Northland Age
  • Northland Age home
  • Latest news
  • Sport
  • Rural
  • Opinion
  • Kaitaia weather

Subscriptions

  • Herald Premium
  • Viva Premium
  • The Listener
  • BusinessDesk

Sections

  • Latest news
  • Sport
  • Rural
    • All Rural
    • Dairy farming
    • Sheep & beef farming
    • Horticulture
    • Animal health
    • Rural business
    • Rural life
    • Rural technology

Locations

  • Far North
  • Kaitaia
  • Kaikohe
  • Bay of Islands
  • Whangārei

Weather

  • Kaitaia
  • Whangārei
  • Dargaville

NZME Network

  • Advertise with NZME
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • BusinessDesk
  • Newstalk ZB
  • Sunlive
  • ZM
  • The Hits
  • Coast
  • Radio Hauraki
  • The Alternative Commentary Collective
  • Gold
  • Flava
  • iHeart Radio
  • Hokonui
  • Radio Wanaka
  • iHeartCountry New Zealand
  • Restaurant Hub
  • NZME Events

SubscribeSign In

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Home / Northland Age

Letter to the Editor Thursday June 19, 2014

Northland Age
18 Jun, 2014 08:59 PMQuick Read

Subscribe to listen

Access to Herald Premium articles require a Premium subscription. Subscribe now to listen.
Already a subscriber?  

Listening to articles is free for open-access content—explore other articles or learn more about text-to-speech.
‌
Save
    Share this article

Smoke and mirrors

Mike Sabin's column keeps telling us how Northland is surging ahead, and seems to be an on-going story in his past few columns. I am sure that we will be having street parties soon to celebrate the new prosperous Northland.

His boss John has just written to me to tell me how well-off my wife and I are compared with 2008. In 2008 we used to shop at Pak'nSave and our fortnightly shopping included meat and six bottles of wine (we used to drink in those days), and the bill was never higher than $180.

Now we do our fortnightly shop and the bill is generally about $220 (no meat, no wine). So the fact that our pension has increased since 2008 does not alter the fact that our dollar buys less.

I suppose the government works on the theory that if you repeat a story often enough it will eventually become true.

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

I would be interested to know how many people in the Far North think that they are doing really well financially, or does Northland finish at Whangarei?

LES STILL

Cooper's Beach

Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.
Save
    Share this article

Latest from Northland Age

Northland Age

'Significant risk to our communities': Police hunt stolen firearms after Kāeo burglary

18 Sep 02:06 AM
Northland Age

Board dissolved at Northland College as commissioner takes over

17 Sep 05:00 PM
Northland Age

Far North News in Briefs: Kaitāia Girl Guides do their bit, photography exhibition at Proctor Library

17 Sep 04:00 PM

Sponsored

Kiwi campaign keeps on giving

07 Sep 12:00 PM
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.

Latest from Northland Age

'Significant risk to our communities': Police hunt stolen firearms after Kāeo burglary
Northland Age

'Significant risk to our communities': Police hunt stolen firearms after Kāeo burglary

The guns and two vehicles were taken from a rural Kāeo property between September 4-14.

18 Sep 02:06 AM
Board dissolved at Northland College as commissioner takes over
Northland Age

Board dissolved at Northland College as commissioner takes over

17 Sep 05:00 PM
Far North News in Briefs: Kaitāia Girl Guides do their bit, photography exhibition at Proctor Library
Northland Age

Far North News in Briefs: Kaitāia Girl Guides do their bit, photography exhibition at Proctor Library

17 Sep 04:00 PM


Kiwi campaign keeps on giving
Sponsored

Kiwi campaign keeps on giving

07 Sep 12:00 PM
NZ Herald
  • About NZ Herald
  • Meet the journalists
  • Newsletters
  • Classifieds
  • Help & support
  • Contact us
  • House rules
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms of use
  • Competition terms & conditions
  • Our use of AI
Subscriber Services
  • The Northland Age e-edition
  • Manage your print subscription
  • Manage your digital subscription
  • Subscribe to Herald Premium
  • Subscribe to The Northland Age
  • Gift a subscription
  • Subscriber FAQs
  • Subscription terms & conditions
  • Promotions and subscriber benefits
NZME Network
  • The Northland Age
  • The New Zealand Herald
  • The Northern Advocate
  • Waikato Herald
  • Bay of Plenty Times
  • Rotorua Daily Post
  • Hawke's Bay Today
  • Whanganui Chronicle
  • Viva
  • NZ Listener
  • Newstalk ZB
  • BusinessDesk
  • OneRoof
  • Driven Car Guide
  • iHeart Radio
  • Restaurant Hub
NZME
  • About NZME
  • NZME careers
  • Advertise with NZME
  • Digital self-service advertising
  • Photo sales
  • NZME Events
  • © Copyright 2025 NZME Publishing Limited
TOP