I have just spent the last 3 days at the NZ Association of Economists annual jamboree in Christchurch. It was well worth the time as it was a good opportunity to meet economists working in a wide range of areas and sub disciplines.

There were plenty of interesting papers on monetary policy, forecasting, environmental economics, migration, work and of course the housing market. There was a good mix of age and gender which added to the energy.

The keynote speakers were interesting with talks as diverse as climate change and the economics of sexual harassment.

The paper on Climate Change from Warwick McKibben is worth a look and the paper from Motu on Nutrient Trading provides a micro view of how trading in externalities might work at the local level. The work on allocating and trading pollution permits dovetails nicely with the work from Peter Barnes on reclaiming the commons and allocating rights to pollute which can be traded.

The general feeling on the housing market is that the boom is coming to an end but that it has been justified by low interest rates and the ability to ringfence losses from geared rental properties. I should add to this that migration and willingness to pay higher prices than locals has also contributed to the excessive rise in house prices. The banks have played their part in happily lending the required amounts and no doubt will be the first ones to notice any pullback from investors. This seems to have already started.

I would like to have seen some papers on behavioural economics as i think that is starting to build as an interesting field alongside new wave areas like neuroeconomics.

Economist is a dirty word in NZ due to the long hangover from the economic revolution of the 80s but i can report they are a good bunch….really

Tags: climate change, economics, externalities, new zealand, policy ideas