Hosking and Brash

It is somehow appropriate that in today’s Herald, Mike Hosking, in his anxiety to pin the blame for inflation on the government, should ignore the evidence from around the world of world-wide inflation rates and supply-side constraints occasioned by the pandemic and the Ukraine war, and should go further – by calling in aid the former Governor of the Reserve Bank, Don Brash.

Brash, it might be recalled, was a major player in subjecting this country to Rogernomics and “the mother of all budgets”. He also distinguished himself by repeatedly demonstrating in the pages of the Herald that he was completely ignorant on the question of what money is and where it comes from – even to the point of disputing and even (so far as one could tell), refusing to read, a detailed paper produced by the Bank England, which set out precisely how the banks create money out of nothing, principally by lending on mortgage.

As both Hosking and Brash demonstrate, virtually any position is tenable – if your starting point is unassailable ignorance.