The writer and anthropologist was the keynote speaker at the Women of Influence Forum 2018 held in Auckland on Tuesday.

She said working environments based on short-term contracts, often poorly paid, where the risks and costs are thrown onto those who actually make institutions and businesses work, and where managers are expected to minimise costs and maximise profits at their expense are now commonplace.

"This is neo-liberal philosophy in action, and I consider it toxic, and a tragedy for women.

Salmond said when young couples try to buy a house and raise a family, they face relatively high fixed costs, with incomes that are often insecure and relatively low.

This was tough on relationships and closely linked with many negative social indicators, she said.

Salmond said workplaces are often set to suit the habits of those who have wives at home, looking after the children and cooking the meals.

"Women may be forced to choose between their deepest dreams and desires - taking care of a sick child, or attending an important meeting."

Salmond thinks the balance between collective benefit and private gain in New Zealand has tipped far too far in the direction of self-interest.

It shows up in our rates of suicide, family violence and many other negative social indicators she said.

"In a recent study based on interviews with 1000 young people, for instance, they identified economic insecurity, unaffordable housing, student debt and insecure low paid work as significant contributors to their anxiety and stress."

She said New Zealand needs to return to more relational ways of thinking, in which the freedoms and responsibilities of men and women are more finely balanced.

Read the whole speech

Source

• stuff.co.nz
• Image: Stuff.co.nz

"Any expectation that we just simply allow that the market to dictate our outcomes for people is where I would want to make sure that we were more interventionist," Ardern told Radio New Zealand.

So what is neoliberalism?

As colleague Henry Cooke put it: "neoliberalism traditionally describes the political shift in the 1980s towards privatisation of government services, a focus on individual freedoms over collective good, and a general glorification of market principles".

Laissez-faire (let them do as they choose) was in, and intervention became something of a dirty word.

As well as rewarding individual toil, proponents believed that greater wealth creation by some would, as if by magic, trickle down to the less fortunate, and on average people would be better off.

Plenty argue it came off the boil in the 1990s and has never really recovered. Some on the Right claim a neoliberal agenda exists only in the minds of the Left, used as a term of disparagement.

When did it arrive in New Zealand?

While the Closer Economic Relations treaty between New Zealand and Australia came into force in 1983 (the significance of which is often overlooked in market reform terms), New Zealanders generally agree the 1984-90 Labour Government was the real start of neoliberalism.

Subsidies were broadly eliminated from most industries, dozens of state-owned companies were sold and the financial sector underwent major market reforms, including the free floating of the dollar.

GST of 10 per cent was slapped on the cost of practically everything and the top income tax rate, of 66 cents in the dollar, was halved over two years.

Later, under National, labour relations saw dramatic changes with the Employment Contracts Act, passed in 1990. Welfare payments were cut. University fees were hiked and have risen since. Continue reading

Sources

• Stuff article by Hamish Rutherford, Wellington business bureau chief at Fairfax Media
• Image: Independent Australia