October 1, 2015

Why the Rich are so much Richer in the US

Nobel Prizewinner Joseph E. Stiglitz has been at the forefront of the debate in the US and elsewhere about growing inequality. In a recent review in the New York Review of Books, James Surowiecki comments on three recent books by Stiglitz. He says:

“The numbers are, at this point, woefully familiar: the top 1% of earners take home more than 20% of the income and their share has more than doubled in the last 35 years. The gains for people in the top 0.1%, meanwhile, have been even greater. Yet over that same period, average wages and household incomes in the US have risen only slightly, and a number of demographic groups (like men with only a high school education) have actually seen their average wages decline.”

November 26, 2015

Victoria Rollison. Couples counselling for Labor and Unions

When I saw the news that the Electrical Trades Union invited the Greens Adam Bandt to address their National Officers conference, and didnt invite a speaker from the Labor Party, the lyrics of Gloria Gaynors “I Will Survive” came to mind: I’m not that chained up little person still in love with you, and so you felt like dropping in and just expect me to be free, and now I’m saving all my loving for someone who’s loving me. This is not a lovers spat. The ETU has felt unloved by the Labor Party for a long time. In 2010, the unions members made their displeasure official through a public, conscious uncoupling. As explained on the ETU website our-history page: The mood of the ETU membership towards the Labor Party has changed. The members no longer have faith in the Labor Party to listen to and act in the best interests of workers. The argument put forward is that political parties only listen to swinging voters. To that end, in 2010 the ETU membership voted to step away from its affiliation with the ALP and support whichever voice in the Parliament speaks genuinely for the workers.

December 6, 2024

A five-minute scroll

Trump announces the head of NASA and the USA’s future among the stars. Barbara Pocock speaks out on nuclear waste in our own backyard. An Israeli professor speaks out on the genocide, while Israel has continued attacks in Gaza overnight. On the anniversary of Nelson Mandela’s death we are reminded of his views of the US.

October 1, 2014

John Menadue. Stuck in a closed information loop

Conservatives who read and listen to News Corp media have a problem. They are encouraged to believe that the world is really like News Corp says it is. The inevitable result is a loss of reality.

Paul Krugman in the New York Times on September 23 wrote of the problems of right-wing Republicans who keep complaining about the lazy jobless. He said

In a nation where the Republican base gets what it thinks are facts from Fox News and Rush Limbaugh, where the partys elite gets what it imagines to be policy analysis from the American Enterprise Institute or the Heritage Foundation, the Right lives in its own intellectual universe, aware neither the reality of unemployment nor what life is like for the jobless. You might think that personal experience almost everyone has acquaintances or relatives who cant find work would still break through, but apparently not.

April 13, 2017

RICHARD BUTLER. US Missile Attack on Syria

The US missile strike on Syria was an act of aggression the consequences of which could be immense. The facts of what happened at Khan Sheikhun must be established.

June 30, 2015

Europe's attack on Greek democracy.

See below link to article by Joseph Stiglitz in Project Syndicate. Joseph Stiglitz is a Nobel Laureate in Economics and University Professor at Columbia University. He was also Senior Vice President and Chief Economist of the World Bank. John Menadue.

http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/greece-referendum-troika-eurozone-by-joseph-e–stiglitz-2015-06

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal