John Quiggin nails it

John Quiggin today nails the 'debate 'about the budget deficit.

I am unsure why so many people wish to impart a contractionary budget on a weak economy.

It doesn't make sense.  The OECD agrees. so does the Kouk

What needs to done is a plan to get back to trend preferably above trend nominal GDP growth.

If this occurs then the budget will be in balance!

It is times like this when it makes you proud you are an Asussie

Yesterday was a very important day in terms of the national psyche.
The nation remembered Phil Hughes a man who died in the prime of his life from a freak accident playing cricket the game l loved.

Phil Hughes was born in Macksville and his father grew bananas. I was born in the adjoining town of Bowraville many years beforehand and my Father was growing bananas then!

I coach a team and we started with silence for 63 seconds. ( Hughes was 63 when he died.) I had a batsman who was 20 not out and in about 20 minutes flashed past 50 with a century in his grasp.
He deliberately retired at 63.
All the players in the team had their bats on the fence with caps on. As it was Channel 9 was at the ground and filmed this.
When I asked my player why he did it he said it was a team thing and anyway 63 was more important score than 100.

Part of it is HERE

I had never felt more proud of my players.

At the match I umpired the Macquarie Uni Captain declared his innings 63 runs ahead. Macquarie won outright with 6.3 overs being bowled in the last innings!

In the A-League in the Melbourne Victory and Adelaide game spontaneous applause erupted in the 63rd minute. Banners were unfurled and it lasted 63 seconds.

In the Sydney derby between Sydney FC and the Western Sydney Wanderers amazing grace was sung by the RBB at the  63rd minute.

There were tears in spectators and players eyes in both games.

It really was an amazing day and it these events made you proud to be an Aussie!

Around the Traps 28/11/14

It is time for Around the Traps.
Visitors on Sunday so I have no idea of when I will update

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• The Kouk on alarming-global-economy-trends , the-house-price-slowdown-is-creeping-up-on-you , australia-s-budget-problems, gerard-henderson-s-innumeracy-shines-through-again
• Mumble on adventures_of_joel_fitzgibbon , does_my_bum_look_big_in_this
• Greg Jericho on slow-wage-rises-show-australias-industrial-relations-system-is-working , why-isnt-the-government-being-held-to-account-on-the-china-free-trade-deal , victorias-poor-economic-results-is-it-too-late-for-denis-napthine , now-is-not-a-good-time-for-the-housing-construction-boom-to-end
• Kevin Bonham on comments-on-lambiepup-split
• Don Arthur on bankers-reject-forrests-cashless-welfare-proposal 
• Ken Parish on cut-the-waste-stop-the-boondoggles
• Andrew Elder on leadership-as-distraction , no , media-and-politics-today
• Steve from Brisbane on lenore-on-deeper-abbott-government
• The conversation on nbn-benefits-regional-centres-but-rural-australia-is-still-left-wanting , older-people-may-be-better-learners-than-we-think
• Anthony Forsyth on the-enduring-myth-of-the-industrial-relations-club
• Jim Rose on some-economics-of-zero-hours-contracts-part-two-the-fixed-costs-of-employment-and-minimum-hours-constraints
• Ben Eltham on abbott-must-clear-more-barnacles-stop-coalition-ship-sinking

Northern America

• Mark Jamison on why-congress-should-not-get-out-of-the-way-of-the-postal-service
• Calculated Risk on house-prices-real-prices-and-price-to-rent-ratio-September , comments-on-october-new-home-sales
• Robert Waldeman on a-caution-concerning-the-kooky-conservative-conjecture
• Menzie Chinn on if-output-is-near-potential-why-is-inflation-so-low
• Gary Burtless on stimulus-program-success
• Holbo on ferguson

Europe

• Simon Wren-Lewis on understanding-george-osborne
• Chris Dillow on osbornes-idiotic-idea , economists-vs-politicians
• Kruggers on euro-bond-yields , the-european-outlier
• Menzie Chinn on avoiding-lost-decades-european-edition
• Robert Waldeman on uk-macroeconomic-policy-mistakes-of-the-past

Asia

• Edward Lambert on abenomics-higher-wages
• Lord Keynes on robert-murphy-on-japan
• Kruggers on diminishing-returns-arent-waste-wonkish

Wonk

• Progrowth liberal on delong-on-hobsons-choice-v-cochranes-Bernie-Madoff-economics
• Brad Delong on a-question-i-want-to-ask-richard-koo
• Francess Woolley on is-economics-really-a-dismal-science-for-women
• Chris Dillow on wanted-class-consciousness
• Edward Lambert on top-down-approach-is-not-working-go-bottom-up
• Nick Bunker on appreciation-robert-solow  Thanks Mark
• Antonio Fatas on is-0-growth-for-90-successful-economic-model  Thanks Mark
• Kruggers on keynes-is-slowly-winning , in-front-of-your-macroeconomic-nose
• Liam Delaney on mental-health-and-unemployment
• Simon Wren-Lewis on understanding-anti-keynesians , do-we-get-leaders-our-media-deserves
• Brad De Long on wth-a-question-for-simon-wren-lewis-how-can-you-not-think-that-it-is-all-ideology-on-the-other-side
• Nick Rowe on short-run-vs-long-run-order-of-moves-between-monetary-and-fiscal-authorities
• Jim Rose on are-we-reliving-the-1930s
• Tony Yates on inflation-truthing-asset-prices-discount-rates-qe  Thanks Mark
• David Glasner on what-is-free-banking-all-about

General

• Noah Smith on fake-asperger-guys , black-swans-frankenfoods-and-disaster-fairy-tales
• Frances Woolley on economists-arent-in-the-prediction-business-and-thats-a-good-thing
• Carola Binder on regime-change-from-roosevelt-to-rousseff  Thanks Mark 
• Chris Dillow on advice-for-youth , immigration-spontaneous-order
• Lorenzo on origins-of-the-state
• Paul Fritjers on where-are-we-with-geo-engineering-in-2014 
• James Hamilton on a-glut-of-oil

Climate

• Valentina Bosetti and Jeffrey Frankel on fair-shares-pledged-carbon-cuts
• John Quiggin on coal-and-china
• Bart Verhaggen on uncertainty-doesnt-imply-nothing-is-known-or-nothing-should-be-done
• hotwhoppers on an-unsustainable-planet-and-yellow-submarines
• Rabette run on pro-se-cei-nr-michael-mann , now-where-has-eli-heard-this-before
• William Connelly on what-it-would-really-take-to-reverse-climate-change

Andrew Gelman ( Mainly Stats)

• princeton-abandons-grade-deflation-plan
• rick-santorum-andrew-cuomo-common
• oh-go
• almost-inadvertently-followed-dan-kahans-principles-class-today
• leif-uri-need-hang-better-class-statisticians
• quantitative-literacy-tough-idea-1958-96-americans-disapproved-interracial-marriage
• arizona-plagiarism-update
• question-varying-intercept-varying-slope-multilevel-models-cross-national-analysis
• Arthus Charpenter on Confidence Vs Credibility intervals Thanks Mark
• Kaiser Fung on gelman-explains-why-massive-sample-sizes-to-chase-after-tiny-effects-is-silly

Genial Dave Giles( Econometrics)

• thanks-for-downloading
• Frances Diebold on more-on-big-data Thanks Mark
• Larry Wasserman on Causal analysis in practice
• 
  

Dianne Coyle ( Quirky + Book Reviews)

• post-festival-reading , truth-emergencies , the-coaseian-milkman , if-you-only-read-two-economics-books , what-to-read-next-3
• Doverbeach on Books in review 4 

Vox Wonk

• fair-shares-pledged-carbon-cuts
• when-economic-models-are-unable-fit-data
• productivity-pricing-power-and-exports
• labour-shares-inequality-and-relative-price-capital
• world-shocks-and-uk-economy
• role-bank-guarantees-international-trade
• causes-g7-fixed-investment-doldrums
• disemployment-and-fdi-evidence-japan
• liquidity-and-foreign-asset-management-challenges-latin-american-countries
• development-and-foreign-aid-historical-perspective
• good-rich-bad-poor

The Industrial Relations Club

Poor old Gerry Henderson has recently going around saying essentially the industrial relations club is back in town.

This was always absurd. About the only evidence attempts to show how this is so is that minimum wages has been rapidly increased.
We have looked at this before and found this wanting. Gerry really needs to look at the Wage Price Index. He often talks about his experience in small business. Apparently employing your wife makes you an expert on small business!

Now we have Anthony Forsyth who has excoriated Gerry's thesis. not hard when there was little meat anyway.

Technology affecting us?

I used to read a newspaper whilst listening to my ipod on the train but now I usually just listen to my ipod.
Whenever I look up I find that everybody else is looking at their phone presumably looking at e-mails or using social media.

I am old fashioned. I look at work e-mails at work and every so often look at my own there as well. I differentiate between work e-mails and my own. I do not let it get mixed up. Given jobs are so fluid having one e-email address just makes sense to me.

I have mentioned previously that technology is meaning more people are doing work at home instead of work i.e they are working longer hours. This means parents no longer turn up at their boys or even girls cricket matches in the mornings.

It also means shows like Insiders are now redundant. They possess  no inside knowledge. Indeed some viewers or even ex-viewers posses more knowledge on certain topics that the said insiders.

The one real positive of technology is amount of research you can do at your desk or chair at home.
I can remember sitting in University libraries reading a lot of papers, books, articles etc and then speaking to lecturers etc,

Technology means sports have a lot less paperwork to do with regard to results, who is playing etc. It makes competition draws much easier.

I guess in the end there are pluses and minuses.

The ABC

This is fascinating.
First of all Abbott blatantly lies about ABC funding . We know this from the now infamous statement he made on SBS the night before the election.

What makes this worse ,as it always does, are the lies about the lying. The government still doesn't get it.

Then we get to the nub of the issue.

Why does the Australian have a front page editorial on this today.
Clearly they are threatened. Indeed it borders on the mark of intimidation.

It seems quite clear to me that many in the government are doing this a 'payback' for the ABC's biased view.
I have yet to see Abbott interviewed differently to Shorten. I never saw this in the past as well.

It reminds of a classic comment made at Catallaxy. When asked for evidence of bias at the ABC it was said it was all in Kerry O'Brien's body language.

Richard Alston attempted to show evidence and ended up with egg all over his face. the IPA put out a ridiculous paper on this as well.

I suspect this will merely exacerbate the Government's poll misfortunes. Steve from Brisbane may well be right if they continue on this way.

Mark the Graph

when I attempt to open Mark the Graph's blog I get this.

This blog is open to invited readers only

http://markthegraph.blogspot.com/

It doesn't look like you have been invited to read this blog. If you think that this is a mistake, you might want to contact the blog author and request an invitation.

You're signed in as nottrampis@gmail.com - Sign in with a different account

Now since I cannot open the blog I cannot contact Mark the Graph. It is a catch 22.

So Mark could you contact me please so i can again open you excellent blogs.

Around The Traps 21/11/14

It is time for Around the Traps again.
Free on Sunday so will update then.

Aussie.Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Jim Rose on real-gdp-per-new-zealander-and-australian-aged-15-64-ppp-1956-2013-us
• Andrew Elder on found-out-2-when-beijing-smog-clears
• Kevin Bonham on poll-roundup-g20-no-help-to-government
• Ken Parish on calmly-considering-abc-cuts , cut-the-waste-stop-the-boondoggles
• The Kouk on rba-policy-errors-highlighted-by-governor-stevens
• Harry Clarke on plain-packaging-the-lack-of-evidence-that-it-works
• Ross Gittins on A good deal but China wins on climate
• Mumble on what_if_the_problem_is_andrew
• Don Arthur on bankers-reject-forrests-cashless-welfare-proposal

Northern America

• Kruggers on a-pundit-explains-whats-wrong-with-washington , the-structure-of-obamacare
• Tim Taylor on how-many-still-without-health-insurance  Thanks Mark
• Livio De Matteo on one-of-these-provinces-is-not-like-the-others
• Barkley Rosser on the-ultimate-irrelevance-of-grubergate
• Calculated Risk on key-measures-show-low-inflation-in-October , a-few-comments-on-october-existing-home-sales
• Menzie Chinn on what-have-the-nonpartisan-research-agencies-ever-done-for-us
• James Hamilton on lower-oil-prices-and-the-u-s-economy

Europe

• Chris Dillow on camerons-lousy-defence , the-turn-away-from-politics
• Simon Wren-Lewis on redistribution-under-uk-coalition , avoiding-fiscal-fudge , the-uk-feel-good-factor , left-right-and-macroeconomic-competence

Asia

• Kruggers on japan-through-the-looking-glass , structural-deformity
• Robert Waldeman on honest-abe
• Menzie Chinn on the-japanese-gdp-release-the-bad-and-the-not-so-bad
• David Andolfatto on japan-some-perspective Thanks Mark
• Mark Thoma gives us Kruggers on fiscal-responsibility-claims-another-victim
• Ryan Advent on japans-economy-about-that-debt
• Tim Taylor on india-rebounding Thanks Mark

Wonk

• David Beckworth on another-look-at-neo-fisherism  Thanks Mark
• Simon Wren-Lewis on can-we-have-our-instrument-back
• Chris Dillow on encouraging-financial-innovation , why-workers-matter
• David Glasner on ludwig-von-mises-explains-and-solves-market-failure , misunderstanding-reserve-currencies-and-the-gold-standard
• Nick Rowe on fragility-of-nash-equilibria-and-neo-fisherites
• Tim Harford on finance-and-the-jelly-bean-problem
• Peter Dorman on rules-versus-discretion-in-macropolicy
• Lord Keynes on my-posts-on-natural-rate-of-interest
• Jim Rose on some-economics-of-zero-hours-contracts-part-1-concepts-definitions-and-initial-puzzles
• Sandwichman on numeraire-shmoo-meraire-nature-doesnt-truck-and-barter

General

• Kruggers on contractionary-policies-are-contractionary
• Tony Yates on haldane-on-cutting-the-umbillical-research-cord , how-to-run-a-research-department-i-mean-hub-thingummy-whatever Thanks Mark
• Chris Dillow on klass-war
• Lorenzo on three-ages-of-western-history-summarised , a-regulatory-wrinkle-from-rational-expectations
• Noah Smith on gdp-counts-in-war-and-peace
• Nick Gruen on complexity-reducability-integrity-and-bullshit-the-general-untheory

Climate

• Ray Pierrehumbert on obama_s_u_s_china_climate_agreement_carbon_budget_and_exponential_curves  Thanks Steve from Brisbane
• Steve from Brisbane on more-lightning-coming
• Jeffrey Frankel on a-pre-lima-scorecard-for-evaluating-who-is-doing-their-fair-share-in-pledged-carbon-cuts Thanks Mark

Andrew Gelman ( Mainly Stats)

• power-06-looks-like-get-used
• I-play-amateur-political-scientist
• 4-year-old-post-arnold-zellner-oddly-topical
• Replication controversies
• retrospective-clinical-trials
• super-soil-scientists-seeking-super-model
• youre-using-proper-informative-prior-youre-leaving-money-table
• 50-shades-gray-goes-pie-chart
• blogs-twitter

Genial Dave Giles ( Econometrics)

• orthogonal-regression-first-steps
• the-rise-of-bayesian-econometrics

Dianne Coyle ( Quirky + Book Reviews)

• orthodoxy-radicalism-and-sanity , rights-versus-utils , the-revolution-will-not-be-disintermediated
• Dover Beach on Weekday Reading Monday Edition, Books in Review 3 , Weekday reading -late edition , Weekend reading
• Jim Rose on book-review-poor-economics-a-radical-rethinking-of-the-way-to-fight-global-poverty

Vox Wonk

• happier-workers-higher-profits
• future-cocos
• credibility-aqr-and-bank-stress-test
• increasing-unemployment-benefits-young
• growth-inequality-and-social-welfare
• market-expectations-and-futures-prices
• high-stakes-school-testing
• currency-carry-trades-are-not-what-you-think
• economics-secession
• shared-supplier-effect-how-foreign-firms-benefit-domestic-firms
• benchmarking-aqr-tale-two-leverage-ratios
• butterfly-defect-how-manage-systemic-risk
• patents-and-global-diffusion-new-drugs
• regional-wage-differentials-public-sector

Why the Government is in so much trouble

Yesterday provided the prefect example of they the Government is in so much trouble.

Tony Abbott said there would be NO cuts to the ABC or SBS.
That is a black and white statement.
Yesterday they announced cuts to both organisations.
The thin skinned Ken Parish has written an apolgetic for the Government.
Unfortunately for Ken circumstances haven't changed for Tony Abbott. What he knew before the election are still the same after the election.

Malcolm Turnbull appeared very uncomfortable in attempting to argue the Government hadn't broken a promise.
This is why the Government is in so much trouble.

People can take broken promises if done for the right reasons. What they cannot hack is the government constantly saying they haven't broken promises when they clearly have,
Ken Parish notwithstanding!

Anecdotes on unpaid overtime

I see there is talk about unpaid overtime today.
I thought i would write about some experiences I have had.

I remember a very long time ago ( before e-mail but in-house mail was around) some people complained about me leaving at 5 p.m.
So I then gave everyone a morning brief each day with an intra-net summary. No complaints when they looked at the time it arrived at their desks so to speak.

I remember a really bad boss having a go at me for not having the mobile phone on during the weekend. I told him I wasn't working over the weekend so if he wanted to get in touch he could ring up on the landline.

The one that really brought it home was a job I was quite enjoying at the time. I had a project to do and told the boss on Friday when leaving the office it would be completed on Monday morning.
Consequently when on Monday I was completing the project the boss blew up because I hadn't completed it on the Weekend.
I told him I was busy on the weekend with cricket and other things and if he wanted me to work on the weekend then he would have to pay me.

My experience with Junior cricket at present has most of the parents doing work at home on the week-ends instead of being at the game and watching their boys.

It is a great shame and shows up how poor the management is at a lot of companies.

Trade diversion ain't great news

We had the announcement yesterday of the OZ/China free trade agreement which like every other bilateral agreement was not about free trade. how Orwellian.

The problem of bilateral agreements are they simply encourage trade diversion not greater trade.  This is taught in the earliest lectures if one studies international economics.

Multi-lateral trade agreements are far better than bi-lateral trade agreements For the reasons stated.

For those who have poor memories the advantages of the US/OZ 'free trade agreement were also overstated. Some of us thought so at the time. Others merely stated what their models came out with.

I blame Tim Fisher for this. He campaigned for bi-lateral trade agreements in opposition and then when he became a minister and found out they did not have any of the advantages he alleged still  kept on with them because he had to 'stick with his word.'

Around the Traps 14/11/14

It is time for Around the Traps again.
Many thanks to Club Troppo for its RSS feed and the inimitable Mark Thoma's daily links.
There is a debate on neo-fisher ideas and doverbeach has a weekly book review well worth looking at.
Cricket all weekend so have no idea when I will update

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Andrew Elder on after-race-is-run
• The Kouk on consumer-sentiment-moribund-wage-growth-remains-at-record-lows
• Ken Parish on embracing-a-mature-tax-debate , rough-justice-for-refugees
• Ross Gittins on dont-forget-our-other-environmental-problems
• Mumble on underestimating

Northern America

• Calculated Risk on update-california-budget-surplus
• Mark Thoma gives us frbsf-economic-letter-does-slower-growth-imply-lower-interest-rates
• Brad De Long on our-current-macroeconomic-problems-here-in-the-united-states-daily-focus
• Kruggers on on-income-stagnation , china-deals
• Mark Thoma gives us fed-watch-dudley-plosser-jolts-potential-output

Europe

• Guntram Wolff on europes-fiscal-wormhole  Thanks Brad
• Antonio Fatas on the-false-rhetoric-of-euro-victims-and-offenders  Thanks Mark
• Simon Wren-Lewis on the-imfs-evaluation-of-2010-austerity , getting-germany-argument-right , why-are-conservatives-so-incompetent-at-running-the-economy , a-simple-guide-to-uk-fiscal-deficit , growth-vindicates-greek-austerity
• Chris Dillow on leadership-in-question

Asia

• Edward Lambert on inflation-in-china-is-falling
• Kruggers on people-should-take-my-advice

Wonk

• Kruggers on keynes-derangement-syndrome, the-unwisdom-of-crowding-out-wonkish
• Edward Lambert on john-cochrane-hero-neo-fisherites , intricacies-of-fisher-effect , getting-the-neo-fisherites-wrong , visualizing-various-paths
• David Glasner on john-cochrane-explains-neo-fisherism
• Carola Binder on reading-keynes-at-zero-lower-bound  Thanks Mark
• David Andolfatto on a-dirty-little-secret  Thanks Mark
• Noah Smith on theres-more-to-qe-than-krugman-thinks
• Nick Rowe on the-collective-speed-limit-game , the-over-investment-and-under-saving-theory-of-the-zlb , reverse-engineering-david-andolfattos-and-stephen-williamsons-neo-fisherian-paper
• Mark Thoma on potential-output-and-recessions
• Peter Dorman on two-types-of-preferences-and-relevance , rules-versus-discretion-in-macropolicy
• Tim Taylor on why-experts-buy-generic  Thanks Mark
• Corey Robin on david-ricardo-machiavelli-of-the-margin
• Roger Farmer on repeat-after-me-quantity-of-labordemanded-is-not-always-equal -to-the-labour-supplied Thanks Mark
• Menzie Chinn on preventing-a-global-slowdown

General

• Jim Rose on armistice-day-2014-world-war-i-as-a-bar-fight
• Chris Dillow on the-cold-war-isnt-over , tories-vs-big-business , the-scars-of-class ,bondage , hammetts-world
• Tim Harford on a-passport-to-privilege
• Gerry Jackson on the-idea-that-inflation-can-drive-economic-growth-exposed-as-rubbish-by-economic-history

Climate

• Mark Thoma gives us Jeffrey Sachs on the-climate-breakthrough-in-beijing
• Michael Quirke on nasa-study-finds-no-measurable-warming-in-deep-ocean-since-2005-general-commentary  great comments
• Hotwhopper on someone-needs-to-explain-seasons-to-Eashenbach-and-robertson , in-case-you-missed-it-uah-for-october
• Skeptical Science on frackingupdate2014 , Remote-control-robots-Antarctic-ice-sheet-melting_The-Carbon-Brief
• Geoff Russell on what-the-melbourne-cup-can-teach-us-about-journalists-and-real-emissions-cuts
• Rabett Run on the-montreal-solution , breaking-us-and-china-reach-agreement

Andrew Gelman (Mainly Stats)

• differences-economics-statistics
• illegal-business-controls-america
• history-mrp-highlights-differences-political-science-epidemiology
• crowdsourcing-data-analysis-2-gender-status-science
• patchwriting-wegmanesque-abomination-maybe-theres-something-similar-helpful
• experiment-700000-participants-youll-problem-statistical-significance-b-get-call-massive-scale-c-get-chance-publish-tabloid-top-journal
• statistical-crisis-science-talk-psychology-department-monday-noon
• times-changed
• question-data-mining-bias-finance
• Kaiser Fung on i-cant-believe-im-citing-david-brooks-on-data , financial-and-statistical-incentives-to-over-diagnose-and-over-treat

Genial Dave Giles (Econometrics)

• a-source-of-irritation
• reverse-regression-follow-up
• read-before-you-cite
• normality-testing-non-stationary-data
• cointegration-definitive-overview

Dianne Coyle ( Quirky + Book Reviews)

• thinking-fast-slow-and-other-tempos , forbidden-places , policy-pickles-redux ,the-mind-of-the-public , making-the-future-happen
• Doverbeach on Weekday Reading , Books in Review 2 , Weekday Reading Thursday Edition , weekend reading
• Noah Smith on some-nonfiction-books-i-really-like
• David Rothery on everything-you-need-to-know-about-cometary-exploration
• J Herbie Difonso on child-custody-parental-rights-vs-the-childs-best-interest
• mike Konzal on profits-state-legitimacy-parrillo-goldstein-balko  Thanks mark

Vox wonk

• influencing-household-inflation-expectations
• battle-asia-pacific-ftas
• aqr-and-eurozone-stress-tests
• world-war-i-why-allies-won
• what-caused-eurozone-s-crisis
• banking-crises-and-sovereign-defaults-emerging-markets
• recent-slowdown-global-trade
• contagion-european-sovereign-debt-crisis
• bankers-bonuses-and-performance-sensitivity
• sticky-information-and-expectations-forecasters
• global-trade-disorder-new-gta-data
• why-keynes-important-today
• safe-asset-eurozone-qe-proposal
• high-marginal-tax-rates-top-1
• globalisation-and-rise-robots
• ttip-about-regulatory-coherence
• career-prospects-overeducated-americans

Wages Breakout update

The ABS released its Wage price index.

Here it is.
Real wages are falling.

Stave Kates and Judith Sloan are on the money with their Wages breakout.

Must be the highly regulated labour market at work!

Dover Beach

Dover Beach has had a blog for a while now.
it is called The ordeal of conciousness.

If you are a social conservative like I you will enjoy the blog. He does have a great set of books reviewed or talked about on Mondays as well( which will always be on my Around the Traps)
Any blog which has the screwtape letters narrated by John Cleese is always worth while.

His taste are sometimes too catholic for me ( pun intended) but it is always interesting.

My guess is Dover Beach will be astonished I have said all of the above!

Postscript.
his Books in review 2 is an absolute cracker.

Why are people so down on Bill Shorten?

The one thing I find quite bewildering these days are various people saying Bill Shorten is doing a bad job.
He is the Opposition Leader in the first term of a NEW Government.
The polls ( in reality the only metric to take notice of) has the ALP winning an election easily if an election was held today. This is unheard of.

A first term Government is usually well ahead in the polls heading towards a very comfortable second term.
Now the polls could well change in the time before the next election however a person who says Bill Shorten is doing a bad job at present  given the polls is simply a complete and utter idiot.


Andrew Elder on related issues.

Temperatures in Australia

I do find it strange that some people love to parade their ignorance about the BOM has wiped the temperatures from early years .

Steve from Brisbane has linked to a great article on this so I will let him take the glory.

Just quietly it is an interesting blog.

Around the Traps 7/11/14

It is time for Around the Traps again.Very busy with Cricket on the weekend but will try to update sometime.

Genial Dave Giles is on fire. So is Club Troppo


Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• The Kouk on why-is-abbott-considering-a-gst-hike , wake-up-rba
• David Walker on the-rocket-equation-keeps-tyrannising-us
• Ken Parish on demonising-victims-and-understanding-grief , ben-elthams-cheap-education-funding-shot-at-tone-and-chrissie , from-assimilation-to-black-power-to-gordon-gekko-to-where
• Nick Gruen on dick-hamer-the-liberal-liberal
• Bruce Haigh on Australia and WW1 Porportion or Propaganda
• Brendon O'Reilly on Capital disaster with Asbestos contaminated houses
• Ross Gittins on you-were-stranger-so-we-wouldnt-take-you-in
• Greg Jericho on cost-of-living-an-interest-rate-rise-could-turn-up-the-political-heat, big-four-banks-profits-soar-but-dont-expect-any-gratitude-for-taxpayer-help
• Kevin Bonham on poll-roundup-two-steps-forward-one-step-backwards
• Mumble on 1972_in_context

Northern America

• Livio De Matteo on comparing-health-spending-restraint-past-and-present
• Pat Higgins on data-dependence-and-liftoff-in-the-federal-funds-rate
• Jan Groen on forecasting-inflation-with-fundamentals-its-hard  Thanks Mark
• Sandwichman on public-works-economic-stabilization-and-cost-benefit-sophistry
• Lei Fung and Pedro Silas on wage-growth-of-part-time-versus-full-time-workers
• Mark thoma gives us Tim Duy on fed-watch-nonsense , fed-watch-employment-report-yellen-speech

Europe

• Simon Wren-Lewis on a-campaign-to-mislead-thisweek-uk
• Stephen Kinsella on potential-output-from-a-euro-area-perspective
• Christian Odenahl on greek-programme-greece  Thanks Mark
• Menzie Chinn on rouble-floats-and-sinks , lunatic-fringe-alert
• Simon Wren-Lewis on a-comment-on-kocherlakotas-suggestions , germany-and-pre-recession-cost-cutting , george-osbornes-european-triumphl
• Tony Yates on ecb-and-qe-asking-for-sparkling-water-when-all-they-will-give-you-is-the-miserable-punchbowl Thanks Mark

Asia

• Kruggers on japan-on-the-brink
• Brad De Long on who-really-thinks-japan-is-argentina-daily-focus

Wonk

• Jon Hartley on estimating-monetary-policy-rules-around-the-zero-bound Thanks Mark
• James Hamilton on evaluation-of-quantitative-easing
• Simon Wren-Lewis on fighting-last-war
• Peter Temin and David Vines on why-keynes-important-today  Thanks Brad
• Richard Sutch on The Liquidity trap, the great depression and unconventional policy  Thanks Brad
• Kruggers on why-dont-we-see-more-macroeconomic-populism , spending-and-growth-2009-13
• Edward Lambert on article-with-insights-into-labor-share
• Nick Rowe on neo-fisherites-and-the-scandinavian-flick , neo-fisherites-again-schmitt-grohe-and-uribe
• Pro growth Liberal on neo-fisherian-nonsense
• Chris Dillow on stagnation-noise-vs-signal , basic-income-left-right , rationality-a-second-best-theorem
• Menzie Chinn on known-unknowns-in-macro
• Gerry Jackson on steve-kates-gets-it-badly-wrong-on-roosevelt-the-great-depression-and-government-spending
• David Glasner on is-insanity-breaking-out-in-switzerland
• Livio De Matteo on bond-finance-and-the-great-depression

General

• Paul Mason on sharkespeare-marxism-feudalism-capitalism  Thanks Mark
• Chris Dillow on the-capitalism-question
• Jim Rose on the-day-that-sex-discrimination-died-solomon-polachek-on-the-gender-earnings-gap
• Alex Bryson on happier-workers-higher-profits
• Nick Gruen on very-clever-people-being-not-so-clever
• Belle Waring on what-do-you-tell-your-children-about-the-internet

Climate

• Roger Jones on new-ipcc-report-busting-myths-both-scientific-and-economic
• Steve from Brisbane on future-may-be-worse-than-thought-for-coral-reefs , el-nino-confusion-again
• Robert Stavins on the-final-stage-of-ipcc-ar5-last-weeks-outcome-in-copenhagen
• William Connolley on global-warming-in-the-mountains
• Rabett run on deja-vu-all-over-again
• Science of Doom on natural-variability-and-chaos-three-attribution-fingerprints

Andrew Gelman (Mainly Stats)

• ray-write
• talk-today-university-michigan-4pm-institute-social-research
• important-statement-macartan-humphreys-ethics-social-science-research
• firth-bias-correction-penalization-weakly-informative-priors-case-log-f-priors-logistic-related-regressions
• debate-kidney-transplant-stats
• scientists-behaving-badly
• im-posting-topic
• Kaiser Fung on how-a-fraud-detection-algorithm-conspired-to-ruin-my-recent-trip

Genial Dave Giles (Econometrics)

• confusing-charts
• central-and-non-central-distributions
• computing-power-functions
• update-to-ardl-add-in-for-eviews
• the-village-idiot-hypothesis
• the-econometrics-of-temporal-aggregation V- testing-for-normality
• a-reverse-regression-inequailty
• Frances Diebold on a-few-words-of-tribute-to-lawrence-r.-klein  Thanks Mark
• Nick Rowe on reverse-regression-and-the-great-gatsby-curve

Dianne Coyle (Quirky + Book Reviews)

• nvestment-and-values , world-cities , read-this-book
• Noah Smith on preview-trillion-dollar-economists , book-review-debt-first-5000-years
• Tim Harford on trading-places-with-a-rat
• Doverbeach on books in review  I gather this is a weekly thing so you will see it on a regular basis

Vox wonk

• fixing-europe-short-and-long-run-proposal
• monetary-policy-and-long-term-trends
• us-rate-hike-fears-are-unwarranted
• social-link-formation-and-economic-outcomes
• demography-and-economics-look-past-past
• impact-fed-s-exit-india
• fiscal-effects-immigration-uk
• immigration-and-public-finances
• policy-uncertainty-spillovers-emerging-markets-evidence-capital-flows
• countering-sanctions-unequal-geographic-impact-economic-sanctions-north-korea
• measuring-competitiveness-china-s-processed-exports
• the-return-of-the-cold-trade-war
• green-policies-promote-eurozone-growth
• systemic-price-mis-measurement-rethinking-ppp
• children-berlin-wall-fall
• zero-lower-bound-has-not-been-very-severe
• market-based-solution-price-externalities
• latin-americas-missing-global-value-chains

Polling and the Government

The inimitable Kevin Bonham has just written on the latest polling where he admits his previous thoughts were wrong. i.e. the polling was coming back to the government and the budget blow-out was over.

My thoughts are thus:
The ALP was essentially defeated by the exchange rate. When the Terms of Trade fell quite a bit the exchange rate remained high which thus condemned nominal GDP to being extremely weak.

If the exchange rate eventually falls to rational levels this will more than offset the negative influence on nominal GDP from the falling terms of trade and the government will comfortably win the next election.
If the exchange does not fall to these levels then all bets are off.

For what occurs when the nominal economy is weak then read the-investors-guide-to-national-accounts by Skeptikoi

Ebola

The Government is to be dragged kicking and screaming into sending people to Africa to attempt the ebola virus.
It is about time. Their excuses were always lame.
You need to nip this in the bud where it is at present and not allow it to occur in other areas.

UPDATE
The government complains they couldn't get any agreements from governments however:
1) How did certain not for profit agencies who are working there get such agreements yet the Government couldn't?
2) the EC offered the government an agreement and they sat of their hands.

This has not been the government's finest hour

Apology

Reader JC  made a comment that somehow I deleted. I didn't mean to so profuse apologies.

What would a government do if they believed in climate change

A government that believed in climate change would do a number of things but the very first thing they would do would be to put a price on carbon either directly through a ETS or indirectly through a carbon tax. This would correct the externality and enable the market to do its work.

A government that did not believe in climate change but said it did because of polling would institute a policy of direct action where the government  determined what was needed, Industry gets a handout for polluting the environment and any action was limited by the amount of government funds.

The Magnificent Wanderers

The Western Sydney Wanderers won the Asian Champions league on Sunday morning.
After winning in the first leg 1-0 they hung on to draw the second leg 0-0 to win over the two legs.

As in any sports game they did have the luck going their way and the opposition obviously let the pressure get to them particularly when they could not convert any of their numerous chances into goals.

This club has only been going three years yet in those three years they have won the premiership and lost two grand finals. They easily have the best fanbase of any sporting team. The RBB are already a legend and more than a match for for football team in the world!
Indeed although both my sons are Fanatical Wanderers fans I go to the  matches just to soak up the atmosphere. It is something to behold.

The Wanderers get more fans to their matches than the Parramatta league team whose home ground it is!!

Well done Wanderers.