Survey on New Zealanders’ Attitudes Towards and Knowledge of Macroeconomic Policy Issues: Documentation of Survey Methodology and Descriptive Results

Abstract

This paper provides background information and basic descriptive statistics for a representative survey of the New Zealand population conducted on our behalf by Research New Zealand in May 2016. The survey addresses important fiscal and monetary policy issues, including: (1) public preferences for public debt and fiscal consolidation; (2) awareness of the government’s Fiscal Strategy Report; (3) citizens’ monitoring of and reaction to inflation and their inflation expectation formation; (4) knowledge and support for the Policy Target Agreement between the Reserve Bank of New Zealand and the government; (5) trust in economic institutions; and (6) indicators for (macro)economic literacy, that is, objective and subjective knowledge about variables and institutions relevant for macroeconomic policy.

Keywords: Household survey ∙ New Zealand, Fiscal policy, Public debt, Monetary policy, Public preferences, Economic literacy

JEL Classification: E52, E58, E62, H31, Z18