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Keywords: Hecs

  • EDUCATION

    Uni fee changes will erase egalitarianism

    • Paul Rodan
    • 03 June 2014
    13 Comments

    An unregulated fee regime will result in an increase in course costs and will mean substantially larger debts for students after their periods of study. The prestigious Group of Eight institutions can be expected to exploit their reputational positions to charge top dollar. How does a 17-year-old decide whether selecting the degree from the prestige university over the same course at a newer institution justifies an extra decade of debt?

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  • ECONOMICS

    Whose liberty matters as Dickensian budget looms?

    • Fatima Measham
    • 07 May 2014
    16 Comments

    French economist Thomas Piketty argues that current conditions have set us on track for a return to 19th century-levels of inequality. The Commission of Audit proposals suggest that the auditors and the Government are keen to expedite this neo-Dickensian era. It's all done in the name of 'incentives' toward 'personal responsibility', but this cannot remain coherent in the face of those who will be hit hard by the proposed suite of cuts and co-payments.

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  • ECONOMICS

    Change tax tack to take power back

    • Jean-Paul Gagnon
    • 18 November 2013
    15 Comments

    What if citizens were given the chance to fill out a preference form online as part of their own personal, digital tax portal? You could choose to pick 'below the line' and individually choose what your tax money can and can't be spent on. For example you might like to spend on funding public schools, the bullet train, hospital supplies and museums, and not to spend on nuclear power plants, weapons development, or the automotive industry subsidy.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Hockey's space cadet schemes

    • Ray Cassin
    • 30 October 2013
    17 Comments

    There is a bizarre and remorseless logic to some of Joe Hockey's proposals, such as the absorption of Centrelink by Australia Post and making Medibank Private responsible for delivering the services of the National Disability Insurance Scheme. ACTU president Ged Kearney described the Centrelink proposal as 'moving into space-cadet territory'. She's right: the space cadets are flying the ship now.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    Honouring cleaners

    • Scott Steensma
    • 29 June 2011
    1 Comment

    The average full time employee in Australia works 44 hours a week. The people in the office Ben cleans pull 35. During his busiest weeks Ben slogs through over 70. 'I gotta lot of responsibilities on my shoulders,' he says. 'This is why I want to do well in life.'

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  • EDUCATION

    Higher education's dirty little secret

    • Andrew McGowan
    • 17 February 2009
    5 Comments

    A recent report into higher education is caught between discontent and fatalism about what prevents universities from doing better for students from the margins. The system's biggest failure may lie in what the report didn't ask.

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  • EDUCATION

    'Ratbag' student activist decries Education Revolution

    • Susie Byers
    • 28 July 2008
    5 Comments

    The current higher education review is hindered by a focus on 'productivity' and 'efficient investment'. Universities should be homes of knowledge whose graduates are more than just pegs to plug the holes in Australia's skills set.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Economic boom's new generation poor

    • Stuart Braun
    • 30 October 2006
    1 Comment

    A decade of economic growth has been good for many Australians. The property market has boomed. Wages have spiralled. Equity markets continue to ride record highs. Ordinary Australians have grown rich—but others have missed out.

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  • EDUCATION

    The price of education

    • Liz Curran
    • 13 June 2006
    1 Comment

    The imposition on students of greater burdens for repayment when they leave university is likely to cause a drought in the number of graduates who will be prepared to work for community agencies and the public service.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Just the ticket

    • Michael McGirr
    • 31 May 2006

    So Mr Latham thinks he has a problem. If elected Prime Minister this year, he is worried that he will have two houses, one in Sydney and the other in Canberra.

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  • ARTS AND CULTURE

    New ideas

    • Troy Bramston
    • 10 May 2006

    Troy Bramston looks at new ideas in Imagining Australia: Ideas for our future.

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  • AUSTRALIA

    Labour of love

    • Eureka Street
    • 08 May 2006

    First time voters, paper castles, songs of joy, bounteous gifts, signs of the times

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