New Zealand's best-known economist, Dr Brian Easton is an independent scholar, researcher, writer, consultant and teacher in economics, social statistics, and public policy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Statistical Society and a chartered statistician. As author, co-author or editor of more than 30 books, Brian writes regularly for the NZ Listener and other journals and newspapers. His recent books include The Commercialisation of New Zealand (1997) and The Nationbuilders (2001). In 2002 he was appointed to the Prime Minister's Growth and Innovation Advisory Board and, in 2005, he was made a Distinguished Fellow of the New Zealand Association of Economists. As well as teaching in a number of universities Brian is a familiar keynote speaker at conferences and an often trenchant critic of economic orthodoxy.