Thanks so much for this Bryan! Bernard was very good on this one.
Can't afford to subscribe to his substack though. Mainstream media is just hopeless, and now so many have to pay lots to access good journalists, because they are forced to go independent - but it means less and less access also to decent journalism for the masses. Like supermarket issues this is another big deal obviously for everyone in a supposed democracy. Arguably it could be one of the biggest problems, access to decent journalists, and they of course deserve a decent income as well.
I am desperate for a govt who will safe guard this stuff, among other things.
I agree re cost of keeping informed and of the importance of sound journalism. My solution is a paid sub to a couple of substacks and settle for unpaid access to headlines on others. I discovered the other day that one or two commentators are also using Youtube which you can access for free eg our Bryan Bruce, Craig Renney, economist at CTU. Would dearly love to add others but then I would not have any time to do the gardening, housework, cooking, etc!
Yeah, thanks. Thats what I currently do, there are a couple more I would love to subscribe to. My main point though, was access for people to better journalism has now become difficult for people who can't afford any of it, or energy and time to go searching for it. It's like a democratic right has been slowly taken from them. From people that need the information so they become more interested in what's going on really, and also some who can get tricked by the talking points and tropes thrown out in mainstream.
Time for mr Rennie to call it a day methinks also mrs Willis really does need someone to explain economics to her in the same succinct way Bernard does to me, a complete airhead when it comes to these matters (though learning quickly thanks B).
I suspect the idea that the finance minister is acting in ignorance is a bit too charitable. She has history with extreme right ideology and this is just what we should expect from her.
The only way out of this mess is to educate people so they vote to improve the lives of all, and both of you are doing a fine job of that. Thanks again.
Yes, we are fortunate to have some great communicators who can do the depth stuff. Right wing ideas are permeating everywhere - by osmosis is what Brayan has said - so I think there is a challenge for all of us to push back and interrupt them when we can - maybe not as eloquently, but as best we can. I am just so grateful that Bryan and co provide us the encouragement and facts to do that.
Please can we have Bernard Hickey doing all govt budgets from now on - he makes far more sense than they do.
This was a budget for billionaires & millionaires & must have been very pleasing to govt. donors. A budget aimed towards more privatisation - because there's money to be made from desperately ill & dying people; there's money to be made from prisons, there's money to be made from education...any minute now, these people will realise that there's also money to be made from the funeral industry.
This budget is nothing short of cruel; its difficult to be sure whether that was deliberate or due to ignorance. But in view os their actions so far, I'm leaning towards deliberate.
But with luck, this budget & their betrayal of women will see them out come the next election.
Except Willis didnt win a seat in the first place. Not sure what can be done to stop that. Yes NZers threw their votes far and wide and that landed us in the mess we are now in. The biggest problem we have is David Seymour, about to tighten his grip on power as he soon begins his term as DPM. NZs darkest hours are looming.
Bernard mentioned the use of leases in the govt sector - good maybe in some situations, not so in others. Here is a news item I stumbled upon a week or two ago which I think worth sharing, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-report-private-equity-hospitals/?intcid=CNI-00-10aaa3a At the foot of the article are other references which reveal the conflicts of purpose and subsequent problems that can arise when hospital facilities and services are primarily treated as financial investment opportunities. A subsequent on-line search brings up adverts encouraging the private investor to buy shares in "health facility real estate" - a "robust growth sector for 2025". At the same time, there are items about the increasing number of such facilities which are closing - usually those in poorer areas. Leasing out facilities can compromise both access and quality of care and could be less transparent in terms of accountability. In some USA instances there has been extensive fraud on the part of CEO's and excessive payouts to shareholders. I would like to see some serious investigation of such potential problems before the govt leads us any further down a privatisation pathway. Does PPP open us up to similar issues?
Was Rob Muldoon Made a Scapegoat for a Predatory Private Central Banking System?
As New Zealand continues to reckon with the long-term impacts of economic policies and decisions made during the late 20th century, one figure remains deeply divisive: Sir Robert Muldoon. Branded by critics as authoritarian and economically reckless, Muldoon has long been blamed for the country’s debt crisis, inflationary spiral, and stunted industrial transformation. But as we peel back the layers of this narrative, a more troubling question emerges: was Muldoon in fact a scapegoat for the deeper, structural failures of the private central banking system that ensnared New Zealand during a pivotal moment in its history?
The Think Big Era: Ambition Shackled by Debt
In the 1970s and early 1980s, Muldoon launched the ambitious “Think Big” program—an effort to make New Zealand energy-independent and industrially self-reliant in the wake of the oil shocks and global economic instability. These projects, focused on resource development and heavy infrastructure, were intended to safeguard the nation from volatile international markets.
But rather than being financed with sovereign money—issued debt-free by the state as had been done by the First Labour Government for state housing in the 1930s—Muldoon was pressured or chose to fund Think Big through borrowing on international markets, mediated through the Reserve Bank and private institutions. This effectively placed New Zealand’s industrial aspirations in hock to foreign creditors, with interest compounding the longer the projects took to yield returns.
A Trap Set by Design?
The real scandal is not the ambition of the projects themselves, but the terms under which they were financed. The shift from a Treasury-centric money system to a private-bank-centric model—codified in the Reserve Bank Act and globalized through the IMF/BIS architecture—meant that sovereign governments like Muldoon’s were increasingly constrained in how they could mobilize national credit.
Was Muldoon reckless for borrowing? Perhaps. But one must ask: what were his alternatives? Domestic monetary sovereignty had been quietly undermined. Even though New Zealand had the skilled labour, raw materials, and technical capacity to execute many of these projects, the state was still forced to borrow foreign-denominated debt to access its own productive potential.
This is not economics—it is economic colonization.
Echoes of Empire, Lessons from Norway
Had Muldoon used sovereign money creation—like Michael Joseph Savage had done decades earlier—to fund resource development, the outcomes could have been radically different. Norway offers a stark counterpoint: faced with its own natural resource opportunity in the form of North Sea oil, Norway established a state-owned company and sovereign wealth fund. It ensured that profits benefited the public, not foreign banks or shareholders.
New Zealand, by contrast, remains debt-laden, its strategic assets often privatized, and its fiscal policy still dictated by fear of market reaction. The core difference lies in who controlled the monetary spigot. In Muldoon’s case, it was not the people of New Zealand—it was a global banking architecture engineered to make sovereign credit appear reckless, while private debt accumulation was normalized.
The Real Legacy
Muldoon made his share of mistakes—his combative style, his over-centralization of power, and perhaps his inability to innovate beyond the Keynesian industrial template of his time. But blaming him solely for the fallout of Think Big projects while ignoring the structural role of private debt-money financing is intellectually dishonest and historically incomplete.
By focusing all our critique on one man, we obscure the far more dangerous system he operated within—a system that continues to erode sovereignty, amplify inequality, and undermine democratic control of the economy.
Conclusion
Muldoon’s era should be revisited not as a cautionary tale of economic mismanagement, but as a case study in how a once-sovereign nation was ensnared by a predatory financial model. If we’re serious about building a resilient, just, and independent New Zealand economy, we must stop scapegoating and start addressing the true power behind the throne: a global private central banking network that profits from public failure.
It is great to see you two chewing the fat, but not looking to deliberately rock the boat, but have an amicable conversation in which I dearly hope you can prove me wrong.
But Bernard you fail to mention the role of Primary Bond Dealer licensed private investment banks, that are not deposit takers(not loaning us already existing money surpluses), but new money creators, that monetise all New Zealand government bonds as interest bearing debt, then sell those bonds to secondary investors collecting a margin while doing so, or keep them on their own books(creating a moral hazard)
Which makes some of your suggestions about borrowing willy nilly need reassessing to account for this?
Or you risk making the same mistake Rob Muldoon did(which I will include an analysis of in another comment on this thread.
The Shell Game of New Zealand Government Bonds: How Public Wealth Becomes Private Bank-Created Debt
In the current design of New Zealand’s public finance system, every government bond issued ultimately becomes a liability not just of the Crown, but of the New Zealand people—created not from public savings, but from the private banking sector’s power to create money. This structure is neither constitutionally required nor economically necessary. It is a policy choice—one that quietly privatizes the creation of money and the benefits of national credit, while the public shoulders the liabilities and interest payments.
Step One: Treasury Is Gagged at the Gate
New Zealand’s Treasury does not issue money directly. Though it is sovereign, its ability to spend is artificially constrained. Instead of funding infrastructure, housing, or disaster recovery directly through its Reserve Bank account, Treasury must go through the New Zealand Debt Management Office (NZDM), a unit that exists to borrow on the Crown’s behalf by issuing bonds. This act alone formalizes the government’s dependence on private capital markets.
Step Two: Primary Dealers – The Money Magicians
These bonds are not sold to the public or to savers. They are sold to a select group of financial institutions called Primary Dealers—private banks and investment houses that are licensed to bid in government debt auctions. These institutions do not loan the government their depositors’ money. Instead, they create brand new credit on their balance sheets to buy the bonds. This is confirmed by the Bank of England in its 2014 bulletin, which states plainly: "Banks create money when they lend."
So when a New Zealand bond is issued, the "buyer" is a bank that conjures the purchase amount into existence via double-entry bookkeeping. No one had to save a dollar for the government to spend a dollar. The bank simply creates the funds, buys the bond, and receives interest-bearing securities in return.
Step Three: Spending into the Economy
Once the NZDM receives the proceeds from bond sales, the government can begin spending into the economy—on schools, roads, healthcare, or emergency recovery, like the Christchurch earthquake. But every dollar spent is now tagged with a debt label. The public receives the benefit, but pays it back over time—with interest—to the very private institutions that created the original funding with a keystroke.
Step Four: The Reserve Bank’s Role in the Shell Game
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) is forbidden under current rules from directly financing the government, except under exceptional monetary operations like quantitative easing. Ironically, during QE, the RBNZ buys back the same bonds from private banks—giving those banks central bank reserves in exchange for the securities they originally bought with made-up credit. This round trip exposes the fiction: the central bank could have just credited the government directly in the first place. Instead, the private banking sector profits from the arbitrage.
Step Five: The Taxpayer Pays Twice
Now, the public must repay the bond principal and interest from future taxes. This repayment flows back to the banks who did not risk existing capital, but merely exercised their license to create money. Thus, private institutions benefit twice: once when they create money to lend to the government, and again when they are paid back with real money extracted from the public.
The Big Lie: “We Have to Borrow”
The belief that the government must borrow from the private sector is a myth. The New Zealand government is a monetary sovereign. It can issue the New Zealand dollar and spend directly via its account at the RBNZ. Yet, it voluntarily chooses to act as if it is revenue-constrained. This choice preserves the illusion of fiscal responsibility while perpetuating the profits of a debt-based banking model.
The Solution: Restore Treasury’s Sovereignty
New Zealand must end the shell game. It is time to allow the Treasury, through the Reserve Bank, to issue public credit directly for public purposes—without the intermediation of private money creators. The Christchurch rebuild should have been funded this way. So should housing, climate resilience, and public infrastructure.
Sovereign money creation is not inflationary if it matches real resource capacity and is transparently governed. It is simply honest, democratic financing of public needs, without the parasitic detour through private banking debt.
The public must understand this: Government bonds, as issued today, are not “borrowing from savers.” They are debt to the private banking system, which creates the money it lends us, and charges us for the privilege. This is not fiscal prudence. It is an extractive cycle that hollows out national sovereignty.
Older New Zealanders in my extended whanau have the debt crisis burnt into their memories and that thinking was passed to many of us as children. As non-economists we may not have updated our knowledge, so the sound bites of political agenda's are easier to stoke fear. I think unpacking how the borrowing then (early 1980's) versus borrowing for infrastructure now is different is critical to even having a starting conversation about investing sustainably in our Kiwi future. I've heard Bernard Hickey talk about this a few times in his substack, but it took this interview today (13'03") for it to stick a bit more coherently in my brain. If I heard it right, basically we no longer borrow in foreign currency, instead issuing NZ Bonds, which is less risk to interest volatility for Government who control NZ currency, and where the oversubscribed NZ Bonds by big overseas funds is still very attractive because NZ is still a good bet internationally. How to get a narrative change to aid improving understanding more generally?
I also don't get how the current budget seems to begin with what can we spend, and then divvy up the "pie", rather than what does NZ want for their future, and how are we going to get there? I wonder if that conversation would be better for engaging the young, rather than a constant messaging: we are a land of plenty, but you won't have enough.
Thanks Bryan for shining a light: you make a difference.
Thanks so much for this Bryan! Bernard was very good on this one.
Can't afford to subscribe to his substack though. Mainstream media is just hopeless, and now so many have to pay lots to access good journalists, because they are forced to go independent - but it means less and less access also to decent journalism for the masses. Like supermarket issues this is another big deal obviously for everyone in a supposed democracy. Arguably it could be one of the biggest problems, access to decent journalists, and they of course deserve a decent income as well.
I am desperate for a govt who will safe guard this stuff, among other things.
I grew up watching your content on TV! Kiaora.
I agree re cost of keeping informed and of the importance of sound journalism. My solution is a paid sub to a couple of substacks and settle for unpaid access to headlines on others. I discovered the other day that one or two commentators are also using Youtube which you can access for free eg our Bryan Bruce, Craig Renney, economist at CTU. Would dearly love to add others but then I would not have any time to do the gardening, housework, cooking, etc!
Yeah, thanks. Thats what I currently do, there are a couple more I would love to subscribe to. My main point though, was access for people to better journalism has now become difficult for people who can't afford any of it, or energy and time to go searching for it. It's like a democratic right has been slowly taken from them. From people that need the information so they become more interested in what's going on really, and also some who can get tricked by the talking points and tropes thrown out in mainstream.
Time for mr Rennie to call it a day methinks also mrs Willis really does need someone to explain economics to her in the same succinct way Bernard does to me, a complete airhead when it comes to these matters (though learning quickly thanks B).
Great explainer, thanks Bryan and Bernard.
I suspect the idea that the finance minister is acting in ignorance is a bit too charitable. She has history with extreme right ideology and this is just what we should expect from her.
The only way out of this mess is to educate people so they vote to improve the lives of all, and both of you are doing a fine job of that. Thanks again.
Yes, we are fortunate to have some great communicators who can do the depth stuff. Right wing ideas are permeating everywhere - by osmosis is what Brayan has said - so I think there is a challenge for all of us to push back and interrupt them when we can - maybe not as eloquently, but as best we can. I am just so grateful that Bryan and co provide us the encouragement and facts to do that.
I totally agree and long may they fulfill this role!
Please can we have Bernard Hickey doing all govt budgets from now on - he makes far more sense than they do.
This was a budget for billionaires & millionaires & must have been very pleasing to govt. donors. A budget aimed towards more privatisation - because there's money to be made from desperately ill & dying people; there's money to be made from prisons, there's money to be made from education...any minute now, these people will realise that there's also money to be made from the funeral industry.
This budget is nothing short of cruel; its difficult to be sure whether that was deliberate or due to ignorance. But in view os their actions so far, I'm leaning towards deliberate.
But with luck, this budget & their betrayal of women will see them out come the next election.
Except Willis didnt win a seat in the first place. Not sure what can be done to stop that. Yes NZers threw their votes far and wide and that landed us in the mess we are now in. The biggest problem we have is David Seymour, about to tighten his grip on power as he soon begins his term as DPM. NZs darkest hours are looming.
Bernard mentioned the use of leases in the govt sector - good maybe in some situations, not so in others. Here is a news item I stumbled upon a week or two ago which I think worth sharing, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/senate-report-private-equity-hospitals/?intcid=CNI-00-10aaa3a At the foot of the article are other references which reveal the conflicts of purpose and subsequent problems that can arise when hospital facilities and services are primarily treated as financial investment opportunities. A subsequent on-line search brings up adverts encouraging the private investor to buy shares in "health facility real estate" - a "robust growth sector for 2025". At the same time, there are items about the increasing number of such facilities which are closing - usually those in poorer areas. Leasing out facilities can compromise both access and quality of care and could be less transparent in terms of accountability. In some USA instances there has been extensive fraud on the part of CEO's and excessive payouts to shareholders. I would like to see some serious investigation of such potential problems before the govt leads us any further down a privatisation pathway. Does PPP open us up to similar issues?
Was Rob Muldoon Made a Scapegoat for a Predatory Private Central Banking System?
As New Zealand continues to reckon with the long-term impacts of economic policies and decisions made during the late 20th century, one figure remains deeply divisive: Sir Robert Muldoon. Branded by critics as authoritarian and economically reckless, Muldoon has long been blamed for the country’s debt crisis, inflationary spiral, and stunted industrial transformation. But as we peel back the layers of this narrative, a more troubling question emerges: was Muldoon in fact a scapegoat for the deeper, structural failures of the private central banking system that ensnared New Zealand during a pivotal moment in its history?
The Think Big Era: Ambition Shackled by Debt
In the 1970s and early 1980s, Muldoon launched the ambitious “Think Big” program—an effort to make New Zealand energy-independent and industrially self-reliant in the wake of the oil shocks and global economic instability. These projects, focused on resource development and heavy infrastructure, were intended to safeguard the nation from volatile international markets.
But rather than being financed with sovereign money—issued debt-free by the state as had been done by the First Labour Government for state housing in the 1930s—Muldoon was pressured or chose to fund Think Big through borrowing on international markets, mediated through the Reserve Bank and private institutions. This effectively placed New Zealand’s industrial aspirations in hock to foreign creditors, with interest compounding the longer the projects took to yield returns.
A Trap Set by Design?
The real scandal is not the ambition of the projects themselves, but the terms under which they were financed. The shift from a Treasury-centric money system to a private-bank-centric model—codified in the Reserve Bank Act and globalized through the IMF/BIS architecture—meant that sovereign governments like Muldoon’s were increasingly constrained in how they could mobilize national credit.
Was Muldoon reckless for borrowing? Perhaps. But one must ask: what were his alternatives? Domestic monetary sovereignty had been quietly undermined. Even though New Zealand had the skilled labour, raw materials, and technical capacity to execute many of these projects, the state was still forced to borrow foreign-denominated debt to access its own productive potential.
This is not economics—it is economic colonization.
Echoes of Empire, Lessons from Norway
Had Muldoon used sovereign money creation—like Michael Joseph Savage had done decades earlier—to fund resource development, the outcomes could have been radically different. Norway offers a stark counterpoint: faced with its own natural resource opportunity in the form of North Sea oil, Norway established a state-owned company and sovereign wealth fund. It ensured that profits benefited the public, not foreign banks or shareholders.
New Zealand, by contrast, remains debt-laden, its strategic assets often privatized, and its fiscal policy still dictated by fear of market reaction. The core difference lies in who controlled the monetary spigot. In Muldoon’s case, it was not the people of New Zealand—it was a global banking architecture engineered to make sovereign credit appear reckless, while private debt accumulation was normalized.
The Real Legacy
Muldoon made his share of mistakes—his combative style, his over-centralization of power, and perhaps his inability to innovate beyond the Keynesian industrial template of his time. But blaming him solely for the fallout of Think Big projects while ignoring the structural role of private debt-money financing is intellectually dishonest and historically incomplete.
By focusing all our critique on one man, we obscure the far more dangerous system he operated within—a system that continues to erode sovereignty, amplify inequality, and undermine democratic control of the economy.
Conclusion
Muldoon’s era should be revisited not as a cautionary tale of economic mismanagement, but as a case study in how a once-sovereign nation was ensnared by a predatory financial model. If we’re serious about building a resilient, just, and independent New Zealand economy, we must stop scapegoating and start addressing the true power behind the throne: a global private central banking network that profits from public failure.
It is great to see you two chewing the fat, but not looking to deliberately rock the boat, but have an amicable conversation in which I dearly hope you can prove me wrong.
But Bernard you fail to mention the role of Primary Bond Dealer licensed private investment banks, that are not deposit takers(not loaning us already existing money surpluses), but new money creators, that monetise all New Zealand government bonds as interest bearing debt, then sell those bonds to secondary investors collecting a margin while doing so, or keep them on their own books(creating a moral hazard)
Which makes some of your suggestions about borrowing willy nilly need reassessing to account for this?
Or you risk making the same mistake Rob Muldoon did(which I will include an analysis of in another comment on this thread.
The Shell Game of New Zealand Government Bonds: How Public Wealth Becomes Private Bank-Created Debt
In the current design of New Zealand’s public finance system, every government bond issued ultimately becomes a liability not just of the Crown, but of the New Zealand people—created not from public savings, but from the private banking sector’s power to create money. This structure is neither constitutionally required nor economically necessary. It is a policy choice—one that quietly privatizes the creation of money and the benefits of national credit, while the public shoulders the liabilities and interest payments.
Step One: Treasury Is Gagged at the Gate
New Zealand’s Treasury does not issue money directly. Though it is sovereign, its ability to spend is artificially constrained. Instead of funding infrastructure, housing, or disaster recovery directly through its Reserve Bank account, Treasury must go through the New Zealand Debt Management Office (NZDM), a unit that exists to borrow on the Crown’s behalf by issuing bonds. This act alone formalizes the government’s dependence on private capital markets.
Step Two: Primary Dealers – The Money Magicians
These bonds are not sold to the public or to savers. They are sold to a select group of financial institutions called Primary Dealers—private banks and investment houses that are licensed to bid in government debt auctions. These institutions do not loan the government their depositors’ money. Instead, they create brand new credit on their balance sheets to buy the bonds. This is confirmed by the Bank of England in its 2014 bulletin, which states plainly: "Banks create money when they lend."
So when a New Zealand bond is issued, the "buyer" is a bank that conjures the purchase amount into existence via double-entry bookkeeping. No one had to save a dollar for the government to spend a dollar. The bank simply creates the funds, buys the bond, and receives interest-bearing securities in return.
Step Three: Spending into the Economy
Once the NZDM receives the proceeds from bond sales, the government can begin spending into the economy—on schools, roads, healthcare, or emergency recovery, like the Christchurch earthquake. But every dollar spent is now tagged with a debt label. The public receives the benefit, but pays it back over time—with interest—to the very private institutions that created the original funding with a keystroke.
Step Four: The Reserve Bank’s Role in the Shell Game
The Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) is forbidden under current rules from directly financing the government, except under exceptional monetary operations like quantitative easing. Ironically, during QE, the RBNZ buys back the same bonds from private banks—giving those banks central bank reserves in exchange for the securities they originally bought with made-up credit. This round trip exposes the fiction: the central bank could have just credited the government directly in the first place. Instead, the private banking sector profits from the arbitrage.
Step Five: The Taxpayer Pays Twice
Now, the public must repay the bond principal and interest from future taxes. This repayment flows back to the banks who did not risk existing capital, but merely exercised their license to create money. Thus, private institutions benefit twice: once when they create money to lend to the government, and again when they are paid back with real money extracted from the public.
The Big Lie: “We Have to Borrow”
The belief that the government must borrow from the private sector is a myth. The New Zealand government is a monetary sovereign. It can issue the New Zealand dollar and spend directly via its account at the RBNZ. Yet, it voluntarily chooses to act as if it is revenue-constrained. This choice preserves the illusion of fiscal responsibility while perpetuating the profits of a debt-based banking model.
The Solution: Restore Treasury’s Sovereignty
New Zealand must end the shell game. It is time to allow the Treasury, through the Reserve Bank, to issue public credit directly for public purposes—without the intermediation of private money creators. The Christchurch rebuild should have been funded this way. So should housing, climate resilience, and public infrastructure.
Sovereign money creation is not inflationary if it matches real resource capacity and is transparently governed. It is simply honest, democratic financing of public needs, without the parasitic detour through private banking debt.
The public must understand this: Government bonds, as issued today, are not “borrowing from savers.” They are debt to the private banking system, which creates the money it lends us, and charges us for the privilege. This is not fiscal prudence. It is an extractive cycle that hollows out national sovereignty.
Older New Zealanders in my extended whanau have the debt crisis burnt into their memories and that thinking was passed to many of us as children. As non-economists we may not have updated our knowledge, so the sound bites of political agenda's are easier to stoke fear. I think unpacking how the borrowing then (early 1980's) versus borrowing for infrastructure now is different is critical to even having a starting conversation about investing sustainably in our Kiwi future. I've heard Bernard Hickey talk about this a few times in his substack, but it took this interview today (13'03") for it to stick a bit more coherently in my brain. If I heard it right, basically we no longer borrow in foreign currency, instead issuing NZ Bonds, which is less risk to interest volatility for Government who control NZ currency, and where the oversubscribed NZ Bonds by big overseas funds is still very attractive because NZ is still a good bet internationally. How to get a narrative change to aid improving understanding more generally?
I also don't get how the current budget seems to begin with what can we spend, and then divvy up the "pie", rather than what does NZ want for their future, and how are we going to get there? I wonder if that conversation would be better for engaging the young, rather than a constant messaging: we are a land of plenty, but you won't have enough.
Thanks Bryan for shining a light: you make a difference.
I wonder if the conference is available on internet?