Middle Class Welfare from Labour

Phil Goff’s latest plan is to borrow more money from overseas, so that people can get the dole – even if their partner is earning a million dollars a year.

I prefer welfare to be targeted towards those who are in real need. I fully accept that if a family has both parents earning say $100,000, then it is difficult if one of them loses their job. Their spending has to adjust. But at the end of the day they still have a family income of $100,000 and that is not the priority for welfare.

Labour seem genetically incapable of coming up with any economic proposal that does not involve borrowing more money to spend more money. As an example Fitch Ratings recently put NZ on negative outlook and said:

Against this backdrop of external vulnerability, more aggressive restoration of public finances through fiscal prudence will be needed to raise the national savings rate to counter weak private savings.

So Fitch have clearly said the Government needs to spend less, and borrow less or we will have a credit rating downgrade. And what is Labour’s response to this:

“National’s problem is that many of its policy changes so far go in precisely the wrong direction. Cuts to KiwiSaver and the Super Fund deferrals in particular will worsen the crucial savings gap,” David Cunliffe said.

So Fitch warn against excessive public borrowing, and Labour’s response is to advocate borrowing an extra $3 billion a year!!

As I said they seem genetically incapable of coming up with any solution, apart from borrow and spend. No matter what the problem is, their solution is always the same.