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Keywords: Debt

  • ECONOMICS

    Until debt do us part

    • David James
    • 20 October 2020
    3 Comments

    The global economy was already teetering on the edge of such a debt crisis before the coronavirus hit. The economic shutdowns have accelerated the damage.

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  • ECONOMICS

    The great economic rethink?

    • David James
    • 20 August 2020
    6 Comments

    There will be Great Reset in finance and economics. It is inevitable because the shock has been so great. The first problem is what to do with global debt, which was already at unsustainable levels before the virus hit: over 320 per cent of global GDP. The only way to prevent system-wide failure has been to lower interest rates to near zero levels.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Righting the wrongs of robodebt

    • Darren O'Donovan
    • 27 November 2019
    7 Comments

    The uncertainties are not ended by last week's announcement. The statement only vaguely signals that the Department will 'work' with recipients to identify 'further proof points'. What constitutes a 'proof point'? The government needs to disavow its past conduct in a much deeper, detailed and clear way. Instead, it has gone silent.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Living in Australia's social credit dystopia

    • Kate Galloway
    • 08 October 2019
    6 Comments

    If government is concerned for citizens' wellbeing, it should properly resource services — drug and alcohol support, parenting support, subsidised childcare, education and so on. Instead, it is generating a system of social credit: rewarding those who toe the line and punishing those whose 'score' falls below that of the 'good citizen'.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    My brush with robodebt

    • Bree Alexander
    • 26 September 2019
    2 Comments

    I was heartened by the announcement Gordon Legal is pursuing a class action for robodebt victims. I am one of hundreds of thousands of people who has gone through the robodebt process. I too felt the exercise of a reverse burden of proof; guilty until proven innocent.

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  • ECONOMICS

    Capitalism isn’t dead, it just smells funny

    • David James
    • 24 September 2019
    9 Comments

    It is easy to blame the financial sector — and the governments that were supposed to oversee the financial system but instead just washed their hands of it — for creating this global debt debauch. They certainly bear much of the responsibility. But in many ways the financial misbehaviour is as much symptom as cause.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Robodebt at the vanguard of government power grab

    • Kate Galloway
    • 12 September 2019
    7 Comments

    A policy genuinely in support of moving into employment would not seek to capitalise on the ambiguity of accounting in the year of transition from welfare to work — which is effectively what robodebt does.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    We need leaders who are smarter on data

    • Kate Galloway
    • 29 January 2019
    1 Comment

    Transitioning to a networked world replete with data is a challenging task. Our parliamentarians have a duty to appraise themselves of the basics of human rights, data ethics, and the technological frameworks that will deliver good governance. Until then, we will be left lurching from one technology omnishambles to the next.

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  • ECONOMICS

    The true lesson of capitalism

    • David James
    • 15 January 2019
    2 Comments

    One of the most basic distinctions in finance, with which any stockbroker or fund manager is familiar, is that between equity and debt. As the global economy teeters on the edge of a debt and banking crisis, with global debt more than 300 per cent of global GDP, the merits of equity is something that needs to be better understood.

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  • ECONOMICS

    Compound interest is the root of banks' evil

    • David James
    • 04 December 2018
    7 Comments

    The problem goes much deeper than a few crooked operatives and it will not be fixed by changing the corporate 'culture'. The fundamental evil is the arithmetic of compound interest. Interest on debt rises exponentially, while economic activity is linear. That means that sooner or later those in a weaker position are unable to pay.

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  • RELIGION

    Christianity tells stories; Islam finds designs

    • Michael McGirr
    • 31 October 2018
    21 Comments

    My year ten class studies Islam, one of the most formative influences in the world that my students will inhabit and hopefully improve. I have a profound respect for Islam. Westerners often fail to acknowledge the debt they owe to Islam, a tradition that had a huge role in bringing Europe through the Dark Ages and into the Renaissance.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    A bill of rights for the age of technology

    • Kate Galloway
    • 29 October 2018
    2 Comments

    A robust human rights framework would hold government to account in its own deployment of technology such as 'robodebt'. It would also provide protections against the government's increasing attempts to control data through legislation — where data is collected and deployed using diverse technologies.    

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