As a New Zealander, I can say that the one thing NZ does really well is marketing, both externally to foreigners and internally to our own citizens. While it is

As a New Zealander, I can say that the one thing NZ does really well is marketing, both externally to foreigners and internally to our own citizens. While it is true that NZers love getting out in nature, when it comes to protecting it we're frankly pretty terrible (see here: https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2021/this-is-how-it-ends-extinction-documentary https://interactives.stuff.co.nz/2021/this-is-how-it-ends-ex...). We have the highest proportion of threatened native species in the world, our fishing industry is out of control, and intensive agriculture is destroying our natural environment (65% of our rivers are considered unswimmable). Our climate record is appalling and not getting much better (see: https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/new-zealand https://climateactiontracker.org/countries/new-zealand). Jacinda Ardern gets a lot of press for her climate-friendly rhetoric, but the fact is that the UK under Boris Johnson did immeasurably better on climate action than we have under her. Our ruling Labour party (supposedly-but-not-really left-ish) does talk a lot about wellbeing budgets, but both our major parties are stuck in a neo-liberal trap where they refuse to allow national debt to get over 30% of GDP (crazy low by international standards), and also refuse to allow the tax ratio to get over that figure. This has meant that all our public services have been systematically underfunded for three decades, which has had a terrible impact on our poor. We like to smugly think that our Aussie neighbours are run by a bunch of knuckle-dragging troglodytes, but they have a vastly fairer tax system (see: https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/07-09-2022/lets-copy-and-paste-australias-tax-code https://thespinoff.co.nz/politics/07-09-2022/lets-copy-and-p...) and welfare system. The British High Commissioner recently said it very well (see: https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/climate-news/300178615/overseas-doubts-grow-about-new-zealands-climate-commitment https://www.stuff.co.nz/environment/climate-news/300178615/o...): "You have Scandinavian ambitions in terms of quality of life and public services, but a US attitude to tax. The brand 100% Pure New Zealand lulled many into a false sense of security, when the environmental reality is far more challenging". Add to that the least affordable housing in the developed world (which politicians of all stripes refuse to touch), and the wellbeing of our less well-off is in a terrible state. If you are lucky enough to own a house, and have some money, you can live in a little bubble and pretend it's not happening to others here, but sadly you would be mistaken. God forbid you might need some of the dustier corners of the health or education systems, like having a kid with special needs. Is this happening everywhere? Yes, it is, but I think there's a general perception that New Zealand is somehow better than a lot of other places, when in a lot of concrete, tangible, measurable ways it's actually significantly worse than most countries that we would like to compare ourselves to. I would struggle to recommend NZ as a place to move to for expats.