The NZCTU’s view is that “New Zealand’s future productivity to 2050” is a worthwhile topic for the upcoming long-term insights briefing.
It is important that Ministers, social partners, and the New Zealand public are aware of the current and potential productivity challenges and opportunities we face and the potential choices that we can make to address them. The most valuable contribution the proposed LTIB could make is to present an analysis of the trade-offs involved in the different strategic choices that we face as a country – for example, the cost in foregone productivity gains that a failure to invest in modernising transport infrastructure may incur. We continue to lack a mature discussion on these issues in New Zealand, and this LTIB can make a positive contribution to changing that.