New Zealander here. Out of all the problems a country could have, 'too many tourists' seems like an awfully good one.
I'm sure it's more complicated than this, but from a naive perspective, putting a higher tax on tourism activities for non citizens seems like a solid solution with no obvious pitfall.
First of all, I assume you meant to say non-residents, rather than non-citizens.
Second, the obvious pitfall here is that tourists don't like feeling like they are visiting a tourist trap, and openly charging them different prices makes it seem like one. I've visited plenty of sites that charge significantly more for non-citizens (in India, in this case) and it feels more exploitative than paying a fee in a country that does not do this. Some museums in Spain, for instance, reach a middle ground by providing free admission to EU citizens during a low-traffic time of the week.
I'm sure he did mean to include, here in NZ there's little difference, for example everyone gets to vote (no taxation without representation after all).
Charging for public goods is very un-kiwi, even for visitors ... it also means having to pay for people to collect the money (in the US that person in the little hut collecting fees when you enter a public park) .... probably something more indirect like a hotel tax would be culturally more acceptable
I like Sweden's compromise. Only citizens can vote in the national elections, but non-citizen residents can vote in local elections (after they've lived in sweden for 3 years)
So you're fine with many foriegn-raised citizens who have weak cultural ties to the country being able to vote as soon as they move there, but residents who have lived in the country for years not being able to until they qualify for typically intense citizenship by naturalization timelines and delays?
I'm just trying to point out that citizenship is in many cases effectively arbitrary if a country is trying to protect its cultural and social values.
Is it true that gardening is illegal in NZ? I've heard of a ban on it, but I couldn't imagine a place where your not allowed to grow some carrots, rosemary, strawberries, tomatoes, etc. Its one of the few things that draws me outside in the summer.
Lots in the States too, usually at regional parks with low traffic. It's not worth it to station someone there, and the people visiting are generally the types who care enough about the livelihood of the parks to attempt to pay. You fill out an envelope and tear off a paper tag to stick on your dashboard as a receipt. In reality, rangers rarely come and audit parking lots for slips, but again it usually actually works.
The modern art gallery MONA in Tasmania charges for admittance, unless you're a resident of Tasmania. I've never heard anyone complain about unfair treatment there. The kind of tourist who would consider that a deal-breaker would probably be the kind of low-quality tourist you wouldn't want anyway.
A tourist trap isn't "you're charged more than the locals", a tourist trap is "you're charged for crap".
Last time I was in the British Museum (about 15 years ago I think) there was just a huge glass box in the foyer where you could put a donation. I don't know how much of the costs it covers but I saw quite a few people put substantial amounts of money in there. I paid five pounds and had a rather pricey snack in the café as well. No queue to get in.
Perhaps we have somewhat different definitions for the term. I have heard many refer to "tourist traps" or similar when talking about a store that overcharged them compared to a local, for example. I don't mean to cause confusion by the expression I used, which is why I tried to explain my justification.
>> charge significantly more for non-citizens (in India, in this case)
Out of curiosity, in India specifically, are the prices targeted at tourists truly exploitive, or are they simply in line with what we can afford in terms of currency exchange? There is a vast gap between "prices are ridiculous, even for tourists", vs. "the tourist is paying more than locals, but they're still getting a bargain or similar to what they'd pay back home".
As a tourist, I don't care if I'm being singled out and paying "reasonable prices based on my wealth". I'm smart enough to "nope out of" paying $100 USD for something that should be $20 USD, but I'm not going to complain because a native is trying to earn a decent wage in their poor economy (eg: $100 USD vs. $70 USD).
At last check, visiting (say) the Taj Mahal cost tourists 10x more than locals - but it was still only around US$10. So "exploitative" would be a stretch.
Visiting Bhutan, on the other hand, incurs fees of at least US$150/day. While justified in terms of minimising impact etc, one politically convenient side effect is to ensure that tourists never interact with anybody not employed by a five-star hotel or visit places without them.
$10 to visit the Taj Mahal - oh my God, so exploitive! That's the sort of thing I was thinking of. It really isn't exploitative at all. Should it technically be free? Yes, but no first world visitor is going to be put out of their way for $10. shrug
Of course, there is a huge difference between making your own way to a tourist trap, vs. being "guided" there. One should always be prepared to be scammed if one is paying someone just to travel to a given destination, vs. paying to actually enter that location by the authoritative body at an official entrance. If you're not paying someone at a physical barricade to the location, you're being scammed. Not too hard to understand.
There's also the informal tax that a tourist would pay. I've even traveled there with someone that is a non-resident Indian (NRI) and he joked with me that while I was getting "ripped off" at one rate, he still wasn't getting the local rate, but "ripped off" a little less. Honestly, the ripped off part came to a few rupees here or there for the most part.
Many tourist towns in New Zealand do the same thing.
By the way, if you're going tramping in New Zealand, then join the New Zealand Alpine Club. They run a separate system of accomodation for the serious outdoors people. In many of these places, there is a simple and cheap NZAC lodge tucked away in a quiet spot about 5 minutes walk from the overcrowded tourist hostels.
I'm not asserting it wouldn't work well, but I just wanted to add my personal experience from the few times I have experienced it. Thanks for informing me about the Hawai'i discount, though.
Eh...not really. Imagine an economy that was really dependent on tourism. Now imagine that tourism disappears for any reason. That economy is screwed. Tourism can play a positive role in an economy, but only up to a certain point. If your economy can't function without tourism, then you're in a bad spot.
I travelled through New Zealand for many months, and there were parts that I loved about the country. There were also parts that I really didn't like that seemed to be all about a culture which exists there which sees travellers as easy to take advantage of.
As a hiker, I was lumped into a category of travellers called "backpackers," which created frequent distress. The street crime is very real. I was victim of an attempted robbery (luckily I got out on the better end of it, somehow), being charged different prices from locals, being given an enormous fine for sleeping in my car when I was sick and tired with a broken phone, and felt it was unsafe to drive any further. I also found erroneous over-charges on my credit card from two NZ businesses that I spent countless hours disputing until they were removed, and spent many nights in shabby, unprofessional hostels with undesirable staff.
The whole thing was a lot different than my experience backpacking around Europe when I was younger.
However, the nature is really incredible, and relatively unspoiled. There is so much to see in such short distances, and it's one of the best places in the world for hiking. The international culture is wonderful. I made friends from all around the world. Some NZ'ers are incredibly friendly: I was invited into people's homes, given meals and I hitch hiked around the South Island without any incident or problem (I somewhere read (cannot verify) a conspiracy theory that hitch hiking in the US was always relatively safe, but the CIA/FBI created a campaign against it).
That said, many of the most famous and attractive places to visit in NZ were overwhelmingly packed with tourists. Milford Sound in February felt like I was in Beijing. Tongariro was swarmed with too many tourists doing the crossing, all lining up in file one-behind-the-other. Wanaka and Queenstown were a disaster, just too many people.
The worst problems were not even in the Bloomberg article. All of them seemed to have stemmed from working class New Zealanders who had hard-working lives that saw backpackers as an easy target.
There is no anti-tourist feelings in New Zealand at all. You were just experiencing New Zealand like a local. It's an expensive country with not many people. If a shop can price gouge because of no competition it will. Customer service is terrible in general and you might be overcharged.
A "backpacking" is a traveler that's seen positively In New Zealand. Most NZs have gone traveling with a backpack at some point in their lives.
I agree that one case isn't representative of what's happening in general, but it's a bit ironic that you counter their view with evidence also drawn from a single case (your own experience).
Are you being straight up honest? You've been robbed or burglarized at least four times in 22 years, living in four different residences, while living in four separate cities? The odds of that having happened are infinitesimally unlikely. Do you walk around your neighborhood, flaunting the fact you are a millionaire, while living in the poorest districts? Your situation cannot be representative of the norm; you sound like someone who is embellishing, flat out lying, or unnecessarily putting yourself in a position to become a victim. There's just no way your luck is "randomly" that bad.
Edit: I've read your history. You clearly indulge with every comment. You have not been robbed 4 times in 22 years in New Zealand. Pathological liar, you should be ashamed. This is HackerNews, not Reddit - people are not going to give you 1,000 sympathetic upvotes for your invented sob story.
It's like you think crime doesn't exist in New Zealand. Living in Devonport I used to see the local kids climb on the roof of the school and un-screw the light domes off the roof of the hallways and climb in. Or see them get their little brother to climb into the clothing donation bins and pull empty out all the clothes.
Living in Glenfield we used to have washing stolen off the line all the time so we would dry clothes in-doors.
Come home to the back door open with the glass smashed and items taken.
People keep trying to paint NZ as this pretty picture when it's not.
Believe what you want, but Auckland is full of crime. It's full of corruption.
Edit: and in all those area's, my family wasn't the only victims.
> Do you walk around your neighborhood, flaunting the fact you are a millionaire, while living in the poorest districts?
Considering my parents moved out of Auckland because they could no longer afford to live there, there wasn't anything to flaunt. Nor were those 'poor' suburbs.
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Also. Those are not cities, they are suburbs in a single city. Auckland.
>> It's like you think crime doesn't exist in New Zealand.
No, I just find it extremely unlikely for a single family to have been targeted in four separate cities. I firmly believe that any burglar deserves life in jail for their first crime, and tend to try not to blame victims for being targeted, but... 4 times across 4 cities, averaging once every 5-6 years? That doesn't sound legit whatsoever, unless the family is doing something to paint a target on their backs.
>> we used to have washing stolen off the line all the time so we would dry clothes in-doors
I mean no disrespect - frankly it's better for the environment and I would normally applaud - but in this modern age using an outdoor clothesline is a sign of poverty, meaning you at least lived in a poor neighborhood where outdoor drying was common. I would bet that you displayed some indication to your poor neighbors that you were not as poor as them. Maybe you're hanging $30-per-pair of designer underwear on your line while they are hanging $1 budget underwear from Walmart on theirs. You probably own a middle-class brand new car, > $30k off the dealership's lot, compared to their < $500 third-hand vehicle that barely gets them from point A to point B. The moment a poor neighbor living off welfare knows you are even slightly beyond their means, you WILL become their target. You might have been hanging clothes outside (ie: "possibly poor"), but you've shown otherwise that you have more money than someone who must hang their laundry outdoors to make ends meet. There is a perceivable difference between hanging clothes outdoors as an optional luxury, vs. being forced into doing so by being at a financial disadvantage.
Source: only been burglarized once and it was while I was earning an above-average income, while living in a poor neighborhood. I know it was my neighbor who couldn't even afford to have electricity hooked up, and they saw me leaving to work every morning with my laptop case. It's unfortunate and disgusting, but yes - if you live in a poor area with more money and possessions than your neighbors, they will notice and make a victim out of you.
tldr; While you were living in a below-average income neighborhood, most likely working for a living while your neighbors lived on free welfare, you found them stealing from you? Forget your sense of basic entitlement and privacy for a moment; quite simply, am I right or wrong? Again, I'm not insulting you for your likely "above average" situation at the time. I'm merely trying to gauge against my own experience, which is that you will become a victim if you live amongst those who are poorer than you.
Can we be clear that these 4 homes were probably within 15km of each other. They are Suburbs in Auckland City. On the North Shore, which is probably considered the richer part of Auckland.
> but in this modern age using an outdoor clothesline is a sign of poverty
I don't know about the rest of the world, but even in 2017 it's still very common in NZ to hang laundry outside. Most people own houses with a back yard.
My parents no longer live in Auckland, the house they live in has a huge front yard and back yard, even tho they own a washer and a drier, mum prefers to hang washing outside, because it prevents the clothes from shrinking from the heat of the drier, and I quote (cos I rang her today to clarify why she dries her clothes outside) "it prevents burning the smell of soap into the clothes so they don't smell like soap"
> While you were living in a below-average income neighborhood, most likely working for a living while your neighbors lived on free welfare, you found them stealing from you?
Those Suburbs are on the North Shore, the 'poor' / 'low income' suburbs are in South / West Auckland. I doubt you would find many people at all on the north shore who are on the dole.
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Look, New Zealand is a beautiful country, with amazing people, it's my home. But our government sucks, and is pretty corrupt despite what the corruption index tells you. Every 3 years we change government, and its full of promises, and they never deliver. There is so much the government could do to make it worth while for Kiwi's to stay in the country, let alone convince people to move there to start businesses or work. But they continue to hinder the country. I left 11 years ago, and every time I go back it's more and more depressing in Auckland.
I have been robbed at least 4 times, all of which was in Hamilton's various suburbs. Mostly taking things from my garage, 5 bikes, 3 scooters. Stereo and speakers ripped out of my car, my sister had her motor scooter stolen. I have friends that were literally robbed while they are at home in another room, they snuck in and took a Macbook, another laptop and a phone. It happens...
So you're driving scooters (not even one scooter... 3 of them!) around in, let me guess, a poor neighborhood where the average household can barely afford food on their welfare and food stamps, while you manage to have scooters and 5 (let me guess, >= $400 per unit) bikes?! Your friend had a high-end MacBook, other computer(s), and expensive phone(s) - all while their neighbors can't afford a 13 inch CRT television?
Again, I don't mean to make excuses for the criminals. But when you live in a neighborhood whereby you clearly have access to more money and possessions than your neighbors, those neighbors will take advantage. Never live "beyond your means" in daily life compared to your rent. That is my experience. If you cheap out on rent, while using your disposable income to buy fancy things, your neighbors will make a victim out of you.
If you can afford a $3,000 MacBook, you have no business paying < $1,000/month rent. Oh sure, you have the right to do so, and you should be legally protected against such attacks. But that's not how the reality of the world works. Medium (or nearly medium) income households who show off they are living above the wealth of their neighbors, will never live harmoniously among the poor who can't afford the same level of comfort. Fact of life.
If you are going to live in a poor neighborhood, you had better act poor. The moment you step out of your cheap-ass apartment wearing a suit and carrying a laptop, jumping onto a scooter or $50k car instead of a < $100 bike or < $500 used car, you've instantly made yourself an easy target.
It is unreal to me that there's some "NZ has a robbery problem" thread here - of all the things one could come up with or complain about NZ I'm baffled that anything crime-related could be on the (otherwise tiny) list!
What I find a bit strange is that there's a number of people making claims about crime levels, yet they're all basing their claims on personal experience, and seemingly haven't thought to check if there were statistics available online. Just searching for (sans quotes) "new zealand crime statistics" these were among the first few results:
New Zealand's government isn't required to report accurate statistics.
There was a controversial interview about this in the last couple of years. One side was arguing 'what's the point in transparency? It is just going to scare people of moving to places that we are trying to rebuild.'
Get to the ground level in NZ. Walk through Christchurch at night. You have a good chance of a bad encounter, unless you're a stacked dude with quite a bit of muscle on you.
> New Zealand's government isn't required to report accurate statistics.
"isn't required" tells me nothing of how accurate the statistics are.
> Get to the ground level in NZ. Walk through Christchurch at night.
this isn't going to give an accurate picture of what crime levels are in general there or any other place in New Zealand.
Anyway, I have no stake in any of this - I'm not one of the people in this thread who were making any claims about the levels of crime (whether low, medium or high) in NZ.
Yes, in the most trivial possible sense a sample size of 1 can tell you something. But the fact that there are robberies was never in doubt. What value did you think your comment was offering?
I've never been to NZ but I was robbed once. Therefore, the evidence suggests you have greater likelihood of getting robbed if you've never been to NZ, since most who have been there have not been robbed.
Hitchhiking is pretty safe for some slices of the population. Riskier (but probably still safeish for others). 6'2" white dude with a few lbs of muscle -- safer. Small individual who someone might try to take advantage of? Less safe, but I bet the driving is riskier than anything else that might happen. I have hitched backed to my car a few times after trekking on the AT. Many hikers rely on hitching to get around.
Well, I have never been anything other than white, but I gather it is easiest to be white in America. You are much more likely to be picked up and treated well in some parts of rural America. (Rural america is usually next door to the wilderness I have experience hitchhiking in, etc.)
I've been travelling on a road trip in NZ for the last month or so (with a few more weeks to go). Even now, tail end of the summer season, the country is packed.
I like to drive around with just a rough route, see a place I like and stop for a while, but that just hasn't been possible if I want somewhere comfortable to sleep. Motels are mostly very small (6-12 rooms) so there's not a lot of availability. I've had to book in advance (and have a super-flexible route, skipping some full towns and even regions) to be able to get anything at all.
There's chronic under-investment in hotels and motels. It doesn't look like much (outside the cities) has been built since the 60's and 70's. It's like if the US never built Holiday Inn Expresses, Hampton Inns and so on and was just relying on mom-and-pop downtown motels to house everybody, or if there were no Premier Inns in the UK and it was still just seaside B&B's.
That does give what little accommodation there is more character with a more personal service, but it's still mostly poor quality and a tiny number of rooms. With some motels (luckily a minority) it's been clear that the near 100% occupancy all the time means they just don't care, somebody will rent the room however bad it is.
I don't think it would be much different with a motorhome or camping, official campsites look full and unofficial campsites are everywhere (and many of those campers do trash the place, giving campers and tourists a bad name and building some real dislike of them in the country).
There are also a few high-profile cases of tourists driving on the wrong side of the road (or just badly) and causing accidents and deaths.
The growing (and very understandable) anti-tourist feeling in NZ should correct the problem in the long run, as tourists feel less welcome and tell their friends that.
It would have been better if the government funding for attracting people to NZ (too fast) had instead been spent on infrastructure (including help with building brand-new motels).
Unless I'm missing your point I think that unspoiled natural feeling is the appeal.
It's still a little wild but not dangerous.
Why bother going there if it's just another strip of Hard Rock cafes, Holiday Inns, Tourist shops selling wallaby trinkets?
You could just save the plane ticket and go to Hawaii instead.. if motels and Hard Rock Cafes are what you want.
And that's what American developers will turn it into....evidenced by...every culturally exploited tourist city in America.
Because capitalism is most profitable catering to the lowest common denominator spring break middle American hordes who prefer the safety and comfort of an Applebees and Holiday Inn over the possible discomfort of something unpredictable.
Seriously, Hawaii and Cozumel have everything you're looking for.
I think you are being rather unfair to the poster. I don't think (s)he is advocating an American style system exist in NZ; only that traveling is made much harder by the lack of it (and exactly how that is made difficult).
In fact, I think the "mom and pop" shops could do a win-win by investing in expanding capacity and providing better service to tourists.
Of course, that is slightly difficult if they don't want tourists. But in that case, it should be made clear to visitors...don't dupe them into coming to your country and then provide terrible service just because you can get away with it.
BTW America is not a "wasteland" by any means. Sure, there are many parts that are like that, but there are an equal number of incredibly beautiful natural sanctuaries. Actually I'm not even sure what you mean by that term.
Ya know, America is a huge place. We have vast tracts of unspoiled nature larger than many New Zealands put together. Sorry if this sounds defensive but it is. I think parent gets it, but for anyone who thinks tourism in America is only some consumer mass product... that is just wrong. The scope of America's wilderness is staggering. It always amuses me when "people" think they have to leave the country to see some unspoiled wilderness.
We didn't really have a culture of summer travelling and staying in hotels, or even usually motels - I grew up camping with my parents, and occasionally staying in a camping ground (most small towns have one) that means hot showers and a tent or cabin (bring a sleeping bag) - as the article says we have had a sudden influx as the GFC retreats ... we're also seeing a lot of Chinese visitors who used to only take block bookings in hotels from coach tours and now are becoming more adventurous and travelling by themselves like you are.
Really as a rule we don't have a problem with "freedom camping" - it's what I grew up doing, a very kiwi thing - and many (I think most) people would like to encourage it ... except for the problem with foreign freedom campers not cleaning up after themselves (if you are planning on crapping on the side of the road please bring a chemical toilet)
I was in South Island for a fortnight a month ago, rented a people carrier with a mattress in the back, and went hiking all over the shop.
Some places and campsites were heaving - but in others, we saw nobody for days at a time, staying in the very well maintained DoC huts which dot the mountains.
Up near Arthur's pass, for instance, all of the listed DoC camp sites were crowded and in pretty unpleasant locations - but if you're prepared to tramp for five hours over rough terrain, fording rivers and what not, you get the mountains and the huts to yourselves. Crow hut stands out as a "I can't believe nobody else wants to come here" moment.
In Franz Josef, we eschewed a glacier hike and instead tramped up Alex Knob - saw maybe a dozen others doing the same - but looking back at the glacier through binoculars was like looking at ants on a cake.
Following this we went to East Antarctica, and saw nary a soul - but then you get to the peninsula and it's like a bad day on the M25.
I dare say part of the issue here is distribution of tourists and their activities - for whatever reason (reviews? recommendations? advertising? "If it's free it must be bad"?) people tend to go where other people already are, and don't go to those places which are less frequented.
The only place that felt oppressively busy was Queenstown on our first night, where we stayed in a £250/night fleapit motel.
Sustainability in tourism isn't just an NZ problem, it's global and growing - and it's not just about infrastructure, but also at what point does the popularity of a locale cause such crowding that it becomes unappealing and self-destructs?
Oh, and I write this from Ushuaia, which exists these days largely due to the tourist trade and likewise seems to be struggling to keep up with demand growth - new developments are springing up on the outskirts while city centre frontage sits abandoned, and locals mutter about water shortages.
Not only that, but it seems many travel solely to take a selfie in the same spot as 10,000,000 others have, without actually stopping to take in the view.
But then, many went on grand tours not to have experiences, but to be able to say they had, so little has changed other than accessibility.
It still seems like one of those "good problems". Hotels and guides will be able to charge more. Government should definitely look at park fees based on usage and investing in infrastructure.
Speaking as someone who grew up in New Zealand - and like most kiwis, spent a great deal of time tramping, camping, and otherwise enjoying the public parks - any tpye of entrance fee to those places would be a huge shift in culture.
Easy and free access (notwithstanding taxpayer funding) to publicly owned parks is something I regard as a birthright. User-pays might sound sensible and fair but I can guarantee you that a large part of NZ's population will choose not to visit the parks instead of paying a fee (even if it is very small). Many of them wouldn't be making that choice themselves (e.g. the children of poor families). For them to miss out on what is an essential part of growing up and living in NZ would be a very bad thing.
Besides, when this was last suggested a month or two ago t was touted as a solution to the Department of Conservation's funding shortfall for maintaining the most popular 'great walks'. That shortfall was said to be around $1.5m - less than the cost of many tourism campaigns.
Speaking as almost your antipode, from a country with similar culture that has a lot of tourism, I'd like it if the people on tourist visas in my country paid access fees to similar places and we'd understand that my taxes go in part to paying my equivalent fee.
It costs something to maintain access to these places. It's fair that the people who see them help support that.
our tourist visas are free at the border for many countries - for a lot of our visitors (Oz, Canada, US, UK) you pass through a machine, never talk to a person (well except for the ag inspection)
I think from the NZ public's point of view the biggest problem is not this, it's 'freedom campers' crapping everywhere - people camping on the side of the road - which we mostly don't mind, but who don't bring toilet facilities with them, and don't bother to seek out public facilities.
Here's a local newspaper story from this week about a woman crapping in the street in the local tech precinct - 2 blocks from a public toilet in one direct, 2 blocks from a gas station in the other:
> “If we don’t fix these things and look to the long term, we’ll be putting a cap on our own growth,”
It always saddens me when I see comments that assume unlimited growth is a good thing - and not an opportunity to consider the pros and cons of managing growth, especially of things like tourism.
We've all been to places that are 'unspoiled' and can understand the interest in keeping them that way. We've also all been to places that are almost exclusively populated by tourists. I'm sure some people enjoy the sensation of being in those places (vendors perhaps) but anecdotally I find it rare that people rate those experiences higher than the former, or wish to revisit those types of places. This suggests we have an understanding of the value of controlling tourism growth.
One of NZ's most famous walks - the Milford Track - already has some significant constraints (presumably to maximise the walkers' enjoyment and to minimise the damage to the environment). During the season, you can only walk the track in one direction, maximum 40 people are allowed to set off each day, etc.
The headline above says "Too Many People Are Going to New Zealand", but the article is actually about "... Tourists overwhelm New Zealand". Perhaps the title needs flagging, because tourists are only one of three main sources of people going to New Zealand. International students and immigrants also go to NZ, and are both also quite large business sectors. Education, like Tourism, is also one of the top 5 earners for NZ, with many flow-on effects in the economy such as pushing up the cost of rental accommodation. And Immigration (including returning former residents), while officially not national revenue but part of the country's "capital account", is huge, pushing up the prices of houses to astronomical levels, especially in Auckland. We need a story about whether there's too many people going to NZ that deals with all human arrivals in NZ, not just tourists. And I suspect it would reach the same conclusion.
I guess we can thank the LoTR franchise for making New Zealand a 'must visit' place. I've visited (and loved) the North Island a few years back, but never done the South Island.
Last year, a group of us old high school friends wanted to book the Milford Sound 1 week trek to celebrate our 50th year on the planet, but found out it was booked out 2 years in advance! Speaking to people who have done it over the years, it seems that 10 years ago, you could do the walk and never see another soul, but nowadays it seems to be a veritable rush hour jam (a bit like the snake line of climbers on Mt. Everest it would seem).
But I do hope that the economic flow through is good for them. I recall that even on my last trip there, we stayed at B&Bs and Farm stays and in talking to the locals, they were quite negative about the dismal economic conditions. But equally strangely, there seems to be a lot of good startups and IT related companies coming out of NZ over the past 10 years (Xero etc.)
I guess the NZ tourism commission will have to make hay while the sun shines. I live on the edge of Kakadu National Park here, and remember back in the heyday of 'Crocodile Dundee', we had the same huge influx of visitors from all over the world keen to see it, but of late, the demand has fallen significantly, which is probably better for the park, but not for the hotel and safari operators out there. Luckily they didn't overextend their infrastructure investments, which could be a lesson for other countries.
Right but randomly posting in a link to Veblen good on Wikipedia because it's one example of when raising prices doesn't lower demand doesn't mean it's in any way relevant to this discussion. Almost no one would argue that this kind of travel is a Veblen good.
Right. And in some cases, that would be apt, but here it's not because travel is almost never a Veblen good.
> unqualified assertion that raising prices lowers demand
An inverse relationship between price and demand is normal. Veblen goods are noteworthy precisely because they are exceptional. The demand of assertion, then, should fall on the poster of the Wikipedia link.
There might not be a 1:1 relationship between the increase in price and decrease in demand but raise prices high enough and you limit who can possibly even afford it.
With the rollout of the Dreamliner and budget long-haul airlines, I would expect this trend to continue. Even if it is a bubble, would solving this problem not also improve infra for residents?
I guess there is a danger in building facilities that are only useful to tourists. Perhaps they should invest in hotel rooms that are either:
1) clustered near universities so that if tourism does collapse, they can be converted into dorms.
2) Easy to merge two rooms, add some fixtures, and create studio/1bed apartments.
As a Kiwi, what catches my attention about this discussion is that "raising the standard of living" in pure economic terms is still a primary political campaigning tool in NZ.
How do you measure the great things we already have and value that aren't so easily shown on a balance sheet and can't be shown on an emotive graph that trends up towards the right hand side?
The voter supported political agenda (whichever party it comes from) seems to often involve economic activities that don't hold to the long term values of the average Kiwi or the things that the rest of the world love our country for but we're temporarily blinded by the prospect of a shiny new car so make concessions in the short term.
I love the fact that so many people want to come and enjoy our home, but please understand that NZ is this way at least in part because we haven't focussed on growth at all costs. It may not always be this way.
A big factor in auckland at the moment ( especially around the time of this story ) is we have a big housing shortage, it's the start of the university year with many students looking for places to live, and a lot of hotel/motels being used while people look
I visited New Zealand 9 years ago with 2 friends for 3 weeks in late November, early December. We visited on our own both North and South islands with the mandatory ferry crossing from Wellington to Nelson. We stayed in backpackers and drove a few hours a day and did short hikes during the day. I almost liked every bit of it, especially the South island, you can see beautiful and diverse sceneries doing only short distances. Tongariro crossing was already packed.
That being said it is a very long journey from Europe, not sure if I'd go back there again (now that I visited it). For fjords I have been told that the Norway's ones are more impressive. For lakes, pristine forests and glaciers, I preferred the Canada's ones (Banff National park). And for Alpine sceneries, well I know live in South of France and there are comparable sceneries with large plateaus dominated by snowy mountains, it is just wilder in NZ.
By the title "too many people are going to New Zealand", I assumed it was about immigration. NZ seems like a great place to migrate to but the catch is that you need an offer letter from the employer first and there aren't any employers around (at least I am unable to find one) who are gladly hiring overseas candidates.
Employers want you to be physically present at the place of job to give you a job offer, country gives work visa only when employer issues an offer letter. Not sure how that'd work?
Come with 3 months tourist visa after already arranging some job interviews online, then once there go to as many as you can & once you get an offer apply for the work visa.
I did the Tongariro Alpine Crossing track in winter, and it is like as photographed. Apparently in the summer (when you can see the coloured pools) it is super congested - back to back backpackers.
Going skiing in NZ this year. From Australia it is actually cheaper than skiing in Australia, even including flying there.
I think that one of the main problems with the Tongariro Crossing is that there are not a lot of similar hikes (in NZ we say "tramps" and "tramping" for "hikes and "hiking") that attract tourists, so if you're not heading to the South Island it's your only real choice for this sort of trip.
We do have AirBnB here don't we? I wonder how they're doing...
EDIT: It's a serious question. With the rise of tourism, and seemingly lack of accomodation, are they doing any better in NZ than they have in recent years?
they have. First time I went to New Zealand from Canada was in 1983. My Mom bought a year long ticket that allowed her to stop anywhere in the pacific rim in the early 70s. She sold it to someone else after 6 months and stayed in Australia for 6 months to work, then continued on her way through South East Asia.
I paid about $900 for a round the world ticket in 1986. Today they are about the same. So calculating the inflation for $900 in 1986 gives $2000 today.
So, yes the travel was possible before, but it is significantly cheaper now. Average income is also going up [1].
I suspect if you have the money and contacts to buy citizenship, and avoid little things like the residency requirement, then you can probably afford to move all your taxable income to somewhere like Bermuda or the caymans
And thus, if NZ tax laws are anything like US tax laws, the very wealthy have ways of largely avoiding taxes. Chances are, NZ will spend more on infrastructure benefits for Thiel than they will get in tax revenue from him.
well exactly, somehow he bought NZ citizenship without meeting the minimum residency requirement provided for by the law ... that's why it's currently an ongoing political scandal in NZ
Political scandal? Admittedly I don't consume a lot of media, but a quick search of the Herald shows a couple of articles when they broke the story, and then more or less tumbleweeds. Does anyone actually care apart from us tech geeks?
I was born in NZ but the family moved when I was 2. I recently got NZ citizenships by descent for my kids because I want to give them the option to move to there if all hell breaks out in the world. It's probably the last place on earth that one can still drink pure water right out of a lake. I choose not to move back there as an adult due to the isolation but if climate changes or wars happen then this isolation becomes a positive.
>It's probably the last place on earth that one can still drink pure water right out of a lake
Dramatic much? I've done this many times from lakes in the Rocky Mountains in the US. I'm sure there are countless other places where it can be done as well.
There are certainly clear, cold lakes in the Rockies. However, I really wouldn't advise just drinking out of them without filtering or other water treatment. Yeah, you'll probably be fine but there's definitely Giardia and Cryptosporidium in a lot of water sources that look perfectly clean.
http://ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/publish/news/newsroom/1789 is the only significant study that I'm aware of. My interpretation is that risks are substantially over stated for true "back country" sources in the Sierras and likely most other places where you would find drainage areas without significant human impact. I still filter water almost all of the time but I worry less when I can't for one reason or another.
I don't really disagree. I expect that, as a practical matter, it's pretty safe to just drink water in a lot of remote places. That said, I also filter or use iodine even if I don't worry about medical facility cross-contamination procedures a lot of the time :-) It's not a lot of trouble and the consequences of getting an infection are unpleasant.
Look. I have no idea personally. However, conventional wisdom is that it's prudent to treat water. If I were dehydrated and had no treatment options, I'd certainly take my chances and drink apparently clear, clean water. (And have on occasion.) But I wouldn't just set off on the assumption it wasn't necessary either.
Yeah, I grew up in New Zealand, and I kept hearing how we had the "most beautiful country in the world", so somehow I got the impression that no other country had beautiful nature like ours. That's completely untrue. There are countless places in the US, Canada, Europe, and Asia where the nature is absolutely pristine and stunning. Canada actually feels very similar to New Zealand in some places.
Most lakes and streams at high altitude in the Sierras, Cascades, Rockies, etc are safe to drink. Once you're above the tree line you don't have to be worried about giardia because few animals live that high up.
I so wish this were still true, sadly unrestrained conversion of farms to dairy has resulted in many rivers not being swimable, much less drinkable. Sadly the government's recent solution to this problem has been to change the definition of "swimmable" to "makes you ill only 5% of the time"
Unfortunately New Zealand rivers are now very polluted due to the booming dairy industry and relaxed environmental policy. Most rivers are no longer swimmable, let alone drinkable. The clean, green image unfortunately doesn't always line up with reality.
I choose not to move back there as an adult due to the isolation but if climate changes or wars happen then this isolation becomes a positive.
If things get so bad you need a bolthole, how do you plan to get there?
There was another article on HN recently about billionaire preppers... But if the shit hits the fan and you don't also have a plan to take your Learjet's pilot's family with you, what makes you think he'll wait...
I'm sure it's more complicated than this, but from a naive perspective, putting a higher tax on tourism activities for non citizens seems like a solid solution with no obvious pitfall.