Coronavirus - New Zealand
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@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@mariner4life said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@voodoo said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@nzzp said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
I think in many places in the world it's just cheaper because the labour is cheaper. NZ is not a cheap country
We're not, and we'll never compete direclty with low cost labour countries.
The cost of living here though seems much higher than (say) Australia, or even the USA. I can't always get my head around why that is. A mate returned from Aus a year or so ago, and wound up going back - cost of living was one of the major factors in that decision
We always notice when we come back. Can anyone explain to me why a block of Colby cheese costs $9 and same brand of Vintage costs $16? It's $32/kg!!!
from my experience booze is cheaper in NZ. So it's not all bad
I notice that when I go to Oz. We can buy Aussie wine cheaper at home
It's quite bizarre - Australian wine is cheaper in NZ than Australia, and NZ wine is cheaper in the UK than in NZ 🤷♂️
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@voodoo said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@nzzp said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
I think in many places in the world it's just cheaper because the labour is cheaper. NZ is not a cheap country
We're not, and we'll never compete direclty with low cost labour countries.
The cost of living here though seems much higher than (say) Australia, or even the USA. I can't always get my head around why that is. A mate returned from Aus a year or so ago, and wound up going back - cost of living was one of the major factors in that decision
We always notice when we come back. Can anyone explain to me why a block of Colby cheese costs $9 and same brand of Vintage costs $16? It's $32/kg!!!
That's because 'Vintage' cheddar is deemed a specialty product for some odd reason. Pricing of that by major brands is actually way lower than an equivalent 'boutique' item.
Colby is shite that is very quickly produced and thrown on the shelf, much like 'Mild'. What they brand as 'Tasty' is marginally more expensive but costs more to produce (less water content, more storage time).
I get that there is then a big leap to what they call 'Vintage' that doesn't seem to equate to production cost but seeing as customers deem it to be in a different category to standard cheese they charge a premium price.I know that in the UK an equivalent product sits alongside 'standard' cheese and sells at half the NZ price per kg. However they also don't have a market of big 1kg blocks for people to compare against.
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@voodoo said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Crucial it's weird. It's certainly a superior product, it's the stark difference in price leap compared to Aus that strikes me, for the exact same 2 products.
Absolutely. Our domestic market pays way more for some things.
I see a Mainland 18 month old cheddar on the Coles site for A$22/kg. As you say, same product here is NZ$36.That kind of pricing is indefensible except for the argument of market forces. If they sell the non-exported extra here in NZ that is the price point we, as consumers, seem willing to pay. Drop the price and demand might outstrip supply availability once export orders are filled.
I can't see why it matters to the producer if the same price comes from domestic or overseas market though.We do get fleeced on examples like this, but, to be honest I haven't noticed that we are overly expensive here when everything is put in the pot. But that may come from me being used to UK prices.
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Switching away from cheese for a bit, I thought this was fairly well put:
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@voodoo said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@mariner4life said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@voodoo said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@nzzp said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@canefan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
I think in many places in the world it's just cheaper because the labour is cheaper. NZ is not a cheap country
We're not, and we'll never compete direclty with low cost labour countries.
The cost of living here though seems much higher than (say) Australia, or even the USA. I can't always get my head around why that is. A mate returned from Aus a year or so ago, and wound up going back - cost of living was one of the major factors in that decision
We always notice when we come back. Can anyone explain to me why a block of Colby cheese costs $9 and same brand of Vintage costs $16? It's $32/kg!!!
from my experience booze is cheaper in NZ. So it's not all bad
I notice that when I go to Oz. We can buy Aussie wine cheaper at home
It's quite bizarre - Australian wine is cheaper in NZ than Australia, and NZ wine is cheaper in the UK than in NZ 🤷♂️
Someone's gouging then, because the Australian government loves taxing alcohol.
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Today was the worst I've seen. It seemed like every 'reporter' or 'journalist' there had the same question re David Clark, it was the only question they had gone in with, and they weren't satisfied until each and every one of these news hounds had asked it, or a very similar derivative of it. The PM trotted out pretty much exactly the same answer over, and over, and over. I'm not sure how many times she needed to say "He is paying a price for his actions, but we need his know-how whilst dealing with the pandemic", or something very similar. It was mind-numbingly hopeless journalistic tripe.
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NZ also has higher sales tax than Australia and it applies more widely (but our income tax rates are lower), so that will have an impact.
On my phone and can't remember where I read it, but tourism is about 10% of GDP, and NZ tourism overseas about half that, so an estimated impact could be 5% of GDP. If we can get the borders open to Australia, that would help a lot.
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@shark I think you are being totally unfair. Having been told about 20 times that Clark had been demoted to the lowest rank in Cabinet and only kept his job because of the situation, they then went to A-HA so do you think its right that Health is the lowest ranked portfolio in cabinet
They also went on and on about PPE again - effectively Bloomfield had to say very slowly as if talking to idiots There are plenty of swabs. There is no problem with the supply chain. If you are being told by people they have no swabs maybe those people should place an order before they run out.
Not the 4th Estates finest moments
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@Crucial said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Toddy said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Bovidae did they name the players?
Mounga was one. It may be under essential services as I understand he was doing tackle practice
That's actually quite good.
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@dogmeat said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Clark is a knob (what is it about Ministers of Health - Coleman was as bad?) but he couldn't face the press today because he was being grilled by the oversight Committee and looking quite ill on it too.
Health is a tough gig and tends to either make or break ministerial careers.
Another note on pricing - one could make a library of books just on that subject if one wishes...
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@Kirwan said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
@Crucial Media probably getting frustrated as the Minister of Health he was avoiding the press. Not the best time to be doing that.
You know, the opposite of open and transparent.
He fronted on radio this morning and Hoskings absolutely roasted him. I'm not saying he shouldn't front again, but jeez, it's hard to send a guy over the top again when he's just had his head blown off.....
One of his questions was when the Minister arrived at the beach car park and there weren't any other vehicles there, didn't he consider he shoudn't be there? To which Clark said something along the lines of "I don't see how that's relevant; I've already admitted to making a mistake and I'm, paying for it". But Hosking being Hosking (and good on him in this instance because he's spot on), then said something like "It's relevant because it speaks to whether you're just dumb, or think you have a sense of entitlement which would allow you to go". Ouch.
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@Godder said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
Or just thoughtless and not paying attention.
Exactly, he did something dumb and apologised. Cant we just move on??? We have much MUCH bigger issues.
This whole leading by example thing is bollox, nobody with a brain thinks politicians lead by example.
Hypocrisy is a different thing, but to me hypocrisy requires an intent to be a dishonest preaching douchbag. The guy just made a mistake, he has sincerely apologised (which is a much better example for young folks).
I am most annoyed at him because it has forced me to defend a Labour minister. -
@Baron-Silas-Greenback said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:
I am most annoyed at him because it has forced me to defend a Labour minister.
Who are you and what have you done with the Baron?