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AusPoliGAF |OT| Boats? What Boats?
- Thread starter Bernbaum
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This country's going to have a non-existent every industry soon enough :\
What do you mean soon enough?
Touche
I don't know if thats true, depending on your definition of 'tech industry'. Of course the mass production of any consumer item is hard given economies of scale and wages in Australia versus parts of asia.
Dastardly Jerks
Banned
My biggest problem with an NBN Cost-Benefit Analysis is the biggest benefits are unimagined, and unimaginable.
The people who are going to imagine, develop and realise the greatest benefit from the NBN are only just being born.
They're going to be raised in a digital, connected world, and come to use that digital connectedness in ways that we can't imagine.
So unless there's a line item for "Unimaginable, world-shaping, concept-changing future developments", there doesn't seem to be much point.
The people who are going to imagine, develop and realise the greatest benefit from the NBN are only just being born.
They're going to be raised in a digital, connected world, and come to use that digital connectedness in ways that we can't imagine.
So unless there's a line item for "Unimaginable, world-shaping, concept-changing future developments", there doesn't seem to be much point.
But what about tech services? It kind of dawned on me when i was in Seattle and saw this massive building with "Expedia" written on it. Or Ask.com in Oakland. What apps/online services have we pioneered?
Inventions? What technology have we developed and built? The last one I can rememember is WiFi by the CSIRO...
Software development? Do we have any big name developers here?
Expedia is an interesting example because Wotif came along first and was developed in Australia.
Atlassian were a large software developer based in Australia, but have since moved to the UK.
Expedia can crush Wotif because American companies can quickly expand domestically due to the size of their market. Once they're ready to expand internationally, they have a large warchest to do that with.
Atlassian, and other software companies, need to sell their software internationally for the same reason. In global terms our wages are very high, mostly due to our overvalued dollar. Developing software is the same as manufacturing and has problems here for the same reasons.
Atlassian were a large software developer based in Australia, but have since moved to the UK.
Expedia can crush Wotif because American companies can quickly expand domestically due to the size of their market. Once they're ready to expand internationally, they have a large warchest to do that with.
Atlassian, and other software companies, need to sell their software internationally for the same reason. In global terms our wages are very high, mostly due to our overvalued dollar. Developing software is the same as manufacturing and has problems here for the same reasons.
That is interesting.
We do have a tech industry but it's small. The point is its not enough to really grow and make a big dent on our economy on a wide scale. We need big industries in Australia aside from Agriculture and primary resources.
The problem is I don't know how were we're going to achieve anything of the sorts.
Not only that, but you just TRY and grow a tech business here in Australia. It's maddening how you're treated as a weird anomaly in business and government circles. No help and constantly being passed from one department to the other. Maybe we're technology. Maybe we're media. Maybe we're arts. Maybe we're infrastructure. It's not any direct hostility - it's just that tech is so out of their frame of reference they have no idea how to handle you.
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With our overvalued dollar, you're not going to be able to sell anything to the rest of the world that isn't specifically Australian. I assume you're ideologically opposed to government "smoothing" but we really needed a huge mining tax to help prop other other industries while the boom continues. Once demand for minerals slows down, our economy will be gutted and we'll have widespread structural unemployment, and presumably a government driven attitude towards dole bludgers that leads to the popularity of things like "work for the dole" that actually makes re employment harder.
Well our economy is basically gutted already. Professionals graduating at an alarming rate to bottlenecked industries which are laying off dozens of more experienced people. Going to be a huge surplus in semi-skilled labour after the car companies shut down. Retail has slowed dramatically.
For all this talk of dodging the GFC I feel like we've just had a delayed reaction. Meanwhile here in the US there's still scars of 08 highly visible in some areas but the economy is recovering. Firms are starting to hire and a lot of building projects are just getting started.
Yeah, that's why "needed" was past tense. It needed to happen in the 90s when the boom started. Instead, the government at the time spent the money on tax cuts and so forth. I believe governments should be spending big in downturns and cutting spending in boom times, but the opposite happens and it hurts us.
I don't have an issue with it per se, I just feel that every time the government tries to steer the economy they cock it up and it ends in some form of mitigated disaster.
I don't really know what anyone can do at this point. There could very well be a discovery or invention which revitalises an entire economy but unless it gets really bad. I don't think that will happen. I just don't think are diverse enough anymore to withstand a downturn in our biggest industries.
I would never suggest that government action always works, or even that it is always prudent, but I think "the law of unintended consequences" can apply equally to inaction. I don't think we'd have too go to far to find examples of where we could have done something, but instead did nothing, and that lead to some form of mitigated disaster.
The examples where government decisions result in a cock up is I think often the result of party politics, either wanting to let something run on for too long, or killing it before it can work. I think I've mentioned before how I'd love if it were possible to depoliticise certain decisions. Maybe a policy gets implemented and it's not working. Turning it off shouldn't be a gotcha for the opposition party. I wouldn't even know where to start with making that happen. Some kind of fundamental alteration of human nature would no doubt be required.
bobnowhere
Member
Another one bites the dust
Another one bites the dust
And another one gone, and another one gone
Another one bites the dust
Hey, I'm gonna get you, too
Another one bites the dust
9th Lib gone on the northern/central coast.
Bart Bassett off to the cross benches. Is there anyone left up there? What is it about that area of NSW, Obeid/Tripodi on one side and just about everyone on the other?
Another one bites the dust
And another one gone, and another one gone
Another one bites the dust
Hey, I'm gonna get you, too
Another one bites the dust
9th Lib gone on the northern/central coast.
Bart Bassett off to the cross benches. Is there anyone left up there? What is it about that area of NSW, Obeid/Tripodi on one side and just about everyone on the other?
Agreed on both points.
I'm don't agree that it's a delayed GFC reaction. It's our own little structural problem.
I'm not entirely sure one way or another. I just can't feel optimistic about Australias Australia's future right now.
One might (with some leap of logic) say that the high dollar is related to the GFC, but that is only because investors feel confident enough to invest in our economy because of how well our country handled the GFC. Other than that though it is pretty hard to argue the GFC has anything to do with our current predicament.
Also is Bart Bassett resigning from parliament or just the party?
Does anyone else find it amusing that the Scotts might do for us what we couldn't do in 1999?
No chance that it actually happens, but it's a nice thought.
No chance that it actually happens, but it's a nice thought.
There is a world of difference between what the Scottish are proposing (which I'm personally against) and what should have happened in '99.
We are legally independent. We've been independent ever since we signed the Australia Act into law in 1986. The referendum in 1999 was to become a republic.
I'm fairly sure that if Scotland votes to become independent they would be giving up the Queen. Not entirely sure though.
The referendum in 99 was never going to pass. People won't fix what isn't broken, and the case for change was uncertain... Two factors that almost guarantee a no.
I'm fairly sure that if Scotland votes to become independent they would be giving up the Queen. Not entirely sure though.
The referendum in 99 was never going to pass. People won't fix what isn't broken, and the case for change was uncertain... Two factors that almost guarantee a no.
And the proposed system (an unelected president) was never going to fly, despite the somewhat reasonable thought behind it.
Who needs a president when you have a captain.
Obviously they have nothing to do with each other but I still find the constitutional question amusing.
And I'm going to stop posting late at night, ugh.
Yes. The constituon exists at the behest of the people. We voted it in and we can get rid of it. We did vote on the question over whether to ditch the Queen. In my mind the People > Queen but I've been engaged in pitched battles with other constitutional experts on this question...some who agree and others who do not.
Dastardly Jerks
Banned
Ah good. Yes. Excellent. This is the good shit.
Yeah, if you're designing your policy to avoid getting shot down in the courts, maybe go back to the drawing board.
Sickening that this may possibly pass.
Technically they wouldn't be officers of the commonwealth would they? They're employed by the states. Plus the court has constantly read that section as narrowly as possible.
They have. I kind of skimped over it in my excitement to read the anti-federal part of the case but Williams v Cth does say that no religious test for an office of the Commonwewlth was being employed here but I'm not sure why...I'll have to look into it.
More royal commissions will come out of the chaplaincy program.
That is definitely a policy alright.
EDIT: Have the ALP said they'll block this. Because they probably should. If they did block it the Libs don't exactly have a sales pitch for this.
From memory it was barely given a paragraph.
Come to think of it is there anything other than the deficit levy and the fuel excise changes that is actually good in this budget?
Also a Labor Senator has received a bollocking for saying what is actually true:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...nding-terrorism-focus-a-budget-diversion-ploy.
Also a Labor Senator has received a bollocking for saying what is actually true:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/20...nding-terrorism-focus-a-budget-diversion-ploy.
Thinking about the issue further, the report is flawed from the very start with the methodology. Depending on how you look at telecommunication infrastructure like fiber, its very easy to argue that using a cost/benefit analysis is wrong. The reasoning is that you can't put a cost or benefit on uses that do not even exist or are extremely new (eg. big data and sharing huge geographic information datasets are two that quickly come to mind). This combined with the present day focus of the report results in a conclusion that most people in AusPoliGAF predicted.
When they laid down the copper network in Australia,its doubtful that anyone did a cost/benefit analysis. Of course it probably didn't exist whenever they implemented our copper network in the 20th century but if the current government was in power back then, its possible that it'd never have occurred because "its too expensive and it'll only let people call each other". I don't think anyone could have predicted the internet and everything its brought to the people and businesses alike. I don't think they could have even predicted fax machines.
But even then, as AusPol has noted, they make some pretty big omissions and assumptions that skew the cost/benefit analysis towards their intended goal: to make the FTTN look like the better option.
Elaugaufein
Member
They assume a very small growth rate, that internet use compounds at ~4.5% per year. There are other studies using ~30% so someone is out by about an order of magnitude.
Dastardly Jerks
Banned
The fact a woman said it probably ticked off Scott Morrison that little bit more.
Elaugaufein
Member
Its sad that the ALP is willing to play the National Security Escalation game reliably and they essentially sanction one of their members for not playing along.
ASIO/DSD would start leaking out so much shit about the offending party to the media it's not funny - they really do rule the country - except unlike the NSA they're actually competent.
They could take down either political party overnight - hence why they get everything they want.
Elaugaufein
Member
The funny thing is that while they can threaten that, they can't actually in pracrise do it. Actually doing that would result in them getting reformed no matter if they destroyed both parties because the successors would be utterly unwilling to have the threat hanging over them. Like so much in politics and espionage its power you have only so long as you never use it.
Actual stats suggest it's much higher the last few years
Consumption statistics
YOY Growth (re: 1/12)
2010: 50%
2011: 80%
2012: 65%
2013: 56%
YoY Growth (re 1/6)
2011: 77%
2012: 51%
2013: 63%
From Reddit:
http://www.smh.com.au/business/mark...-on-medibank-private-ipo-20140829-10a2tf.html
If you ever had doubts on their power worry no more!
And yes, I will definitely get in on the private share offering, along with my father, and anyone else who'll listen and buy what will be the bargain of the century.
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