The bush is going bust while the cities boom. This seems to be the popular perception of what is often referred to as a rural crisis. Yet it is by no means all doom and gloom. Indeed, the popular view is very damaging to rural and regional interests.

Many New Zealanders mistakenly blame the economic reforms of the 1980s and 1990s for social problems such as family breakdown, unemployment and crime. They should take another look at the 'good old days' without rose-tinted glasses.

Greg Lindsay talks to Helen Hughes. From fifteen years at the World Bank to ten years at the National Centre for Development Studies, Helen Hughes has had a distringuished career in economics as both a practitioner and an academic. In 1985 she was awarded an Order of Australia in recognition of her services to international economics.

How the Media Captures Public Policy: By trying to accomodate the seemingly endless parade of victims in the media, the state extends its grip more and more into the details of daily life.

Political Correctness and Public Finance by Dennis O'Keeffe (The Institute of Economic Affairs, London, 1999.)

Political correctness is not only an affront to commonsense, but also a threat to civil society. Yet it continues to flourish because of the power given to intellectual cliques by state control and funding of the education system.

National and Permanent? The Federal Organisation of the Liberal Party of Australia 1944-1965 By Ian Hancock (Melbourne University Press, 2000.)

The Father of Modern Financial Analysis.

Merton Miller is famous for the M&M theorems that transformed the academic discipline of finance. But his insights are also applicable beyond the traditional domain of corporate finance.