Opinion

An old job for the ‘new’ Treasury?

Pattrick Smellie
Sat, 14 May 2022

The ghosts of Treasury secretaries past will be watching as Grant Robertson delivers next Thursday's budget. (Image: NZME)

Pattrick Smellie
Sat, 14 May 2022

For the last decade – really since the global financial crisis – New Zealand has ridden a wave of global economic growth.That growth was fuelled primarily by the most extended period of the lowest interest rates in history and when it looked as if covid-19 could plunge the world into recession, governments everywhere discovered they could make money out of thin air.In those wild days just before the level 4 lockdown in March 2020, I well remember bumping into a senior Treasury official in a sandwich shop on Lambton Quay.With the sli...

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An old job for the ‘new’ Treasury?

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