5 point economic plan for New Zealand

Prsuant to the rules, I will only comment on his plans here. While all none of my opponent;s proposals are bad on their own, collectively they do nothing to improve the economy of New Zealand. Because there are similarities between many of his points, I hope the reader will indulge me in responding out of order.1. Index tax brackets to the rate of inflation2. Increase income tax on the rich5. Introduce a capital gains taxThree of my opponent's proposals are tax changes the first appears to be a reasonable change to prevent bracket creep. However, in the context of the other proposals, we can see that this is clearly a set of proposals designed to shift tax burden up the income ladder. Increasi taxes on "the rich" and creating an entirely new capital gains tax to raise net income and shift the burden to higher income workers. I take no position on whether the current tax burden is distributed fairly, too much at the low end, or too much on the high end. However, this is a debate over proposals on how to improve the New Zealand economy, and I am aware of no evidence that the economy of New Zealand is suffering from being under-taxed. To this end, my opponent introduced no arguments suggesting that more taxes would improve the economy. He has suggested that the government might need revenue, although as I have shown in my proposals, government spending does not rely on taxation. For the size of government in New Zealand, the population is over-taxed, not under-taxed.3. Swap interest free student loans for student allowancesThis proposal changes nothing about the macro-economic state of New Zealand. Somehow, my opponent argues that the government cannot afford to lend students money at no interest, but can afford to give it to them. Moreover, he suggests that the government is losing money by borrowing money at interest to lend it out for free. This is false. New Zealand is not on the gold standard. The government does not need to borrow to spend, it just spends. As a matter of record keeping, the governmetn choses to issue bonds equal to it's deficit, and then buys some of them back through the RBNZ. When the bonds are held by the RBNZ the government pays interest to itself (i. e. , not at all). Since the RBNZ decides how much government debt to leave in the private sector to hit an interest rate target, the publicly held debt and the government spending are operationally disconnected. The treasury and RBNZ together issue enough governmetn bonds to hit the target rate and the rest of the deficit is financed through invented money. Whether you approve of this system or not, it is what we have. Thus, increasing loans to students does not in any way impact government "borrowing". The government is not taking a "loss".4. Abolish the MilitaryI am not in a position to argue whether New Zealand needs a military, however, this is not a debate on whether the defense force (NZDF) is a strategic necessity. This is a debate about how to improve the economy of New Zealand. The NZDF is unbelievably small compared to other countries. However, laying off 12000 New Zealanders is hardly beneficial to the economy. Even if the 1% of GDP that is spent on the military could be put to other use (although my opponent has proposed no other use) this would be a miniscule change. However, what change there is would be poor for the economy. Since he offers no better use for the military, my opponent's plan would put 12000 people out of work. In addition to the added strain they cause to society, that would be 12000 fewer consumers of other goods and services. This would have a cascading effect causing job loss throughout the economy. For these and the many forgooing reasons, my opponent's proposals would not improve the New Zealand economy.