Bryce is a Senior Fellow at The New Zealand Initiative, and also the Director of the Wellington-based economic consultancy firm Capital Economics. Prior to setting this up in 1997 he was a Director of, and shareholder in, First NZ Capital. Before moving into investment banking in 1985, he worked in the New Zealand Treasury, reaching the position of Director. Bryce holds a PhD in economics from the University of Canterbury and was a Harkness Fellow at Harvard University. He is a Fellow of the Law and Economics Association of New Zealand.
Bryce is available for comment on fiscal issues, our poverty, inequality and welfare research. He also has a strong background in public policy analysis including monetary policy, capital markets research and microeconomic advisory work.
Latest reports:
Walking the path to the next global financial crisis (2021)
Illusions of History: How misunderstanding the past jeopardises our future (2021)
Policy Point: A risky place to do business (2021)
Policy Point: Is climate change a key risk to global financial stability? (2020)
Roadmap for Recovery: Briefing to the Incoming Government (2020)
Pharmac: The right prescription? (2020)
Research Note: Doing whatever it takes with someone else’s money (2020)
Policy Point: FDI: Unjustified Urgency (2020)
Research Note: Deficit spending in a crisis: why there is no such thing as a free lunch (2020)
Research Note: Quantifying the wellbeing costs of Covid-19 (2020)
Research Note: How bad might the lockdown be for jobs and income? (2020)
Work in Progress: Why Fair Pay Agreements would be bad for labour (2019)
Scroll down to read the rest of Bryce's work.
Phone: +64 4 472 5986
Eminent UK economist and Financial Times columnist John Kay reportedly believes that the global financial system is broken and that there is a simple remedy. It is broken because bankers have lost the plot. Read more
Poorly Understood recognises that poverty is a complex and multi-faceted issue. It presents an overview of poverty-related issues: its definitions; its measures; its causes; and its history. Read more
Politics, not finance, is the prime factor stopping local authorities from being more pro-growth and pro-housing. That is a primary conclusion of a report, Local Government: Myths, Facts and Challenges, that The New Zealand Initiative released this week. Read more
Senior Fellow at The New Zealand Initiative, Dr Bryce Wilkinson discusses bamboo scaffolding in Hong Kong, noting some interesting points about risk and wages. Read more
Child abuse is a shameful thing. It occurs to a disquieting degree. Read more
Should the owner of Lochinver Station, the Stevenson Group, have the right to sell it to the Crown at the Shanghai Pengxin bid price of $88 million? In that case, the Crown could (and should) immediately sell the station to the highest bid from a New Zealander. Read more
In March this year, the Prime Minister spoke at our members' retreat in Auckland. Members took the opportunity to express concerns about specific regulatory imposts for which there seemed to be inadequate justification. Read more
Dr Bryce Wilkinson on Radio NZ: Blocked sale of station may worry other investors Read more
Question: Do the likely benefits from the Health & Safety Reform Bill (or any other Bill) exceed the costs? Answer 1: They do if you hire the right economist Answer 2: They do if you assume the benefits are large enough to exceed the costs Public policy decisions have to be made on some basis. Read more
The current issue of Policy Quarterly, published by Victoria University of Wellington, has a special focus on Budget 2015. It kicks off with an article by New Zealand Children's Commissioner, Richard Wills. Read more
Dr Bryce Wilkinson on Radio NZ: Largest foreign investor in NZ revealed. Read more
Dr Bryce Wilkinson of The New Zealand Initiative discusses KPMG's Foreign Direct Investment analysis on TVNZ Breakfast, 17 August 2015. Read more
Central government is squandering billions of dollars of householders’ income. It is doing so simply because it lacks the incentive to assess value for money with sufficient rigour. Read more
This week we released a research report, A Matter of Balance: Regulating Safety. It looked into the costs and benefits of Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment's (MBIE) campaign to reduce workplace injuries from falls from heights of less than 3 metres in residential construction. Read more
The construction industry has made some substantial and laudable moves towards better safety practices. But recent changes in WorkSafe regulations, mandating extensive and expensive scaffolding for roof repairs and new builds adds, indicatively, from two to seven thousand dollars per project. Read more