Poverty
About Poverty
How we treat those who are struggling is one of the key markers of a compassionate society. We’re committed to investigating the reality of poverty and deprivation in New Zealand, with the purpose of contributing well-researched policy recommendations that have the potential to transform and redeem the lives of our neighbours who need help.
Most Recent Activity
Recommendations | Defining and measuring what it means to be poor in New Zealand
By Kieran Madden
DEFINITION AND MEASUREMENT Defining Poverty: A definition of poverty cannot capture “everything in the world we don’t like,” as one…
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Defining and measuring what it means to be poor in New Zealand
By Kieran Madden
INTRODUCTION Who is poor? How did they get there, and how has poverty damaged their lives? The first paper in…
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Drawing the Line | Measuring Poverty
By Kieran Madden
Just as there is no one accepted definition of poverty, there is also no one measure of poverty. Measures of…
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The Looking Glass | Defining Poverty
By Kieran Madden
DEFINITIONS Defining poverty is about distinguishing between those who are poor and those who aren’t, and is an exercise in…
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Digging Deeper | Understanding Poverty
By Kieran Madden
Most of us are swimming in ideological waters without even knowing it, and this immersion shapes to some extent how…
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Setting the Scene | The Problem of Poverty
By Kieran Madden
INTRODUCTION How we understand, define, and measure poverty matters. Poverty, especially in developed countries like New Zealand, is complex and…
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Work = wellbeing
By Danielle van Dalen
“Choose a job you love and you’ll never work a day in your life.” This cliché was printed on a…
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Creating poverty-busting opportunites that work for people with disabilities
By Alex Penk
by Alex Penk and Danielle van Dalen This week there’s been a lot of coverage about employment opportunities for people…
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Creating better opportunities for work
By Danielle van Dalen
New Zealand is in the middle of a national conversation on poverty, and yet, despite being over-represented in the poverty…
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Policy Paper: Creating Opportunity
By Danielle van Dalen
People with disabilities are overlooked in the national conversation on poverty and overrepresented in New Zealand’s poverty statistics. They face…
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Two-and-a-half cheers for child poverty bill
By Alex Penk
I was born at the tail-end of Gen X, so I grew up with a pop culture saturated by “fear…
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Mana in Mahi isn’t your average work-for-the-dole scheme
By Kieran Madden
Translated to “strength in work,” Labour’s Mana in Māhī scheme shows real potential to make a difference in the lives…
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Irresponsible lenders on borrowed time
By Julian Wood
While borrowing money at an annualised interest rate of up to 693% wouldn’t appear at the top of anyone’s wish…
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Submission: Child Poverty Reduction Bill
By Kieran Madden
Maxim Institute supports this Bill and proposes amendments to strengthen it. We welcome this Bill and its potential to increase…
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Promises and plans to change poverty in New Zealand
By Kieran Madden
A few weeks ago, my colleague wrote about Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s “courageous move” to introduce the Child Poverty Reduction…
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Labour’s courageous move on poverty
By Jeremy Vargo
Labour’s announcement last week of the Child Poverty Reduction Bill was almost instantly hailed by many as a huge step…
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Discussion Paper: Acknowledging Ability
By Danielle van Dalen
People who are living with a disability are vastly overrepresented in New Zealand’s poverty figures, and 74 percent of those…
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Save Social Investment
By Kieran Madden
National’s Social Investment Approach must stay, but not as we know it. Imagine, for a moment, that policies are cars….
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Investing in people, regardless of return
By Julian Wood
Like the proverbial frog in the slowly heating pot, many of us are blissfully unaware of the change currently going…
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The State must serve
By Kieran Madden
Is the government’s flagship Social Investment approach simply the “incremental privatisation of social services?” When journalist Richard Harman posed this…
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