some thoughts on the dismissal

November 11 is a very interesting day in Australia. We have Armistice or Remembrance day.  I prefer Armistice day.

We have Ned Kelly's hanging.

But we also had the dismissal of the the ALP government in 1975.

My memory of the dismissal of Gough Whitlam was studying at home whilst listening to Steve Liebman on 2UE. He was talking to Katherine West when his Canberra correspondent rang in ( he was Kevin someone who was the Canberra correspondent for the Daily Telegraph). He informed the program that Gough had been sacked. Liebman's reaction was "shit"

I remember thinking at the time the Liberals were way too impatient. They merely had to wait for the election for everyone to vote against the present government.  The ALP government had finally gotten some decent ministers. Hayden, McCellend, Wriedt were all quite good minsters and the government was finally looking competent.

The dismissal changed my vote from voting for the liberals to voting for the ALP purely because of their actions of essentially raping the constitution.
There are new books ( by Paul Kelly and Jenny Hocking) on the crisis bolstered by the opening up of papers hitherto unread.
These papers do not help Kerr's Fraser's. Mason's, Barwick's or even Whitlam's reputations at ball.

It will never occur again. Fraser never had the legitimacy to follow through on any policy.

It made the election of the ALP in 1983 that much easier.

The Ice age scare

Nick Stokes does everyone a favour by showing up what scientists were saying in the 70s even 60s about the planet cooling.

Has technology improved our life like we thought it would ?

I remember way back in high school and even at Uni the major thought about technology was how would we spend all this extra leisure time?

Unfortunately it hasn't turned out like that.
I said last week one of the problems of junior cricket is the lack of parents, This is directly due to the parents working at home on Saturday morning.
I have a mate who refuses a smart phone at any job he has. He believes  ,rightly in my view, that it means means extra work for no pay.

I have two anecdotes.
One from a long time ago when I arrived to work one Monday morning and was asked by my boss at the Monday meeting why my mobile was turned off on the weekend. I told him because I didn't work on the week-end!

I remember another occasion I left work on a Friday saying I had so much left to do on a certain project.  i was asked again when I arrived at work early Monday morning what I had to do and I said the same as I told him on Friday. He then asked me why I hadn't finished it on the weekend. I then told him of not only my wedding anniversary but also of two grand finals that occurred over the weekend and then asked him which of those things he wanted me to cancel.

Technology is a blessing. I realise this just from a cricket administration point of view but it also has let employers make people work  unpaid overtime at home and this is a bad thing. It is also unsustainable.I know this from all the feedback I am getting from volunteer organisations.

Around the Traps 6/11/15

It is time for Around the Traps again.
I read all articles however I do not support all views. I simply give air to interesting points of view.

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• James Horne on as-drought-looms-the-murray-darling-is-in-much-healthier-shape-just-dont-get-complacent
• Marc C Scott on /optus-the-new-player-in-australias-sports-media-rights-battle
• Emma Connor on Why-no-tears-will-be-shed-for-Australias-knights-and-dames
• Croaking Cassandra on another-productivity-commission-inquiry , how-the-reserve-bank-thinks-we-should-evaluate-its-monetary-policy, Unemployment a pretty poor record, thinking-further-about-employment-and-unemployment , the-joint-macroeconomic-declaration
• Mark the Ballot on aggregation-and-observations
• Tomas Mitchell on gst-compensation-trades-one-inefficiency-for-another-and-wont-achieve-fairness
• Stephen Hatfield-Dodds on study-australians-can-be-sustainable-without-sacrificing-lifestyle-or-economy
• Micharl Brull on israeli-government-propaganda-still-gets-facebook-likes-despite-linking-to-wrong-story
• Ross Gittins on why-were-sure-to-be-voting-on-rise-in-GST
• The Kouk on why-the-aussie-dollar-will-move-higher
• After Grog Blog on the FIRST TEST
• Flavio Menzies on increasing-gst-to-cut-income-tax-would-be-a-zero-sum-game
• Greg Jericho on turnbull-has-improved-confidence-but-what-the-economy-needs-is-more-spending

Northern America

• Rhys Bidder on are-wages-useful-in-forecasting-price-inflation Thanks Mark
• James Hamilton on u-s-economy-keeps-growing
• Menzie Chinn on the-opening-of-the-american-macroeconomy-and-the-implications-for-monetary-policy
• Edward Lambert on inc-soc-ben-is-lm
• Timothy Taylor on update-on-national-school-lunch-program
• Mark Thoma gives us Tim Duy on fed-watch-what-2016-might-bring
• Brad De Long on secular-stagnation-vs-ben-bernanke

Europe

• Bahar Baser and Ahmet Ozturk on turkey-election-erdogan-and-the-akp-get-majority-back-amid-climate-of-violence-and-fear
• Simon Wren-Lewis on the-ecb-as-sovereign-lender-of-last-resiort, politically-impossible, public-investment-has-george-started-listening-to-economists
• Chris Dillow on intellect-in-politics
• Daniel Wokes on Erdogan-will-the-strongman-of-Europe-evolve-into-a-democratic-progressive
• Murat Es and Rolien Hoyng on censorship-and-conspiracy-theories-rule-day-in-post-election-turkey
• Tony Yates on monetary-policy-hypotheticals , inflation-overshooting-should-not-be-a-major-concern

Asia

• Brendan Thomas-Loone on China-US-New-study-reveals-dramatic-tilt-in-military-balance
• Leon Berkemans on Chinas-GDP-data-Reason-to-keep-on-believing
• Menzies Chinn on guest-contribution-text-of-trans-pacific-partnership-agreement-now-online

Wonk

• Kruggers on explaining-trade-weakness-wonkish, liquidity-traps-temporary-and-permanent, demand-creates-its-own-supply , currency-wars-at-the-zlb
• David Andolfatto on neofisherism-without-rational-expectations
• Brad De Long on cracking-the-hard-shell-of-the-macroeconomic-knut-keynesian-friedmanite-and-wicksellian-epistemes-in-macroeconomics
• Edward Lambert on keynes-ed-id-ir, keynes-promise-ed
• Carola Binder on did-natural-rate-fall
• Simon Wren-Lewis on fiscal-council-developments, tax-cuts-vs-spending-vs-helicopters
• Chris Dillow on on-misunderstanding-economics
• Antonio Fatas on the-missing-lowflation-revolution
• Noah Smith on conservatives-don-t-have-a-secret-formula-for-growth, growth-vs-static-efficiency
• Larry Summers on reconstructing-keynesian-macroeconomics
• Nick Rowe on secular-stagnation-and-mutual-fund-marxism , business-cycle-theory-vs-growth-theory
• Noah Smith on big-tfp-data-mystery
• Tony Yates on is-monetary-policy-adventurism-by-politicians-ok
• Timothy Taylor on land-use-regulations-vs-negotiations
• Antonio Fatas on the-missing-lowflation-revolution
• Nick Gruen on the-costs-of-social-breakdown-anomie-despair
• David Glasner on the-well-defined-but-nearly-useless-natural-rate-of-interest

General

• Ryan Spencer on five-reasons-why-you-should-read-aloud-to-your-kids-and-pick-their-favourite-book
• Barkely Rosser on george-will-starting-out-smart-and-dumbs-down-anti-semtism
• Lord Keynes on self-refuting-nonsense
• Chris Dillow on grit-beats-talent 
• David Morrison on al-qaeda-isis-and-wider-fallout-from-iraq-invasion

Climate

• Andrew Gilkson on melting-antarctic-ice-sheets-and-sea-level-rise-a-warning-from-the-future 
• hotwhopper on antarctic-ice-growing-or-shrinking-nasa
• and Then Theres Physics on greenland-and-climate-science-denial, honesty-and-hypocrisy , arguing-ad-argumentam-in-an-ad-hominem-world , steve-koonin-in-the-new-york-times
• moyhu on ncepncar-index-up-02
• Harry Clarke on droughts-climate-change-some-ideas-about-policy , climate-change-policy-under-uncertainty-2
• Stoat on mass-gains-of-the-antarctic-ice-sheet-exceed-losses
• Kevin C on homogenization_of_temperature_data
• David Appell on coastal-west-antarctic-gaining-snow-mass
• Artic sea ice blog on piomas-november-2015
• Greg Laden on evidence-of-high-climate-sensitivity
• Mitchell Black , Andrew King and David Karoly on a-year-of-records-the-human-role-in-2014s-wild-weather
• Tamino on thoughtful-insightful-intelligent-commentary
• Ingenious Pursuits on monckton-pause-update-its-got-to-go
• What's up with that Watts on mistakes-learning-replicatingclaims
• Rabette run on the-deep-blue-sea

Andrew Gelman ( mainly stats)

• cauchy-priors-for-logistic-regression-coefficients
• stop screaming already
• another-reminder-that-david-brooks-is-very-good-at-being-david-brooks
• the-tabloids-strike-again-2
• local-instruments-global-extrapolation
• why-retraction-watch-remains-necessary
• Kaiser Fung on keep-eating-those-sausages , rip-gft

Genial Dave Giles ( econometrics)

• Marc Bellemare on multi-collinearity

Dianne Coyle ( Quirky + Book Reviews)

• american-growth , winner-of-the-enlightened-economist-prize-2015, the-devil-take-the-debt, economic-progress
• Frances Woolley on toasted-pumpkin-seeds-or-waste-is-a-value-judgement
• Mathew Yglesias on star_trek_movies_and_tv_series_which_are_the_best_why  Thanks Brad

Vox wonk

• exchange-rates-still-matter-trade
• social-networks-ethnicity-and-entrepreneurship
• german-reunification-lessons-european-fiscal-union
• european-smes-struggle-raise-equity-capital
• securitisation-and-growth-collateral-matters
• online-hiring-offshore-workers
• copyright-and-creativity-lessons-italian-opera
• restarting-global-economy
• offshoring-and-geography-british-jobs
• how-tackle-europe-s-non-performing-loan-problem
• welcome-zlb-global-economy

Cricket and stuff

The First Test against the Kiwis ( I think it could a be beauty) starts today and it got me thinking.

This is the first cricket season for fourteen seasons I won't be coaching cricket. For the first time I can sleep in on Saturdays. I get to the game I am umpiring before the toss and can inspect the ground!

I do miss the coaching and seeing the enthusiasm of the boys. We finished on a high though. Unbeaten through out the season and winning a close final.

I won't miss little support from parents though. There is a lot of work to do in coaching a team.One embarrassing thing that occurred in recent times was that I had no -one to score when we were fielding.
I do think that technology has decreased our leisure time not increased it.

I do wonder about the future of cricket when parents do not have the time to watch their boys for a morning  at all during the season even in a final where their team are the favorites.

Update:

Channel Nine have really boring people as commentators bar Chapelli.
the ABC do seem to be trying to ape channel nine. Gerard Whately is a wonderful commentator on many sports and can commentate on other sports but not cricket.

Star Trek. The best post for Trekkies

If you are a trekkie like me me then THIS is essential reading.

I don't agree with all of it but who cares!

Tax Reform

We had a PBO estimate yesterday into a MP reference to them about how much revenue a GST would gain if it was essentially the same as in New Zealand.

We have a few problems when discussing this.

If you raise and broaden the GST ( which I  have no problem with ) the following things need to be done:

• the poor have to be compensated
• The States have to get rid of taxes that inhibit economic activity. as the HENRY Review recommended.
• The States need more revenue to compensate for the funds the Federal government are no longer going to give them
• It needs to gain more revenue to the States over and above the last point so the Federal government can cut income taxes ( from monies they no longer have to give to the States)

Thus you have to raise one hellva lot of revenue to do all these things.

I do not have any problems with any of the above items but I do think it would be politically courageous.

I do agree with Noah Smith