The child’s face in the Smith Family ad sums up all that is wrong with Australia. In this rich, first world nation, the Smith Family call us to sponsor a child so that she might go to school. A basic human right is being denied and in that denial our state and government stands condemned. Continue reading »
Economy
If the COVID-19 pandemic is teaching us anything it is the important contribution of doctors, nurses, pharmacists, allied health professionals, hospital workers and teachers. Health, people, and communities are precious. My research (2015-2020) considered the dichotomies of regarding employees as assets with utility (valuable) or as people with dignity (valued). The policy implications for employers Continue reading »
Treasury, along with all economic institutions, must replace their ageist definitions and assumptions about older people and become part of the solution, not the assault. Quelle surprise! We finally have a Treasurer who is an independent thinker, and more surprisingly he is thinking out loud. Jim Chalmers is rethinking capitalism to restore some basic values. Continue reading »
The release of the Strengthening Medicare Taskforce report has re-ignited discussions about reform of Australia’s primary healthcare system. The report and options for reform were discussed on the 8 February at the National Press Club in Canberra where health economist Dr Stephen Duckett appeared on a panel with Dr Kerrie Aust GP AMA President ACT and Dr Continue reading »
It’s no surprise that Jim Chalmers’ gentle challenge to neoliberal economics has generated an often rabid and intensely hostile response from the Murdoch media. To be hoped for is a more reasoned, informed national debate which focusses on, as Chalmers points to, fundamental changes to our economic environment. Some digging is needed to extract from Continue reading »
Despite countless Western bossy-boots beavering away in the media and beyond, generating worst-case projections as they strain to create a collective storyboard for “China: The Disaster Movie”, China, exasperatingly, keeps successfully pressing on towards its own clearly considered, affirmative future. The American Plan A for reforming China was firmly in place by the 1990s. The Continue reading »
How a bleak Christian theology influenced the development of the dismal science.
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Jim Chalmer’s Monthly essay is an attempt to prepare us for a shift in the coming budget, from the era of neoliberal domination to giving more attention to non-economic factors. But we need far more than that given we are headed for catastrophic global breakdown. Chalmers’ move is commendable and a few decades overdue, but Continue reading »
A week or so ago, on a visit to the ICU ward in the Alice Springs hospital, the Federal Minister for Indigenous Australians, Linda Burney was shocked to discover that of the 16 beds in the ICU, 14 were occupied by Indigenous women who had been subjected to violent assaults. Alcohol is widely acknowledged to Continue reading »
Katy Gallagher’s recent rejection of an ATO supported pay increase was entirely justified if the Government is to move away from agency-based remuneration to an APS-wide approach. The problem is that achieving an APS-wide approach which delivers the remuneration necessary to attract, develop and retain the skills the APS needs will not be easy and Continue reading »