Nick Smith

Nick Smith is a senior financial journalist at The Independent, having previously worked at some of the country's leading newspapers and news magazines. He has won seven Qantas media awards, a David Low fellowship to Oxford University and, prior to journalism, was an Elvis impersonator at a West Auckland theatre restaurant. He writes on economics.

Grinch likely model for welfare shakeup

05:00am 01 Jul 2010

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BY NICK SMITH

Timing, as always, is everything. During the December days leading to that annual event celebrating, among other things, Christian charity, the Welfare Working Group will deliver its report to the Government.

Few are expecting a Santa Claus approach to redesigning the country's welfare system. Grinch, say the group's critics, is a more likely Christmas role model.

The working group recently held its first public debates, a chance to set out the ideological battle lines.

At one event were philanthropic polemicist Gareth Morgan, former MP and activist Sue Bradford and Rick Boven, director of economic think tank the New Zealand Institute.

Bradford warned of the looming apocalypse if, in a parallel universe of Bradford's making, the group recommends a US-style system of welfare provision by private insurance.

Sizing up the economic scoreboard

05:00am 24 Jun 2010

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BY NICK SMITH

"Australasia 1?'' asks Australian economist Roland Randall with a tone of incredulity, if not hurt national pride.

The Sydney Morning Herald's attempt to claim Australian credit for the All Whites' magnificent draw with Slovakia with its headline, ''Australasia 1, Slovakia 1'', sticks in Randall's craw.

A few Kiwis were taken aback, too. Were the All Whites to join Crowded House, Phar Lap and pavlova as joint trans-Tasman treasures?

No fear of that, reassures Randall, a TD Securities strategist who covers the New Zealand and Australian economies from Singapore.

But he is still smarting from the four-zip spanking handed out to the ''Shockeroos'' by Germany.

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The new corporate nanny state

05:00am 17 Jun 2010

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BY NICK SMITH

Imagine you're a member of the professional classes: a scientist, a lawyer, an accountant or an analyst. Or, God forbid, a journalist.

Now think back on the last 30 days and ask yourself whether you've engaged in behaviour that might put your employment at risk.

Perhaps you were at a party, a reunion of old mates, an occasion to reminisce about days past while Elton John or Nirvana blared over the stereo system.

Maybe in a fit of bonhomie you even shared a joint, as people sometimes do. That un-Clintonesque inhalation may have jeopardised your future employment.

Reefer, as my father calls it, stays in the system for 30 days and a standard drug and alcohol urine test will reveal the presence of cannabis.

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Gift economy cafe confounds some

05:00am 10 Jun 2010

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BY NICK SMITH

Some people ''really freak out'', says Endel Araujo of customers' reaction to the ''gift economy cafe'', the new addition to the Auckland-based natural food and eco-friendly cafe, Wise Cicada, in Newmarket.

At the gift economy cafe, the customer decides how much to pay for that soy latte (there are no dairy products or meat) and organic, gluten-free muffins.

But when confronted with a choice of what to pay rather than a price tag, a few people simply do not know what to do, he explains.

Some, such as the female executive who completed her master's degree in ''pricing'', simply flee from the store, unable to put a value on the exchange.

There is no negotiation, he assures. ''You choose how much you want to pay,'' and the transaction is ''completely without judgment''.

Painting privatisation as a dirty word

05:00am 04 Jun 2010

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BY NICK SMITH

To many New Zealanders, Kiwibank is the financial sector equivalent of mineral-rich conservation land.

Opening up that institution to private-sector mining, as MP and Christchurch mayoral candidate Jim Anderton might describe it, was always going to provoke outrage.

Anderton is exploiting this vein of public opinion and not letting the facts get in the way as he lets spray at supposed privatisation proponents.

For the record, says one of Anderton's targets, Rob Cameron, who is executive chairman of investment bank Cameron Partners, he supports Kiwibank and did so at its inception.

His advice that the initial Labour government plan for Kiwibank was undercapitalised proved correct.

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