Three-quarters of the way through the Government's financial year its revenue continues to grow steadily while spending has hardly increased at all.

The government kept a smaller operating deficit than forecast in the first nine months of the financial year, even as the cost of the Canterbury earthquakes grew.

The Government says there are 29,000 fewer Kiwis receiving benefits since the last quarter - including hundreds who had theirs cut after being caught claiming them unfairly.

We can expect some scary numbers when the Treasury updates its statement on the long-term fiscal position this year, writes Brian Fallow.

The New Zealand government had a smaller operating deficit than expected in the first eight months of the financial year as it took in more income tax than it had forecast.

New Zealand's research and development spend rose to $2.6b last year but remains far below many other OECD countries as a proportion of GDP.

Half of the $21.4 million spent on SuperGold Card public transport last year was in Auckland, although it is home to only one quarter of the country's senior citizens.

The news the Govt is looking to reduce access to certain elective surgical procedures is likely to raise the blood pressure of many across the country, writes Dr Justin Vaughan.

Economists and psychologists have long been engaged in understanding behaviour when compromise and self-interest collide, writes Ananish Chauduri.

Editorial: Ultimately, this revenue-raising exercise may be less significant than the check on the Government's spending programme.

Editorial: When the Children's Commissioner set up an "expert advisory group on solutions to child poverty" this year, many New Zealanders will have cheered.

For the past two years a gleeful band of Eurosceptics in the Anglo-US political establishment have been arguing that the euro cannot survive.

Bratty middle-class me got my knickers in a twist when I had my resident's carpark taken away - boo hoo.

Most agree that the kiwi is overvalued and some say the solution is for the Reserve Bank to cut interest rates. But two differing perspectives argue it's not that simple. Add your comment to the debate.

The battle over public funding for our major orchestras has all the ingredients of comic opera, if not farce.

Civil servants' 'roaming' fees on phones costing public $800,000.