The economy

Press, 20 July 1979, Page 12

The economy

Sic, — Between 1976-77 and 1978-79 we lost 200,780 permanent emigrants (reduced to 86,000 if we take into account permanent immigrants). On a Vietnamese basis (14 times our population) this corresponds to 2,800,000 “refugees” from New Zealand. Why is that? Our economic policies are utterly misguided. Instead of dealing with our balance-of-payments problems like President Carter, by trying to achieve greater selfreliance by import controls, we try to develop manufacturing exports at breakneck speed. This means destroying the local market — so that it. may be available to foreign buyers. Depression is the logical corollary of this policy. New Zealanders leave the'ship as they can see the incompetence of its. master and his chief- mates. — Yours, etc., ; W. ROSENBERG. July 18, 1979.

Sir. — In 1975 we were in debt to the extent, of more than SIOOOM. This changed

very little in the next two years although a lot of. advice was given. In 1978 the National Super age became 60. This immediately raised our debt by several hundred millions. Was this necessary? In 1979 we have a "mini” budget and the child allowance is doubled thereby increasing our debt by another hundred million. A 33 1/3 per cent increase to $4 would have been common sense. To offset some of the debt it is found that the old age beneficiaries have been overpaid for the last six months. Who was responsible for this error? In private business anything as important as this would have been checked and double checked. If we as private individuals were to run our own household budgets and finances in the same manner we would all be in debt. — Yours, etc., F. BURGOYNE. July 18, 1979.