Head2Head

Auteur(s): Bryan Bruce Investigates
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  • Résumé

  • An Aotearoa New Zealand based podcast series featuring interviews with community leaders and influencers about the big issues facing us today and what we could do to solve them and create a better tomorrow.

    bryanbruce.substack.com
    Bryan Bruce
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Politique Sciences politiques Sciences sociales
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Épisodes
  • Episode 44- Economist Susan St John on rethinking Superannuation.

    Episode 44- Economist Susan St John on rethinking Superannuation.
    Apr 26 2025
    THE SUNDAY LONG READ (OR LISTEN ).It’s time to face the fact that our superannuation scheme is unsustainable. So what could we do to fix it? Associate Professor Susan St John has a viable answer. Listen to the podcast or read the transcription below.Bryan:Hello I’m Bryan Bruce, welcome to Head2Head. Today I’m catching up with economist Susan St John who is an Associate Professor at Auckland University, a founding member of the Child Poverty Action Group here in New Zealand, but these days is engaged and work nearer the end of life than at the beginning . Welcome to my aging world Susan!Susan:Welcome to you! (laughs)BryanWe've got rising costs of aged healthcare and superannuation and we need to be deciding what we're going to do about that because the costs are fast becoming unsustainable. Talk me through this problem. How did we get here and what do you suggest we do about superannuation?Susan:Yes, well you're right. As we look out we see that the costs for healthcare and for pensions are going to rise very steeply and they're doing that at the expense of other things. So if we think about The Welfare System as a whole, and the money that we've got to spend on all parts of the demographic spread, we're spending an inordinate amount at the top end without any questioning of it. And in the meantime what's happening is that what we're doing for working aged, and for children, has become incredibly mean, and less satisfactory over time and is getting worse. So it's contributing to the wealth divide that we're seeing emerging very sharply in New Zealand.Bryan:Thanks to the neoliberalism and the economic reforms of the 1980s and all of that ! So, we're here now. You did a working paper just recently on Superannuation as a basic income, universal basic income treated as a grant. Why should we change to that kind of system?Susan:Well there's some very good things about New Zealand Super. Of course it is going to be too costly and we'll have to do something about it, but the tools that we have to do some changes to Super are limited and they've got enormous costs. So we can talk about raising the age of eligibility and that's going to impact on an awful lot of low income people and disproportionately on Māori and Pasifika and so on, and it's not a quick fix. And we can talk about lowering the level of it and it's just going to create more poverty and we're seeing poverty emerge amongst the older age group now. So what else is there? It's some sort of surcharge, basically an income test which would have the effect of clawing back from the very top end where superannuation is a drop in the bucket, it doesn't matter in terms of well-being or anything else at that end, and there's potential to save significant amounts of money and to do some very useful things with that money.The idea of paying a grant is because we don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater. We want to retain the very best aspects of New Zealand's Super so everyone is entitled to this basic income. It's an opt in. It’s like it is at the moment and if you opt in you get this grant, and for a person that would be about $21,000 as a nontaxable grant equal to what they would get today; and then the counter to that is that if you have opted to take that, your other income is taxed on a separate text scale and the way that is designed determines how quickly you can claw back that $21,000.Bryan:OK, so the wealthier you are and the more money you make the less you become eligible for this grant?Susan:No you’d be eligible for it in full that's thing. It is a basic income, it's there for everyone now you don't have to opt in and many people might think, by the time I pay this extra tax I may as well not bother, and particularly people in well paid jobs at 65 might defer their application, it's still there if they want it. The point of a basic income is it’s there if your circumstances change, it is an unconditional income there to support youBryan:So it's not means testing necessarily?Susan:It's a form of means testing as a broad term, which includes asset testing. It’s the sort of thing they do in Australia, and when you look at the draconian sort of means test they have on their age pension New Zealanders wouldn't have a bar of it . We want something more moderate I suggest. We did use the wealth surcharge and it operated for 13 years, and this idea is somewhat similar, in that if you have a lot of other income you pay a higher rate of tax.Bryan:You sometimes hear politicians say, “We're just going to have to raise the age at which you get the pension.” What's wrong with that?Susan:Well you hit the wrong groups. You have to really ask yourself what is the problem we're trying to address? And the problem is, of course, that people who are in well paid jobs and maybe millionaires can get it at 65. But if we address that problem by raising the age for everybody then you capture multiple people who are in no position to wait ...
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    25 min
  • Episode 43 -The Compassionate Economy

    Episode 43 -The Compassionate Economy
    Apr 22 2025

    In this episode of Head2Head I talk with two remarkable political economists who are passionate and informed advocates of the “compassionate economy “ - the idea that economy should serve the people and not the other way around and is kinder to our life sustaining planet.

    Professor Liz Grant holds a chair in Global Health and Development at the University of Edinburgh and is responsible for developing and supporting global health partnerships with colleagues in low- and middle-income country (LMIC) communities, and for local and global advocacy translating global health research into action.

    Liz is a co-director of the University’s Global Compassion Initiative developing work on the value base of the Sustainable Development Goals, the science of compassion, and the contribution that faith communities make to the Sustainable Development Goals.

    Liz has led the development of a suite of global health MSc programmes, MOOCs and coordinates the Global Health PhD programme all specifically designed for students from resource constrained countries. She currently is the Co-Director of the Masters of Family Medicine and the MSc in Global Health Challenges

    Her own research interests span planetary health and palliative care in contexts of poverty and conflict – new beginnings and better endings.

    She sits on the Scottish Government NHS Global Citizenship Board and was on the Board of Directors for the Consortium of Universities for Global Health, (CUGH), an association of over 170 Academic institutions training in Global Health, and currently chairs the CUGH Research Committee.

    DR KATHERINE TREBECK is a political economist, writer and advocate for economic system change. She co-founded the Wellbeing Economy Alliance and also WEAll Scotland, its Scottish hub. She is writer-in-residence at the University of Edinburgh’s Edinburgh Futures Institute and a Strategic Advisor to Australia’s Centre for Policy Development. She sits on a range of boards and advisory groups such as The Democracy Collaborative, the C40 Centre for Urban Climate Policy and Economy, and the Centre for Understanding Sustainable Prosperity.She is a New Economics Senior Fellow at the ZOE Institute, a Fellow of The Leaders Institute and a Distinguished Fellow of the Schumacher Institute. She worked for Oxfam GB for eight years’, where she developed Oxfam’s Humankind Index and led work on downscaling the ‘doughnut’ for various contexts.Katherine has Bachelor Degrees in Economics and in Politics (University of Melbourne) and holds a PhD in Political Science from the Australian National University. She was Honorary Professor at the University of the West of Scotland and Senior Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Strathclyde.In 2019 she co-authored The Economics of Arrival: Ideas for a Grown Up Economy (with Jeremy Williams and published by Policy Press), and her report Being Bold: Budgeting for Children’s Wellbeing was launched in March 2021.

    Head2Head is made possible because of the generosity of paid subscribers to my Substack who value independent public journalism that speaks truth to power, gives a voice to those who have none, and promotes positive ideas that will make the world a better place for the the many, not the few.

    If you are receiving this post as a free subscriber please consider upgrading to help this work to continue. My thanks again to my paid subscribers for your support.

    Please restack and share posts you think are worthwhile as it all helps to build readership and viewership.



    This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bryanbruce.substack.com/subscribe
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    31 min
  • Episode 42- Economist Prof Richard Wolff

    Episode 42- Economist Prof Richard Wolff
    Apr 11 2025

    On the eve of Trump imposing tariffs that will upend the world economy I interview renowned world political economist, and New York based, Prof Richard Wolff.

    He is a professor emeritus of economics at the University of Massachuesetts Amherst and a visiting professor in the graduate program in international affairs of the New School. He has also taught economics at Yale University, City University of New York, University of Paris (Sorbonne) and The Brecht Forum in New York City.

    If you listen to no other podcast on economics this year I urge you to listen to this one. Over the course of our hour long conversation Prof Wolff not only unpacks Trumpism and the impact his tariff agenda will have on the world economy, he provides a razor sharp analysis of Capitalism and offers practical solutions on how we could put an end to the rule of the oligarchs and a create a fairer society.

    If you would like to know more about Prof Wolff’s work and how we can return to having a meaningful democracy in our daily lives please visit :

    https://www.democracyatwork.info

    His youtube channel has just over 500,000 subscribers and you can find here:

    https://www.youtube.com/c/democracyatwrk/videos

    Prof Wolff will be beaming in from the USA as a key speaker at the Post-Capitalist Aotearoa: Wellington Conference to Explore a New Economic Future at St Andrew’s On The Terrace

    April 23 -24 2025 which you can find out about and register at

    www.proutresearch.nz

    Or contact

    Bruce Dyer

    Email: info@proutresearch.nz

    It is because of my paid subscribers that I can record interviews like this one .

    I post something every day. Free subscribers receive about 30% of what is available on my site so please consider upgrading and supporting my public journalism work.

    If you can afford $9 a month including GST your subscription will not only give you full access to all my work, you will be able to comment on posts andjoin our chat group of intelligent New Zealanders who want to make a difference.

    To my paid subscribers - thank you again for your support and making it possible for me to continue to work on stories in the public interest, to speak truth to power and give a voice to those who have none.



    This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bryanbruce.substack.com/subscribe
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    1 h et 3 min

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