The high price of stress, Australian Financial Review, 15 November Go Home On Time Day, Radio Australia, 21 November Dig a little deeper for full mining story, Newcastle Herald, 28 November Where the buck stops in politics, Australian Financial Review, 27 November How not to make policy: Tasmanian forest deal, Crikey, 29 November Rethinking nation’s

Our two-speed economy has a two-tiered tax system, with capital-intensive mining companies paying among the lowest rates of corporate tax and the labour-intensive service sector paying among the highest. All companies face the same nominal 30 per cent tax on income but the existence of accelerated depreciation and other tax concessions deliver disproportionately for the

If you listen to the mining industry Australia is at risk of killing the goose that’s showering us with golden eggs. Australia, they claim, has become a high cost place to do business. Wages are up, the exchange rate is making it more expensive to build new projects and Australia’s low productivity is making everything

The case against cutting the corporate tax rate, D Richardson, December 2012 Tasmanian Forest Agreement 2012: Who is the winner?, A Macintosh, December 2012 The rise and rise of the big banks, D Richardson, December 2012 Carbon credits from Western Australia’s multiple use public native forests: A first pass assessment, A Macintosh, December 2012 An unhealthy obsession:

Economic growth is a very strange thing. In 1949 when our gross domestic product was about a tenth of what it is today, Australia set out to build 145 kilometres of tunnels, 16 major dams and nine power stations as part of the Snowy Hydro scheme. But 60 years later, when GDP is $1.3 trillion

The NSW Minerals Council is out spruiking the benefits of the mining industry in the Hunter region in a new economic study. Using the same old tricks to inflate their numbers and ignoring any economic downside they manage to spin the result into a rosy picture that reaches the epic proportions of claiming that the

The newly-inked Tasmanian Forest Agreement has been hailed by many as a historic breakthrough that provides Tasmania with an opportunity to end the divisive “forest wars” and remake the state’s ailing economy. In truth, it is a case study in how not to make policy. By handing over the responsibility for resolving the dispute to

Conservative politicians used to bemoan the way Australia’s youth mindlessly imported American culture, but you don’t hear so much of that these days. Maybe it’s because many conservative politicians have become so comfortable importing their political talking points from their US counterparts. Like Republicans in the US, many in the Coalition seem alarmed about debt,

Imagine if we could increase the number of car parking spots in the Canberra CBD by 20 per cent. Now imagine we could do so at no cost to government, business or individuals and with no disruption. Would you support it? I imagine you would. So, what’s the catch? The catch is that most street-side

According to Rene Hidding, Tasmania’s Liberal spokesman for forestry, it is “insulting” to Tasmanians to inform them about the tiny contribution the forestry and logging industries make to that state’s employment. Presumably he thinks it would be better to deceive the people? For all of the analysis about what the collapse of the state’s forest

Job ads and corporate websites are often littered with claims that particular companies are “employers of choice” or committed to the wellbeing of staff. But according to a recent survey by the Australia Institute, around one third of the workforce reports experiencing stress and anxiety as a result of their work. About 2.2 million workers

John Howard’s description of work/life balance as a ”barbecue stopper” was more accurate than he realised. Not only does it continue to stop conversation among the ”working families” of such interest to political strategists, but the length and unpredictability of working hours makes it increasingly difficult for friends and families to make plans and keep

Neoclassical economics has a clear definition of a competitive market, but it has been so debased by Australian politicians and business leaders that it now borders on meaningless. According to mainstream textbooks, a competitive market is one in which there are lots of buyers and sellers, none of whom have any market power. Buyers are

They’re not widely publicised, but co-operatives and mutuals give customers a different option to the major banks. You might not like the fact that the big banks dominate 90 per cent of the mortgage lending market or that the finance industry makes a fortune investing your compulsory super in other big companies that buy up

The faith of Australian policymakers and business leaders in communist China to keep delivering record growth is touching. Just as they assume the sun will rise tomorrow, so too do they believe those responsible for setting China’s exchange rate, making five-year plans and running their vast state-owned enterprises will keep doing a great job. When

Alan Jones tried to link the backlash against his insult of Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s late father to the issue of free speech but, in reality, it is the free market that is causing him grief. The problem for the dinosaur of radio is that national brands such as Woolworths and Mercedes-Benz increasingly want their

It’s always a bit sad watching someone torn between what they said they wanted and what they really wanted. Choosing can be hard at the best of times, but having an audience can make it excruciating, so spare a thought for the good folk of the Business Tax Working Group. Corporate Australia has told us

The Canberra Liberals are hoping to win the upcoming election on a promise of lower rates. If you vote Liberal, the ads blare, your rates will be lower. But what is not clear is whether they plan to collect less tax overall. The ads are strangely silent on this issue but the simple fact is

This edition of The Australia Institute’s newsletter features: Productivity – lazy workers or lazy analysis? David Richardson Gina’s call a bit rich Dr Richard Denniss Exposing the great sunscreen cover-up Dr Gregory Crocetti Measuring fugitive emissions Matt Grudnoff Could you live on $245 per week? Ben Irvine Infographics The economy and social justice Senator Doug

Listening to the mining industry complaining about the high exchange rate is like listening to a three-year-old complaining about the noise of their own tantrum. It simply adds insult to injury. The surge in world demand for our resources and the flood of foreign money into Australia to buy or build mining assets has been

The Nationals are worried about Chinese farm ownership yet it’s European mine ownership that’s harmed farmers Australians, it seems, don’t like selling off the farm. And the National Party really doesn’t seem to like selling them to the Chinese. But while the Nationals have a long, if not always proud, history in Australia it is

Why we do what we do Gina: another reason we do what we do Media highlights for August TAI research on super tax concessions Events Why we do what we do Democracy is all about getting the numbers. Put simply, if you don’t have them in the parliament, you won’t be able to turn your

If you haven’t heard Gina Rinehart’s latest foray into the political debate around Australia’s productivity, here is an extract we found particularly shocking: “… Business as usual will not do. Not when West African competitors can offer our biggest customers an average capital cost for a tonne of iron ore that’s $100 under the price

There are two fiscal elephants in the Gillard government’s cabinet room. The first and better known elephant is the fact that the government’s wafer-thin surplus has been crushed under the weight of a slowdown in revenue forecasts and a speed-up in new spending announcements. The second elephant is that the cost of so-called “self-funded” retirement

Carbon price floor scrapping raises questions of cost, 7:30, 29 August Time to clear the haze of carbon price charges, The Canberra Times, 22 August How our courts are pricing justice out of public reach, Crikey, 22 August Tasmania’s forestry sector akin to ‘work for the dole’, Crikey, 21 August Calls for more reporting of

Research papers Can the taxpayer afford ‘self-funded retirement’?, R Denniss and D Richardson, 15 August 2012 What price dignity?, R Denniss and D Baker, 1 October 2011 The great superannuation tax concession rort, D Ingles, 24 February 2009 Recent op-eds Political cowardice on ‘self-funded’ super, Australian Financial Review, 4 September 2012 Super subsidies: a budget

TAI

Democracy is all about getting the numbers. Put simply, if you don’t have them in the parliament, you won’t be able to turn your ideas into laws.  With the Prime Minister announcing a raft of new spending measures, the numbers she has on the floor of parliament and amongst her COAG colleagues are going to

With the PM announcing a raft of new spending initiatives people are asking ‘how will she fund it?’ The cost of super tax concessions is set to blow out from $30 billion per year to $45 billion per year. This blowout alone is enough to fund Gonski, NDIS and Denticare and still have change left

It’s obscene for someone with inherited wealth, whose business is subsidised by government, to criticise low-paid workers. Two numbers pretty much sum up all that is wrong with political debate in Australia: Gina Rinehart earns the annual full-time minimum wage every 53 seconds and, at the peak of the mining boom, the industry contributed only