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Keywords: Economy

There are more than 200 results, only the first 200 are displayed here.

  • ECONOMICS

    Review: The Shortest History of Economics

    • David James
    • 22 March 2024

    Economics may be useless for forecasting, and its assertions can be overly simplistic. But it is a language that should be understood, and here is a good place to start. In simple and clear prose, Leigh spans the history of human economic activity, beginning in prehistoric times and ending with the modern day.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Searching for the truth about a wartime massacre

    • Juliette Hughes
    • 15 March 2024
    3 Comments

    Two books about a 1942 massacre of Australian nurses were released last year. One is reliable, the other is notable for factual omissions. If we leave something out, are we then guilty of censorship? Alternatively, if our truth-telling offends someone else, what is our justification for so doing?

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  • ECONOMICS

    The economy is in worse shape than you think

    • David James
    • 07 March 2024
    4 Comments

    The aggregate picture of the economy may seem healthy enough after two years of heavy immigration, over 800,000, and the return of students and tourists. But the elephant in the room remains. Australia is a two-tiered society sharply divided between people who own homes and people who do not. The generational divide is worsening.

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  • EDUCATION

    Declining staff-to-student ratios reveal sorry state of higher ed

    • Erica Cervini
    • 06 March 2024
    2 Comments

    By 2012, when the federal government first started reporting on staff-to-student ratios in universities, there was one academic for every 20 students. The most recent data, from 2021, shows that figure had increased to 23. As Australian students return for the new academic year, it will surely come as no surprise to find that ratio has worsened.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Why the choice revolution let us down: In conversation with Mark Considine

    • David Halliday
    • 28 February 2024
    1 Comment

    The main purpose of government is to promote the welfare of its people. And yet over the last few decades, through numerous inquiries, it’s become clear that the Australian government has failed to provide services for the Australian population as well as might be expected. 

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    The Russia-Ukraine war two years on

    • Binoy Kampmark
    • 28 February 2024
    5 Comments

    After two years, the attack on Ukraine by Russia on February 24 has left half-a-million dead, traumatised a generation, and promises little in the way of a halt to hostilities. The unpalatable reality to this conflict is that some diplomatic solution will have to be found in this war of murderous attrition.

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  • INTERNATIONAL

    The perils of being a civilian

    • Tony Smith
    • 22 February 2024
    1 Comment

      The illusion of warfare as a contest between professionals should have disappeared forever as the twentieth century brought numerous examples of barbarous armies butchering civilians. And unfortunately, the pattern now is that some 90 per cent war casualties are civilians. 

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  • ECONOMICS

    Are we in a post-industrial society?

    • David James
    • 20 February 2024
    3 Comments

    What does it mean when ideas of scarcity – supposedly the driving principle in understanding supply and demand – are no longer the only or best way to think about economic activity? What is needed to understand the post-industrial environment is a new way of thinking about economics and finance. 

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  • AUSTRALIA

    We need a real conversation about tax reform

    • Joe Zabar
    • 12 February 2024
    1 Comment

    Much of the discussion about tax reform is about the mechanisms of collection; around changes to things like negative gearing, stamp duty, land tax, capital gains tax, and superannuation. But what is missing is a statement of values about what we expect our tax system to fund.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    On optimisation

    • Michael McVeigh
    • 12 February 2024
    1 Comment

    A coffee shop used AI technology to track and measure the activity of its employees and customers to 'optimise' team performance. Not only does this raise a slew of ethical issues, but also leads us to consider: can the human element that makes a team or business successful ever be truly quantifiable?

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  • AUSTRALIA

    When missiles threaten our ethics

    • Tony Smith
    • 30 January 2024
    1 Comment

      This rush to the missile age is part of a broader escalation of the arms race in previously peaceful regions, distancing countries like Australia and New Zealand from their roles as honest brokers in a nuclear-free Pacific.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Black swans and the art of expecting the unexpected

    • Max Jeganathan
    • 24 January 2024
    2 Comments

    Even the best forecasting gets it wrong, and every year has its own 'Black Swan' events, characterised by their unpredictability and impact. They remind us that the future is unpredictable, perpetually lurching between prediction and confusion.

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