Inequality is a subject all societies must confront. An extensive range of evidence suggests that large income and wealth disparities have significant negative effects – both on the individuals who are left without the resources they need, and on a social fabric that can become strained when rich and poor lead such different lives. Large disparities lead to a broad swathe of social problems, including worse health outcomes, lower trust, and higher imprisonment. They can also weaken people’s support for democracy and bias politics towards the interests of the well-off. These effects are felt here in New Zealand, where income imbalances widened faster in the 1980s and 1990s than in any other developed nation. Meanwhile, the wealthiest tenth own 70% of the country’s assets, leaving little to go around for others. Rather than being natural or inevitable, such disparities stem largely from political decisions, and could be reduced. This site aims to provide a reliable and accessible guide to the key data on New Zealand’s economic disparities, as a basis for more informed debate on the subject.