In the Aftermath: Consumer Choice and the Deregulation of Australian Retail Banking, 1988–1993

This article explores whether deregulation of the Australian retail banking sector in the 1980s delivered the enhanced consumer choice that had been promised. Using new data on banking products and their usage, it analyses consumers' ability to select optimal ‘frontier’ products. It concludes that following deregulation of retail banking, product offerings underwent such tumultuous change that the scope for effective consumer choice was severely constrained. While there were improvements towards the end of the period, progress was not assisted by the banks' strategy of proliferating and re‐bundling products. Consequently, the anticipated improvements to consumer choice were slow to arrive.     

The Development of the Institutional Investor: The Case of Australian Life Insurers 1945–85

This paper considers the post‐war development of asset management practices among Australian life insurers, which have historically been among the largest institutional investors in Australia. A complex process of adaptation and organisational restructuring allowed life insurers to transform from basic investors of policy‐holders’ funds to large multifaceted institutional investors in just three decades. Three stages in the development of investment practices are identified. These phases trace the process of expanding existing knowledge bases; diversification; and the acquisition of new skills; consolidation and the integration of these skills into institutional structures; thus completing one cycle of organisational learning and setting the stage for the next.     

‘LONG SLOW BOOM’?: MANUFACTURING IN NEW ZEALAND, 1945–70

Many studies of post-war New Zealand economy are highly critical both of economic policy and of the business sector, emphasising protection, complacency and sclerosis. This article argues that such accounts are excessively simplistic and, by analysing the structure and performance of New Zealand manufacturing during 1945–70, suggests that there was considerable innovation in both technological and organisational spheres. The result was that, to a greater extent than current accounts allow, New Zealand manufacturing pursued efficiency and international competitiveness.