Hard News: The digital switch-off
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What we do need to hear is the term "stagflation", which is absolutely applicable to our current situation - the economy's stagnant, but inflation is well and truly on display.
Perhaps although it's not a noun that can be used to describe what we are in. We're not in a Stagflation.
It also seems to me that making up a new word to describe "the economy is really fucked" isn't really so helpful. When a Depression is defined in a highly technical way, that means that economists will prescribe measures to avoid it, which could be as bad or worse. When the idea is more general, then they have to fix it more generally too. I just don't see it as something easily measured by some golden ratio.
It's quite possible we could never, never have another Depression like the one in the 1930s, on all the indicators. But we could still have something just as bad. Unemployment probably doesn't need to rise as high as then to make society fall apart badly. We could have full employment, but at shockingly low rates, with runaway inflation, for instance. Then we're poor and getting poorer, but all the numbers are right. Or we could have skyrocketing unemployment, but it would hardly matter if everyone was rich as.
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Jan Farr, in reply to
The big selling point of the switch from analog to digital was going to be that there would be more channels available on Freeview than the current analog free-to-air – this is going to make it a much harder sell ….
Good point! Maybe when the earth-quake news is over we'll get round to talking about these things in public.
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We're watching more TV than ever
Just to quibble a bit here, and use Craig's caution about the majestic plural, the 'we' here represents the 550 households on the Peoplemeter panel (which is dominated by Pakeha, middle-class and older viewers) who may be watching more television, on the behalf of the rest of us.
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@Ben I think that we should means-test superannuation payments before we start attacking beneficiaries and low-earners, and no political parties are brave enough to address the issue. Support the 70% of elderly who need support - for sure. We are in trouble financially and the idea that we pay $16500 to Michael Fay, even though he resides abroad, seems unfair. The older generation have paid taxes but not compulsory super - so doesn't that make the pension a benefit?
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And just to support the meme of this thread I agree that the best programmes from TVNZ7 should be screened on TV1 or 2 or a public broadcaster showing news, doco's and current affairs-only would be a good idea.
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Marcus Turner, in reply to
No problem. Perhaps you thought my post had something to do with yours. I just posted it then, 'cos I found it then. Couldn't think of a better place to put it.
In my observation, this is a pretty good list for civilised argument, and my views have been challenged and changed simply by reading posts here. But I have noticed barbs. In my experience, these are usually some way of saying "ouch", but sometimes have the effect of being an attack on someone else (who then says "ouch" in a damaging way, and so it continues - except when we learn to break the cycle).
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
It also seems to me that making up a new word to describe “the economy is really fucked” isn’t really so helpful.
Except that stagflation isn't a made-up word. In fact, it's sufficiently not-made-up that Firefox's dictionary (which doesn't recognise Firefox, as a matter of amusement) considers it valid.
It may not be in common English usage, but it's definitely a "proper" word and it definitely describes our current economic situation more accurately than "depression". In addition to not having the same panic-inducing connotations. -
Jan Farr, in reply to
The problem I have is this (and I would imagine I am not the only one): I pay around $80 per month, just for Sky Digital. And that's just for the one telly in the living room. We have it because Ian watches TV alot, and sometimes for most of the day, if he's feeling poorly. I would get MySky for him but I think that takes it up to $95 p/m, and you pay for the box, which doesn't even belong to you. So they can get stuffed on that one. I would love Freeview for my TV, in the bedroom, which is the one I normally watch telly on, but I have a HD recorder, and as far as I'm aware, if I'm watching something through Freeview, I can't record something else on another channel. So what to do?
Well, true, Jackie - you can't record something on another channel - but you can watch the programme while it's recording - go back and check something you missed - pause it for as long as you like and fast-forward over the ads. It's not all bad.
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Jan Farr, in reply to
Thinking about this overnight, I don't think i am that worked up by the demise of TVNZ 7. hardly anyone watched it anyway.
I have no idea if 'hardly anyone' watches it. All I know is that I do, a lot, and that it's the only channel that you can be almost certain to be able to find something worth watching on. I think that's called a public service, even if the public it serves is not the whole public.
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Jan Farr, in reply to
We never saw TVNZ6's Kidzone as a means to occupy our four-year old for 12 hours a day. It was however brilliant to know that we could sit our wee-one down to watch a moderate bit of telly any time between 6am and 6pm knowing that the programmes would be worthy, age appropriate and often quite educational. Absent would be the three-frames-per-second style of cartoon common on commercial TV consisting of an orgy of destruction by enormous robots (or similar). Also absent were the commercials and commercial tie-ins where programmes are simply an extended advertisement for overpriced plastic merchandise for sale at your local Toy World. Along similar lines, I've witnessed preschoolers talking in American accents as a result of watching nothing but Playhouse Disney on Sky.
Kidzone's host presenter, Kayne Peters was probably the hardest working man in television (I have no idea how he kept up that level of energy and enthusiasm). Not only is our wee girl is bitterly disappointed at the loss of TVNZ6, she was also pretty upset the other day when in 60 seconds on TVNZ7 we went from "Giggles" at 7.59am to scenes of devastation and distraught people in Christchurch on the 8am news and Te Karere (we were out of the room at the time but this was something we had been trying to avoid exposing her to).
I agree with every word you say Gabor. I've always felt quite safe turning on TV6 for my 5 year old granddaughter. The lack of Barbie Doll ads is as important as the familiar accents and relevant content.
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What I'm going to miss the most, on the children side of things, is actually the TVNZ7 news. My lot is growing up without newspapers in the house, which is bad enough, but also without the 6 o'clock news, and you can only make do with radio to a point.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
Maybe they should define their policy a bit more
Maybe they should. Or maybe they didn't think people would take it to mean 100% of government purchasing must be from local suppliers, when that's plainly impractical and ultimately leads to a closed market with sky-rocketing prices courtesy of the legislatively-captive purchaser. You may dismiss many of their policies, but they do have some members who are capable of taking a longer-term view.
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Jan Farr, in reply to
Personally I would like to see a publicly funded channel showing only Documentary, Current Affairs and News with a daily discussion/forum type show discussing those shows with a satirical show for perspective.
There you go, a mission statement in three lines. ;-)
Who would be up for that?.I say yes, yes, yes – as long as you could squeeze ‘tennis’ in there somewhere. Maybe under ‘current affairs’.
Um - and the occasional decent drama? Could we maybe add a small Culture category?
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I have to say that before Worik Stanton attacked me I hadn't read all of the Green's policies... but I still think that there should be a party like the Alliance circa 1992 that included various left-wing viewpoints with a lesser degree of ecological bias. Like a capital gains tax-introducing non-National party party that doesn't require us to compulsorily go organic?
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I'm about to be offline for a while but will check back for Worik's response later... cheers!
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
Like a capital gains tax-introducing non-National party party that doesn't require us to compulsorily go organic?
Sorry, can you take me back to the part where the Greens are saying that buying local or going organic should be compulsory, as opposed to incentivised?
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Russell Brown, in reply to
Um – and the occasional decent drama? Could we maybe add a small Culture category?
It would probably have to be old drama. Drama's effing expensive to produce.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
If it costs a lot more to buy local then the government should buy overseas.
I have been arguing against this kind of thinking for years. If you pay someone to mow your lawns the money goes out of the family purse, if you pay your Son, or Daughter, to mow your lawns and then charge them rent it will cost you nothing but the cost of fuel (even I wouldn't be cruel enough to insist they used scissors) Filling Government contracts locally has a long onflow effect. Company employs more workers, less welfare payments for unemployed. Company makes more profit, Government collects more tax. Workers spend more at the shops, shopkeepers make more profit and collect more GST and pay more tax. Shopkeepers spend more in other shops, other shops employ more people and so on ad-infinitum.... It is the gift that just keeps on giving golden geese.
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giovanni tiso, in reply to
Shopkeepers spend more in other shops, other shops employ more people and so on ad-infinitum
Welcome to socialism! Although even I would have to note for honesty's sake that we've had a few problems with the "ad infinitum" part.
But yeah, the idea that it's cheaper to buy overseas doesn't take into account the cost of people losing their jobs domestically, and the cost of having a fucked up balance of payments.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
that’s plainly impractical and ultimately leads to a closed market with sky-rocketing prices courtesy of the legislatively-captive purchaser.
[citation needed] I think. I can't see why. If the captive purchaser is legislative, ie. Government then they have the power to control this. They could, in fact, control inflation, to an extent, by controlling their own contract pricing.
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Steve Barnes, in reply to
Welcome to socialism!
Thank you, I have been here a while. ;-)
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Bart Janssen, in reply to
I have been arguing against this kind of thinking for years.
I'll bite. To some degree if you can buy local that's great. And if the only reason overseas goods are cheaper is because they pay slave labour rates then definitely buy local.
But if you insist on always buying local by preference then you can easily get to the point where inefficient and sometime crap quality local suppliers are being favoured and efficient overseas suppliers (energy efficient, labour efficient and "good") are being excluded. That situation has existed in my memory in NZ.
So as an idea it's cool. But there are times when I'd rather our local suppliers made something else and left overseas supplier to supply things they can make better.
To use your analogy, if by getting your kids to mow the lawns you are preventing them from going to school and learning how to design buildings etc then you are much better off getting your neighbour to mow your lawns.
TLDR the policy is OK but not as an absolute.
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BenWilson, in reply to
it definitely describes our current economic situation more accurately than "depression"
I don't think so. Depression itself is not well defined. Stagflation is a much more specific term, and could be experienced at the same time as a depression. It doesn't describe everything that's happening, just a couple of indicators.
Essentially a depression is a sustained downturn. We're having that, even though the ways of measuring it are not identical to the Great Depression.
I don't think "panic inducing" is fair. If we're in a depression, we can't just hide our heads in the sand to avoid doing something about it. Quite the opposite, it's best if we front up to it, and work out what to do. It was one of the most grueling things about the Great Depression that people wouldn't even acknowledge it was happening until well into it, there was always the "let's ride it out, things will improve" which kept people hanging on and hoping, rather than getting wildly upset and actually forcing required change.
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Matthew Poole, in reply to
that’s plainly impractical and ultimately leads to a closed market with sky-rocketing prices courtesy of the legislatively-captive purchaser.
[citation needed] I think. I can’t see why. If the captive purchaser is legislative, ie. Government then they have the power to control this. They could, in fact, control inflation, to an extent, by controlling their own contract pricing.
It's pretty self-evident, I'd have thought. If the State is legally required to purchase from local suppliers, the locals can jack prices up because they have to be used.
If the option to go offshore exists, that presents a cap on the cost of local purchasing. Take that away and there's nothing to stop the locals bumping their costs, especially if there are only a couple of local purchasing options - or just one, in the case of trains. Welcome back to the bad old days pre-Roger. -
giovanni tiso, in reply to
Welcome back to the bad old days pre-Roger.
Dear lord.
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