A nice Trip

I have been away for a number of days.
I went to a place called Hillview which is not far from wither Wingham or Taree. My wife has friends who have retired there there.

They have now got the internet. It is pure countryside. The air is pure , the only noise are the animals and at this time of year it isn't too hot.

On a typical afternoon it is very pleasant to sit on the porch and sip red wine whilst taking in the sensational views.

A few things in no order of importance.

• The drive along the pacific highway is boring. Trees , more trees and even more damned trees. Oh for some green countryside or a bit of the ocean.
• The only upside of using the highway is fuel economy. Our Kia Cerato gets in the high 9s in fuel economy around the city. We got to 6 on the trip.
• The ABC is an absolute boon in the countryside. It was a great pleasure to listen to ABC classic. ABC local radio is an absolute must listen whenever there is a bushfire.
• homegrown vegetables taste way better than even those we buy at the local fruit and veg at Eastwood.
• time goes much slower in the country. you can relax very easily.
• with the advent of the NBN living in the countryside is becoming a very attractive proposition.
• the only problem in retiring to the countryside is your family cannot visit you all that often

Around the Traps 28/9/18

It is time again for Around the Traps

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Peter Goss on three-charts-on-why-catholic-primary-school-parents-can-afford-to-pay-more
• Brendan Cotton on super-if-labor-really-wanted-to-help-women-in-retirement-it-would-do-something-else
• Ralph Hampson on australias-residential-aged-care-facilities-are-getting-bigger-and-less-home-like
• Kate Griffiths et al on influence-in-australian-politics-needs-an-urgent-overhaul-heres-how-to-do-it
• Croaking Cassandra on inflation-and-the-tax-system , once-were-traders, not-much-business-investment,more-on-orr, shame-on-our-mps
• Kevin Bonham on poll-roundup-current-polls-arent-all-that-meaningful
• Ross Gittins on frydenberg-must-lift-treasurys-game-on-spending-control.political-corruption-with-so-much-smoke-there-must-be-fire, how-economists-lost-their-fear-of-minimum-wages
• Peter Manning on despite-her-good-intentions-michelle-guthrie-was-never-the-right-fit-for-the-abc
• Andrew Dodd on abc-boss-michelle-guthrie-sacked-but-the-board-wont-say-why, with-justin-milne-gone-how-does-the-abc-go-about-restoring-its-crucial-independence
• Dennis Muller on michelle-guthries-stint-at-abc-helm-had-a-key-weakness-she-failed-to-back-the-journalists
• Kevin McQuillan on restoring-australia-pacific-media-presence
• Rachel Ong ViforJ et al on when-falling-home-ownership-and-ageing-baby-boomers-collide
• Christopher Standen on privatising-westconnex-is-the-biggest-waste-of-public-funds-for-corporate-gain-in-australian-history
• Rick Sarre on why-the-increased-penalties-for-strawberry-sabotage-will-do-little-to-prevent-the-crime
• Greg Jericho on should-we-worry-about-a-crash-of-the-housing-market-lets-all-take-a-deep-breath
• Mark the Ballot on aggregated-poll-update , updated-aggregation
• Warren Hogan on battle-won-our-budget-woes-are-behind-us
• Susan Hutchinson on australia-dodging-its-terrorism-obligations
• Rose O'Dea and Shinichi Nakagawa on study-of-1-6-million-grades-shows-little-gender-difference-in-maths-and-science-at-school
• Andrew Linden on abc-board-chair-over-reaches-in-a-bid-to-appease-hostile-government
• Peter Fray and Derek Wilding on how-abc-chairman-justin-milne-compromised-the-independence-of-the-national-broadcaster
• Richard Holden on vital-signs-for-all-its-worth-the-banking-royal-commission-could-hurt-a-generation-of-battlers
• The Kouk on government-debt-is-at-a-record-high

Northern America

• Menzie Chinn on guest-contribution-trump-renews-charges-of-chinese-currency-manipulation, does-the-fed-care-about-the-rest-of-the-world, guest-contribution-all-in-us-trade-balance-led-by-ag-exports
• Jeremy Nalwaik on inflation expectations and alternative hypotheses Thanks Brad
• Macro Musings on fomc-preview-we-have-nerve-to-invert-the-curve
• the conversable economist on corporate-debt-and-leveraged-loans-financial-snags-ahead, rumination-why-not-military-war-on-trade, portability-of-occupational-licenses
• Calculated Risk on housing-inventory-tracking, real-house-prices-and-price-to-rent-ratio-in-august, a-few-comments-on-august-new-home-sales
• Macro Mania on what-is-yield-curve-forecasting
• Michael Strain on slow-wage-growth-is-based-on-emotions-and-economics Thanks Brad
• Robert Shiller on is-the-us-stock-market-a-bubble Thanks Mark
• Kruggers on tariffs-trump-corrupt Thanks Mark
• Thomas Wright on trump-united-nations-bolton-foreign-policy-iran-north-korea-russia
• Barkley Rosser on the-us-mexico-trade-deal-dies
• Uneasy Money on only-idiots-think-that-judges-are-umpires-and-only-cads-say-that-they-think-so

Europe

• Mainly Macro on has-qualities-but-negotiating-skills-is-not-one-of-them, the-final-deal-referendum-question
• Coppolla comment on cake-and-cherries
• Lord Keynes on austerity-in-pre-1938-fascist-austria

Asia

• Max Walden on malaysia-allowing-students-find-voice
• Nicole Talmacs on chinese-box-office-dilemma
• David Brewster on air-traffic-control-china-and-india-compete
• Benjamin Habib on economic-growth-and-trump-proofing-why-the-latest-inter-korea-summit-matters
• Jeremy Chiang and Alan Yang on china-s-divide-and-conquer-charm-offensive
• Roland Rajah on sliding-rupiah-causes-jakarta-jitters
• Brad Setser on how-did-china-manage-its-currency-over-summer Thanks Mark 
• Alexia Underwood on trump-israel-palestinians-aid-cuts-un-general-assembly
• Arti Betigeri on india-game-changing-health-care-initiative

Wonk

• Cassandra's Legacy on did-club-of-rome-ever-disavow-limits-to-growth
• Nic Bisley on the-risks-of-a-new-cold-war-between-the-us-and-china-are-real-heres-why
• Rodger Shanahan on eu-and-iran-push-back-against-us-sanctions
• Economic Principals on What have we learned since Bagehot Thanks Mark
• global inequality on hayekian-communism , 11/2-adam-smiths Thanks Mark
• Kruggers on steeper-versus-deeper-wonkish
• Ben Bernanke on the-housing-bubble-the-credit-crunch-and-the-great-recession-reply-to-paul-krugman Thanks Mark
• Dean Baker on response-to-bernanke-on-the-bubble-versus-financial-crisis-story-of-the-great-recession Thanks Mark
• promarket on pursuers-truth-peddlers-influence
• Alex Tabaarrok on liberal-radicalism-mechanism-producing-public-goods
• the conversable economist on some-notes-on-corporations-and-social-values

General

• David Logan and Stewart Nestead on ive-always-wondered-are-suvs-and-4wds-safer-than-other-cars
• Tim Harford on didyourholidaymakeyoumorecreative

Climate

• David Appell on noaa-race-track-graph
• arctic sea ice on hurricane-florence-and-arctic-sea-ice
• and Then Theres Physics on hurricanes-and-carbon-cuts
• Rabett run on while-elis-away-arctics-that-way
• skeptical science on new study reconciles a dispute global warming will happen, retraction of florides et all
• Open Mind on arctic-sea-ice-for-suckers-ron-clutz-shows-how-to-hide-the-decline
• Stoat on bob-and-richard-and-mighty-shtwit-storm
• Tyler Cowen on climate-change-may-expensive-think
• Arctic Sea Ice on 2018-arctic-sea-ice-minimum

Andrew Gelman (mainly stats)

• tweeking-big-problem-not-think
• dont-calculate-post-hoc-power-using-observed-estimate-effect-size
• youve got data on 35 countriesbut its really just N=3 groups
• potential-big-problem-placebo-tests-econometrics-theyre-subject-difference-significant-non-significant-not-statistically-significant-issue
• using-stacking-to-average-bayesian-predictive-distributions-with-discussion
• Kaiser Fung on think-twice-before-you-waze,chip-cards-example-of-predicting-invariables
• Statschat on reading-clickbait

Genial Dave Giles (econmetrics)

• No Hesitations on nber-wps-hit-25000

Dianne Coyle (quirky + book reviews)

• Tyler Cowen on what-ive-been-reading, dream-machine-j-c-r-licklider-revolution-made-computing-personal
• Kaiser Fung on a-purely-mathematical-theory-of-risk-is-not-enough

Vox wonk

• immigrant-entrepreneurship-america
• cross-country-differences-risk-attitudes-towards-financial-investment
• do-women-anticipate-employment-effects-motherhood-evidence-and-implications
• influence-leaders-criminal-decisions
• why-friends-give-do-not-want-receive-money
• tax-bargaining
• underemployment-us-and-europe
• why-women-matter-monetary-policymaking
• central-bank-swap-lines
• heterogeneous-impact-brexit-firms
• interest-rate-expectations-and-monetary-policy-low-interest-rate-setting
• ownership-and-power-structure-together-last
• resilience-eu-member-states-global-crisis
• natural-rate-portfolio-flows
• three-tariff-lessons-us-interwar-history
• fiscal-space-government-spending-and-tax-rate-cyclicality-patterns
• europes-fiscal-policy-doom-loop
• rational-backlash-against-globalisation
• measuring-unfair-inequality
• curiously-varied-impact-recessions-political-stability
• copy-trading-platforms-and-risk-taking
• culture-matters-saving-behaviour
• third-party-labour-market-effects-china-s-exports

Milne and the rest of the board must go

The Board of the ABC are simply smelling of a deep stink.

Milne has directed the previous Managing director to sack certain journalists because he thought the government did not like them and it inhibited getting the right amount of money from the government.
It does appear Milne is acting like Murdoch's editors. There was and is no clear instruction to take a particular line from the government. He was simply acting on what he thought they wanted.

A few things to be said here.

First it is not the job of anyone on the board to sack anyone BAR the Managing Director.

Second It appears Guthrie informed the board of Milne's directions to her re the sackings.
Despite this the board agreed with Milne that Guthrie had to go. Milne and the rest of the board appear to have a Steve Kates  understanding of politics. The very idea that if you sack a journalist the government does not like that you would get more money illustrates the whole Board does not understand what the word political  corruption means.

Thirdly and related to the last point the issue shows the Board has not one iota of what constitutes Journalism

Fourthly assume every so madly the sackings went through. how do you think that would affect all journalists at the ABC?

Fifthly this follows on on how the government of the day would react. They would know how to get favourable treatment.

The whole matter is an absolute disgrace both to the current Board and the government who appointed them


update:

Milne has gawn. This man was no idea of basic australian polity
                 

The budget is balanced

The final figures for the budget of 2017/18 were released yesterday.
Naturally given the internet some-one has written about it before me and done a better job than I would have.
Warren Hogan has done this.
One interesting point is the estimates for the NDIS were way too much. This could very well mean the large increases we told previously was making it a very costly operation for the budget are over. Most people associated with the industry did say the increase in costs would be large to start with. It could well be they were right all along.

This 'improvement' has come about because of large increases in revenues.Those large tax deductions companies were using after the GFC have now gone. also important the Current government has continued the use of spending restraint the previous government utilised. However as Ross Gittins points out all the low hanging fruit has gone. to continue this restraint is going to be much much harder and it is hard to see this.


A couple of associated points.
The budget was already in balance on an accrual accounting basis. What I find amazing ( perhaps not) is that the budget papers never have the accrual figures in them. Why not? Cash accounting can be very easy to manipulate. Both parties have done this and continue to do this.

The structural balance of the budget has improved. Why?  The deficit was there because of revenue decisions made. No decisions have been made to improve revenues over the business cycle so the mystery continues. We should note the ALP already has a number of such policies to enact if they win office.
I strongly suspect that any major economic downturn will amazingly show a deterioration in the structural budget as occurred in Ireland following the GFC.

NOW  is the time for fiscal austerity. Strong nominal GDP growth means fiscal consolidation will facilitate economic growth as Keynes said in 1936 and not hold it back as it does when the economy is weak.

On a political note on my back of envelop calculations the ALP would have the Revenue to GDP ratio back to levls we saw when John Howard was Prime Minister.

ABC Boss gawn

The ABC Board has shown the Managing Director the door.
I tend to agree with Andrew Dodd. I still have little idea of why she was sacked. Tsk Tsk, Fancy the ABC imitating the private sector.

I also agree with Peter Manning that on my observations she was never the right person to head the ABC.

In my many years of experience of finding some-one to replace some-one who has left or to fill a newly created job you have to make up your mind which are the most important qualities you need. After that is is problematic on what other qualities are very helpful for the job.

With regard to the Managing Director the two essential skills would be:

1. Political Smarts This not only incorporates understanding what happens at Senate hearings but also defending the ABC against Murdoch press lies. Mark Scott knew what to do at committee hearings. When Abetz alleged 'left-wing' bias in always vague team he said that must be why the ABS has produced more Liberal  politicians than Labor ones!  David Hill is another one. When Hawke was on the attack against the ABC Hill counter-attacked with the highly effective 10c a day.  He also knew how vital the ABC is to Rural Australia.
2. They must understand journalism. the ABC is not just a news network but that is where most of the criticism comes from. If you do not understand journalism you will not not how to defend mostly against wilful ignorance. see Dennis Muller

It is significant that Guthrie had neither! Moreover even in her last days it appeared she still little idea of either. however the Board that appointed her knew that!

Milne's position is now untenable

The cricket season cometh

At least I get to umpire a game of cricket on Saturday. ( Wouldn't it be ironic if having gone through the first football season in some 40 years without one round being washed out the first days play is curtailed because of rain!!)

This season is a first for me. I usually umpire for the local association as they start on the second Saturday of September but this season The Northern District Cricket Association ( NDCA)  and the North Shore Cricket Association ( NSCA) will have 6 divisions of cricket including the usual two turf competitions.

Mysteriously the NSCA do not start until after the October long weekend. Thus no matches to umpire until this Saturday.

For the first time in its history the Shires umpires now have more umpires than matches  and I have one of the newbies on Saturday. It seems only yesterday I was umpiring my first game at Lane cove and having to call a 'bowler' for throwing'

I mostly umpire in D grade and this is usually well behaved. I put this down as  teams are made up young boys with potential and some old experienced hands.

There is only one problem with umpiring. The weather is usually too hot. What happened to getting old and feeling the cold. It seems the  opposite is occurring to me. Once the sun is out in Sydanee you can wear a T shirt even in winter.

Around the Traps 21/9/18

It is time again for Around the Traps

Aussie,Aussie,Aussie,Oy,Oy,Oy

• Stephen Howes on why-yet-another-visa-for-farm-work-makes-no-sense
• Croaking Cassandra on orr-on-women-and-himself, a-bouquet-for-the-government, automation-future-of-work-and-other-distractions, is-this-what-leadership-looks-like, a-stuff-up-by-statistics-new-zealand
• Ross Gittins on long-way-to-go-to-get-banks-back-in-their-box, aged-care-abuses-latest-of-many-mistakes
• Rafal Chomik on its-hard-to-make-money-in-aged-care-and-thats-part-of-the-problem
• Mark the Ballot on ipsos-47-to-53-in-labors-favour
• Greg Jericho on keep-newstart-low-so-young-beach-bums-dont-stay-on-it-thats-laughable
• Sasha Petrova on hot-hand-darts
• Erin O'Donnell and Avril Horne on giving-environmental-water-to-drought-stricken-farmers-sounds-straightforward-but-its-a-bad-idea
• Suzi Kerr on why-nzs-emissions-trading-scheme-should-have-an-auction-reserve-price
• Giovanni De Lieto on trump-versus-china-means-picking-sides
• Elise Bant on fees-for-no-service-how-asic-is-trying-to-make-corporate-misconduct-hurt
• Frank Bongiorno on just-a-regular-joe-or-bill-or-scomo-how-our-leaders-work-hard-at-being-ordinary-joe
• Dennis Muller on media-power-why-the-full-story-of-murdoch-stokes-and-the-liberal-leadership-spill-needs-to-be-told
• Jane Phillips et al on weve-had-20-aged-care-reviews-in-20-years-will-the-royal-commission-be-any-different
• Graham Clark and Emma Johnson on desal-plants-might-do-less-damage-to-marine-environments-than-we-thought
• The kouk on everyone-stopped-talking-about-government-debt-but-here-s-why-it-still-matters
• Chris Wallace on quotas-are-not-pretty-but-they-work-liberal-women-should-insist-on-them

Northern America

• Pedro Costa on wage-growth-should-be-much-stronger-by-given-jobless-rates Thanks Brad
• Roland Nickles on trump-lies-about-everything-all-time Thanks Brad
• Macro Musings on the-feds-floor-system-sayonara
• Brad De Long on using-the-solow-growth-model-assessing-the-clinton-administrations-1993-deficit-reduction-program
• Ezra Klein on barack-obama-donald-trump-ben-shapiro-speech 
• the conversable economist on update-on-us-health-insurance-coverage
• Tyler Cowen on tax-salience-new-trump-tariffs, comes-public-health-america-pretty-well, amazon-monopsony-lead-higher-prices
• Amelai Thomson-DeVeaux on why-manaforts-flip-may-matter-more-than-25-russian-indictments
• Calculated Risk on comments-on-august-housing-starts, a-few-comments-on-august-existing-home-sales
• New Deal Democrat on a-detailed-look-at-industrial-production-during-this-expansion, housing-a-big-miss-in-permits-with-important-ramifications
• John Cassidy on dont-underestimate-the-danger-of-trumps-trade-war-with-china, brett-kavanaughs-supreme-court-nomination-is-in-big-trouble
• The Kouk on trump-boosts-us-stocks-with-borrowed-government-money
• Nate Silver on can-a-democrat-really-win-a-senate-race-in-tennessee-or-mississippi

Europe

• Brad Setser on could-coalition-friends-turkey-ride-turkeys-financial-rescue Thanks Mark
• Mainly Macro on why-brexiters-look-defeated

Asia

• Nan Tian on chinas-arms-trade-rival-global-influence
• Barkley Rosser on go-secretary-mnuchin-save-iranian-banks
• Connor Macdonald on myanmar-media-stranglehold
• Khang Vu on third-moon-kim-summit-uncertainties-abound
• Stuart Lau on taiwan-lonely-winter
• Elsie Thomas on the-other-rohingya-crisis
• Rodger Shanahan on crowded-skies-syria
• Adair Turner on japan-successful-economic-model Thanks Mark

Wonk

• Tim Harford on is-twitter-more-unequal-than-life-sex-or-happiness
• Coppolla comment on do-you-remember-yesterday
• the conversable economist on some-economics-of-hurricanes, international-car-production-and-ownership
• Justin Wolfers on money-satisfaction-lottery-study Thanks Brad
• Janet Yellen on /comments-on-monetary-policy-at-the-effective-lower-bound Thanks Mark
• Mohamed A El-Erain on central-banks-strike-back-against-political-interference Thanks Mark
• Noah Smith on economics-gets-it-wrong-because-research-is-hard-to-replicate
• Roberto Billi on the output gap and monetary policy Thanks Mark
• Mainly Macro on how-to-predict-crisis
• Macro Musings on more-non-star-metrics-for-monetary-policy
• Robert Waldmann on paul-krugman-declares-victory
• Alex Tabarrok on do-boys-have-a-comparative-advantage-in-math-and-science
• Mehmet Ozalp on world-politics-explainer-the-iranian-revolution
• Marc Bellamare on food waste and efficiency
• No Hesitations on wonderful-network-connectedness-piece
• Kruggers on a-smorgasbord-recession-wonkish Thanks Mark
• Carola Binder on political pressure on central banks Thanks Mark
• microeconomic insights on growth-well-policy-not-based-gdp-alone Thanks Mark
• Alexander Klemm et al on declining-tax-progressivity-becoming-sensitive-changes-income-tax-rates Thanks Peter Whiteford
• Sandwichman on what-keynes-ignored, is-ecological-salvation-of-human-species-at-hand
• Croaking Cassandra on debt-default-by-the-us-government

General

• Alastair Blanshard on spartacus-the-rise-and-rise-of-an-unlikely-hero
• Erika Cammacho on the-most-addictive-theorem-in-applied-mathematics Thanks Mark
• John Cook on take-charge-of-your-twitter-stream
• Katie Pickles on why-new-zealand-was-the-first-country-where-women-won-the-right-to-vote
• Kate Burridge on curious-kids-why-does-english-have-so-many-different-spelling-rules

Climate

• David Appell on leap-year-days-in-365-day-moving
• and Then Theres Physics on we-are-science
• Arctic Sea Ice on piomas-september-2018
• moyhu on giss-august-global-down-001-from-july
• Wesley Morgan on climate-change-frontlines
• Noah Smith  on saving-the-planet-doesn-t-mean-killing-economic-growth

Andrew Gelman (mostly stats)

• high-profile-statistical-errors-occur-physical-sciences-not-just-problem-social-science
• dont-get-fooled-observational-correlations
• measured-outcome-doesnt-quite-line-youre-interested
• why-oh-why-do-so-many-people-embrace-the-pacific-garbage-cleanup-nonsense-i-have-a-theory
• hot-hand-darts
• couple-papers-genetic-diversity-explanation-africa-remote-andean-countries-poor-europe-north-america-wealthy
• post-publication-peer-review-whos-qualified
• how-to-graph-a-function-of-4-variables-using-a-grid
• statschat on briefly, lotto-no-youre-still-not-going-to-win
• Kaiser Fung on reading-some-wild-traffic-statistics-from-new-zealand, the-idol-worship-of-objective-data-is-damaging-our-discipline

Genial Dave Giles ( econometrics)

• controlling-my-heating-bill-using-bayesian-model-averaging
• No Hesitations on banque-de-frances-open-data-room

Dianne Coyle (quirky + book reviews)

• cost-benefit-analysis-dont-get-over-excited
• Larry Summers on best-books-on-globalization
• Steve in book reviews on review-of-reagan-the-life-by-h-w-brands Thanks Jim rose

Vox wonk

• effect-machine-translation-international-trade
• using-benford-s-law-detect-tax-fraud-international-trade
• government-should-target-stock-market
• why-central-banks-should-not-be-inflation-nutters
• losing-soft-power-lowers-exports
• increasing-faith-macroprudential-policies
• testing-accountability-improves-student-achievement
• re-emerging-currency-mismatches
• heterogeneous-effects-trade-agreements-across-product-types
• firm-size-productivity-and-pay-service-economy
• strikes-and-local-politics
• foreign-expansion-competition-and-bank-risk