Writer
Ian McAuley
Ian McAuley is a retired lecturer in public finance at the University of Canberra. He can be contacted at “ian" at the domain “ianmcauley.com” .
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IAN McAULEY. The BCA needs to study Argentinian history, and some basic economics.
The Business Council of Australia is running a hysterical campaign against trade unions, Getup! and the Labor Party, as if corporate Australia is facing an existential threat. That’s partisan rubbish. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Strong employment growth, until you look behind the figures.
The ABS monthly employment data released last Thursday shows that since the Coalition was elected five years ago the Australian economy has generated one million additional jobs. Does this indicate success of the Coalition’s policies? Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. A warning about “team players”
Bad behaviour by young cricketers in South Africa has unleashed strong reactions, including references to a decay of moral standards in the wider society. It should also prompt us to realise that team loyalty is not an unmitigated virtue. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. South Australia’s election – Xenophon no kingmaker but still a force
At first sight the South Australian election looks like a collapse of Xenophon’s SA Best Party and a stunning victory for the Liberal Party in taking office from Labor. But the reality is a little more complicated: SA Best is still a strong political force, and the Liberal Party’s vote has actually slipped. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Labor’s superannuation changes: clever cosmetics but a failure on equity, public revenue and economics.
There is something wrong when “self-funded” retirees can enjoy a six digit tax-free income, while others who earn their income through their own efforts pay normal rates of income tax. But Labor’s proposals on dividend imputation would sustain that inequity, would compromise public revenue, and would divert Australians’ savings away from high-return quality investments. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Tax reform, not tax cuts
From an unlikely source comes a message that Australia doesn’t need “smaller government”. Rather we need tax reform to ensure we can build a social safety net, and fund world-class health and education. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Has Labor lost its nerve on private health insurance?
In his Press Club address last week Bill Shorten made some unflattering remarks about private health insurance. But every indication is that an incoming Labor government will maintain, or perhaps even strengthen, support for private health insurance. An opportunity to reform health care by phasing out private health insurance and by redirecting its $10 billion Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 8: Choice
Market-based capitalism, we are told, brings us choice. But often “choice” is within a limited range of similar products and services. In the name of supporting markets we can be denied the choice of being able to share services with one another, and the choice of opting out of markets. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 7: Capital
Former Science Minister Barry Jones complained that we tend to think of “capital” in terms of stuff that hurts when we drop it on our toes. It’s too easy to overlook other forms of capital – human capital, social capital, institutional capital and environmental capital. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 6: Jobs
Governments brag about the number of jobs created on their watch. Does our obsession with “jobs” distract us from other ways in which people can contribute to society and share in its bounty? Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 5: Competition
Competition is a means of encouraging innovation and productivity, and bringing those benefits to the community. When it becomes an end in itself, however, it can impose costs on us all. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Private health insurers frighten the ALP-A REPOST from June 2 2017
There was a recent flurry of media excitement about a supposed “secret hospital funding plan”, which turned out to be no more than an option under consideration by a think-tank. But the real (and overlooked) issue in health funding is a high and growing hidden subsidy to private health insurance, where, contrary to traditional political Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 4: Economy and environment
Arguments around climate change and other environmental matters tend to assume some tradeoff between “economic” and “environmental” objectives. But the overriding principle is about making the best use of scarce resources. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 3: Economy and society
Many public debates are framed in terms of compromises or balances between “economic” and “social” objectives. Such ordering is confused: economic policies are meaningless unless they serve social ends. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 2: The role of government
We tend to think of a “left” seeking bigger government and the “right” seeking smaller government. But such a framework can see governments simultaneously neglecting important areas while interfering where they shouldn’t. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Reframing public ideas Part 1: Leadership
Leadership is the hard task of getting communities to make progress on difficult problems requiring adaptive change. It is not to be confused with authority. Beware of the call for a “strong leader”. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. Reframing public ideas
Our capacity to understand political and economic issues, and to shape better public policy, may be helped if we break out of established but no longer functional ways of looking at public policy – re-framing in other words. Over January I will write eight articles about the way we frame public ideas. They will cover Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. The finance sector: a drag on the real economy
The royal commission into the finance sector is more about detecting “misconduct” in individual institutions than exposing the ways in which the sector has misallocated investment funding and caused other economic distortions. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. Queensland election: a policy challenge for the Coalition
The Queensland election has been a disaster for the Liberal-National Party. There is a risk that the Coalition will misinterpret the result and become even more alienated from the Australian electorate. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. The Trans-Pacific Partnership isn’t about trade liberalisation: it’s about corporate protection
It’s in Australia’s interests to remain open to the world on immigration and trade, and to cooperate on climate change and labour standards, but when “openness” comes to mean a permissive set of policies satisfying the demands of foreign investors, as proposed in the “Trans-Pacific Partnership”, we risk a political backlash leading to isolation and Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Scott Morrison commissions an economic platform for a Shorten Government
Last week the Commonwealth released a major report on productivity challenges facing Australia over the next five years. Although it was commissioned by Treasurer Scott Morrison, it is unlikely that the government, which shows no appetite for meaningful economic reform, will act on its recommendations. But the report may form a useful guide for whichever Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Turnbull’s National Energy Guarantee: can it work?
The Commonwealth’s proposed National Energy Guarantee is vague and confusing, and is based on dated engineering and economic ideas. But it may allow an economically responsible government, if we elect one, to reshape it into a set of policies that honour our environmental responsibilities and modernise our energy sector. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Yet another futile attempt to support private health insurance
The government’s changes to private health insurance have little, if anything, to do with health policy. Rather they are about staving off the insurers’ death spiral of rising premiums and desertion of profitable customers, and protecting the government from the embarrassment of yet another five or six per cent rise in premiums in 2018. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. What Australia can learn from Germany’s election
At first sight the German election could be seen as a swing to the right, but it’s more about the continuing decline of traditional “left” and “right” parties, and the differing fortunes of Germany’s regions. In Australia we can learn from Germany about how to handle our own transition to a multi-party democracy. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY– Private Health Insurance – let’s make the young pay.
Private health insurers are losing their most profitable members, younger people whose contributions subsidise older members. Rather than forcing young people back into private insurance, the government should break private hospitals’ dependence on private insurance and let private insurance go the way of other high-cost industries. The media and the PHI lobby consistently understate the Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Mates, lobbyists and rent-seekers
Two books, one recent the other written 35 years ago, explain how special interests are strangling the Australian economy. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. Electricity discounts for some, price rises for others
If we follow the government’s suggestion that we should hunt around for cheaper electricity there will be no net benefits, just a re-shuffling of who cross-subsidises whom in the market. We have been brought to this absurd situation by a blind faith in privatisation and “competition”. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. Low wage growth: does the government understand how capitalism works?
Some on the far right may see stagnant or falling wages as a welcome boost to profits and competitiveness, but in both structural and political ways low wage growth and consequent widening inequality is undermining capitalism. Continue reading »
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IAN McAULEY. Pauline Hanson, Malcolm Turnbull, and the ABC – a Faustian bargain
Turnbull’s deal with One Nation, to require the ABC to be “fair and balanced”, looks innocuous at first sight, but if implemented it would see the ABC cast into the wasteland of moral relativism. Continue reading »
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IAN MCAULEY. Can Labor hold its nerve on tax reform?
Shorten has brought tax reform to the political arena. Let’s hope the Labor Party doesn’t go to water between now and the next election, because we need more public revenue and a fairer and less distortionary tax system. Continue reading »
