Finance
Victoria: Back in the Basket Again
Reproduced with permission from The BFD https://thebfd.co.nz/2024/05/09/victoria-back-in-the-basket-again/ I grew up in Victoria (don’t judge me, it wasn’t always the way it’s become), and lived through the dark days of the early 90s. Back then, it seemed that hardly a week went by without another economic calamity: the Pyramid building society collapse, the Tricontinental bank collapse, the State Bank of Victoria...
The Tax Power
The Commissioner of Taxation has too much power. Libertarians consider tax to be either theft or, at best, should be low and flat to cover bare necessities. It certainly shouldn’t be as complex as it is or run to thousands of pages. Most mainstream tax reform proponents have grandiose visions that would only add complexity and likely raise the overall tax...
The Federal Government Should Deliver a Decade of Surpluses
A government’s balance sheet indicates whether it is engaging in intergenerational redistribution. If the government has negative net assets it is leaving future generations with more obligations than benefits. A government with positive net assets is leaving future generations with more benefits than obligations. Governments have no advantages over individuals in making decisions about what to leave to future generations,...
Free Markets Work Better for Energy
Energy is again front and centre in the news with the debate over the merits of nuclear energy becoming mainstream. But then last week the Prime Minister announced a new scheme to subsidise the manufacture of solar panels in Australia. One wonders whether this is to support industry or just to close down a debating point against solar -...
None of your Business
Housing affordability is a perennial issue that seems to be spilling over into the political domain in a way that is more divisive and acute than ever. And as usual, the political class is more interested in sounding like they are engaging with the issue than actually addressing it. Oddly enough it is the left side of politics that has...
The Everyday Libertarian
In today's politically charged atmosphere, evangelical libertarians often stray into polarising debates around topics like firearms or drug legalisation. Is there a subtler, more effective approach? I suggest the “everyday libertarian mindset”. It involves reframing common complaints and concerns through the lens of smaller government and individual liberty. I often hear myself responding to complaints about government by saying “that’s why...
The Missing Ingredient – Assimilation
When Al Grassby was Immigration Minister in the Whitlam government in the early 1970s, he announced that multiculturalism was to be Australia’s future policy. Assimilation was over. There was a time when Australia actively promoted assimilation. It was the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries and applied to Aborigines, varied by state and location, involved the removal of vulnerable children...
25 Provocative Predictions For 2024 From The World’s #1 Political Observer
GOVERNMENT OVERREACH Habeas corpus will not be restored in Australia. The Australian Federal Budget will be in deficit and expenditure will increase on the previous year. Correct: “A deficit of $28.3 billion is forecast in 2024–25.” Source: Statement 1: Budget Overview. Page 2. https://budget.gov.au/content/bp1/download/bp1_bs-1.pdf Correct:...
E-Scooters: A Two Wheeled Burden?
Since approximately 2016 there has been a rapid increase in personal and for-hire electric scooters (e-scooters) in cities around the world. Over 600 cities now have e-scooter for-hire services and, globally, the electric scooter market is valued at more than AUD $49 billion and growing at 10% per year. In Australia, there was an 800% increase in e-scooters from...
Part II:Programmable Money
Two years ago the Deputy Governor of the Bank of England, Sir John Cunliffe, spoke the most sinister sentence I’d heard in a long while. The menace was unmistakable: “giving your children pocket money but programming the money so that it couldn’t be used for sweets.” This statement was offered in the context of Central Bank Digital Currencies. Let me explain...
