The treasury hasn't told the government anything it didn't already know in its post-election briefing paper for ministers.
It says there's a need to implement wide and ambitious policy reforms to increase economic growth and meet the target of returning to surplus in 2014/15.
"Treasury's views on all these issues are well known and so are the government's - there's nothing new here," Finance Minister Bill English said after the paper was released on Thursday.
"We want faster growth but we also want to take New Zealanders with us and we believe we've struck the right balance."
The Treasury is suggesting further efficiency gains in the public service, which usually means cutting departmental budgets and jobs.
It says that to raise productivity and minimise cost pressures there should be changes to policies including education, welfare, tax, regulation, science and innovation, infrastructure and the management of natural resources.
The Treasury presents advice to ministers after elections, telling them what it thinks needs to be done to generate economic growth.
Its suggestions are often considered too radical and politically dangerous to implement.
Among its latest suggested measures are:
* Reintroducing interest on student loans, which the government has previously rejected.
* Using education money more efficiently by increasing class sizes and spending more on teacher training. Mr English says that might be worth considering.
* Cutting income and company taxes, which the government says it can't afford.
* Contracting out some welfare services.
* Making further reforms to the Resource Management Act.
NZN