business Handouts
Thursday, 24 May 2001, 9:42 am | Keith Rankin
Nobody really cares that the Government has spent slightly more than it planned to spend this financial year (to June 2001). Indeed there appears to be widespread if understated support for an expansionary fiscal policy to be outlined in today's budget. ... More >>
Rankin: Monetary Pragmatism - Fiscal Anorexia
Thursday, 17 May 2001, 12:40 pm | Keith Rankin
The fourth Labour Government, dogmatically right-wing with respect to monetary policy (ie monetarist), was, despite their spin, spendthrift on fiscal policy. The fifth Labour government is very different. More >>
Keith Rankin: The Shipley Bill
Thursday, 10 May 2001, 9:41 am | Keith Rankin
Jenny Shipley's Electoral Options Referenda Bill has been drawn from the private members' ballot. Tilting at windmills, Mrs Shipley wants, or claims to want, "the people" to decide whether to fix an electoral system that ain't broke. Certainly ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Taxing Green Dollar Communities
Thursday, 3 May 2001, 10:30 am | Keith Rankin
National's revenue spokesperson Annabel Young has taken it upon herself to condemn 'green dollars', and to label 'green markets' as "black markets". She could be opening a Pandora's Box. It only requires enough people to take the bait. (Her ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Another Measly Parental Benefit
Thursday, 26 April 2001, 9:44 am | Keith Rankin
It appears that something called "paid parental leave" will be implemented by this government. I infer from Radio New Zealand reports that the new proposal will be, as National's 1999 parental tax credit was, the equivalent of a social welfare ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Political Economy of Foot and Mouth
Thursday, 12 April 2001, 9:22 am | Keith Rankin
Although it no longer dominates the news in this country, Britain's foot and mouth epidemic continues to rage and many thousands of healthy animals continue to be slaughtered. Further, we are told that the introduction of foot and mouth disease into New Zealand, ... More >>
Rankin: Sound Democracy or Foolish Politics?
Thursday, 5 April 2001, 9:17 am | Keith Rankin
A few months ago, the burghers and businesses of Onehunga were asked, by way of a postal referendum, whether the local water should be fluoridated. Onehunga has its own prized spring water. It is the only suburb of Auckland to not have its water ... More >>
Keith Rankin: The Last Taboo
Thursday, 29 March 2001, 9:25 am | Keith Rankin
We are starting to acknowledge that suicide is a topic that must be discussed and discussed openly. But in New Zealand almost all the media references are to youth suicide. However in 1998 - the latest year for which New Zealand suicide statistics ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Public Property Rights
Thursday, 22 March 2001, 9:04 am | Keith Rankin
There is a more sustainable, more relaxed, more free, route to egalitarian prosperity than the maximum growth maximum employment option. The key concept is that of public property rights . More >>
Keith Rankin: March Party Madness
Thursday, 15 March 2001, 10:31 am | Keith Rankin
Last weekend, the Act party exposed itself to potentially terminal ridicule by continuing to suggest that kiwis should be domesticated, farmed and eaten. While Act's spokesman tells us that no domesticated species ever became extinct, we see on television mass ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Demanding A Knowledge Economy
Thursday, 8 March 2001, 9:48 am | Keith Rankin
The Tertiary Education Advisory Committee (TEAC), set up to advise the government how to achieve its vision of a complementary rather than a competition-oriented tertiary sector, presented its second of three reports yesterday. The focus, as expected, ... More >>
Keith Rankin: Procreate Or Immigrate?
Thursday, 1 March 2001, 9:36 am | Keith Rankin
Just over a week ago, Opposition leader Jenny Shipley suggested that New Zealand could solve some of its problems by raising the birth rate. While her idea made a lot of sense to professional demographers, it was met with derision in the editorial ... More >>
