The Herald is running its annual "mood of the boardroom" survey today, in which they ask a tiny minority of uber-rich top business executives how they think the country should be run, then pretend their opinion counts for more than the other 4 million of us, and unsurprisingly they've found someone to say that "New Zealand should be working like a small business". So, according to our business "leaders" - the people responsible for such stunning business successes as EquitiCorp, Air New Zealand (pre-takeover), and BridgeCorp and its assorted clones - this country should:
- be run at a loss as a tax dodge;
- never have any investment made in it;
- be systematically asset-stripped, and milked for short-term profit rather than long-term yield;
- have a 60% chance of going out of business within 7 years.
"Running the country like a small business" is the absolute last thing we need - and the self-important, self-interested neo-nobility who advise it are the last people we should listen to.
