March 5, 2014

Eric Hodgens. Where do bishops come from?

Sydney needs a new archbishop who has every chance of becoming a cardinal once Cardinal Pell turns 80. How do we get a new bishop?

The pope will appoint one. Since 1917 he has claimed the right to do so. History is not on the side of that claim – but that is another story.

Today’s official method is for bishops to send recommendations to the Papal Nuncio. When a diocese becomes open the nuncio does a search, checks these recommendations, and makes a list of three suggestions. This is called a “terna”. He sends it to the Congregation of Bishops in Rome – the papal personnel department. The bureaucrats of that department do their own checking and prepare the agenda for the Congregation. There are about 30 cardinals who are members of the Congregation – some live in Rome and would regularly attend; others are spread round the world and attend when they choose. The Congregation meets fortnightly, discusses the matter and sends a list of three to the pope for his approval and appointment. The pope normally takes the first name on the list.

December 31, 2013

Repost: Are most asylum seekers and refugees Muslims? John Menadue

Repost for holiday reading.

Well, as a matter of fact, they are not.

But I am sure that many commentators and a lot of the community believe that most are Muslim. The dog-whistlers like Scott Morrison feed on this assumption .According to Jane Cadzow in the Sun Herald he urged the Coalition parties “to ramp up its questioning … to capitalise on anti-Muslim sentiment”.

Figures on this issue are extracted from the DIAC Settlement data base. One reason for the difficulty in analysing the figures is that a religious test is not applied to persons seeking refugee status, and neither should it. Ascertaining religious background often then depends on voluntary declarations.

December 18, 2014

Kerry Murphy. Intra-religious conflict.

Most violent deaths of Muslims in the world are due to others claiming to be Muslims. The conflicts in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria are all predominantly conflicts within the Islamic community. This is strongly felt within the communities but not usually reported in the mainstream media.

This week in Peshawar in north western Pakistan, more than 140 mainly Muslim children are killed by men who claim to follow a version of Islam that requires them to chant ‘God is Great’ whilst they execute unarmed school children. They claim this is because the military in the Islamic Republic of Pakistan has attacked yet another group of people where other civilians are killed. “We selected the army’s school for the attack because the government is targeting our families and females,” said Taliban spokesman Muhammad Umar Khorasani. “We want them to feel our pain.”

February 18, 2018

JIM COOMBS. Trickle Down – My Hat !

The orthodoxy of the Neoliberal Economics (Let’s call it Nasty prehistoric Unfair capitalism, NPUC for short) asserts in the face of universal contradictory evidence, that giving capitalism free reign benefits the poor and the weak. Pull the other one!

February 18, 2018

The American Empire, China, the Region and Australia

As the American Empire weakens we see a tendency to look to China and seek security in a nebulous concept of “the region.” We are not facing up to the defence of our continent by Australians for Australians.

October 4, 2017

WALTER HAMILTON. Koike's coup.

Japan is going to the polls on 22 October, with the conservative coalition led by Shinzo Abe facing a stiff challenge from a new party led by the right-wing governor of Tokyo.

August 12, 2024

Iran is about to attack Israel

Iran may be about to launch a proper missile strike on Israel for the first time ever - in retaliation for the attack on Tehran last month which killed Ismail Haniyeh. Israeli intelligence says an attack is likely to come within days.

December 31, 2013

Remarks by Sir William Deane AC on "Refugees and Asylum Seekers: Finding a Better Way".

On 17 December, Sir William Deane, former Governor-General launched Australia21 - essays on refugees and asylum seekers. Sir William Deane’s remarks follow.

Paul Barratt’s acknowledgement of the traditional custodians in which I respectfully join, serves to remind us that apart from indigenous Australians we are all migrants or descended from migrants and that many of us were asylum seekers or are descended from asylum seekers. My own great-grandfather came to Australia with his wife and young family, including my grandfather who was aged 7 from Tipperary in 1851 on a wooden sailing ship called the Harry Lorrequer. They sought asylum on this side of the world from the devastation of the great famine. After disembarking in Melbourne and time on the goldfields near Ballarat, my great-grandfather took his family to Wahring near Nagambie in rural Victoria where he became the legal owner of land taken without compensation from the Taungurung people. That land, which we now know was unlawfully acquired, provided the basis of his and his family’s subsequent well-being.

April 28, 2016

Frank Brennan SJ. Manus Island proposal.

Asylum seekers on Manus Island should be brought to Australia and processed. Those who are refugees should be permitted to stay in Australia.

Neither the Liberal Party nor the Labor Party agree. The race to the bottom and the race against time is now on as the country prepares to go into election mode on or about 12 May 2016. The Labor Party is adamant that the Rudd government’s MOU with PNG was posited on the firm understanding that the processing and resettlement of the asylum seekers would be done and dusted within 12 months.

September 16, 2024

Five-minute scroll

We start the week with our five-minute scroll on X to bring you a sample of the world and local issues that may not be found in our mainstream media. Today the first posts we saw include the plea to educate yourself on the history of Israel’s actions in Gaza, Malcolm Turnbull talks reality regarding AUKUS, Yemen sends a missile 2000 kilometres into Israel, the Philippines speaks to peaceful coexistence with China and Miriam Margolyes speaks out about Israel to the Jewish community in Australia.

April 13, 2014

Caroline Coggins. The story of Easter: the love template.

How often do we fall in love, the sort that turns us around, strips us and re-orientates us, shakes the foundations of what it is to relate and be with another? Not very often, mostly we are too guarded. But at times it happens, and I have come to take this as a call, our feelings leap forward and say follow me.

A person I loved died this week. He was an old man, though he did not feel old to me. I just loved him. He had been a training supervisor when I was becoming a psychotherapist, so I came to know him in that particular way. This man stretched me. He was shy and very private, but he knew the way the human heart worked, and what it needed to grow. Mostly he worked with children, and they are great teachers, open, and available to their needs. This man taught me about my ‘duty of care’. Sounds clinical, but it was far from that, it was his relationship with me that showed me what this means. He mentored me into the depths of what another really needed of me, and then what I needed to do/grow within myself to get there. This man knew how to keep an opening for the other.

February 17, 2013

The asylum seekers that we don't talk about

In the last ten years, 65,000 asylum seekers have come to Australia. 47,000 or 72% of those came by air. Only 28% came by boat. In the last five years, we received 47,000 asylum seekers, of whom 28,000 or 62% came by air. Only 38% came by boat. In only one year, in the last ten years, 2011-12, did we have more boat arrivals (7,379) than air arrivals (7,036). Air arrivals are fairly steady at about 5,000 to 7,000 p.a. whilst boat arrivals fluctuate more.

March 5, 2014

National Council of Priests - Choosing a successor to Cardinal Pell - a pastor or a prince.

In late February the National Council of Priests met with the Catholic Bishops Commission for Church Ministry. This is an annual dialogue. Fr Ian McGinnity who is the President of the National Council of Priests sent to his colleagues a record of the issues that were raised with the Bishops. The issues raised referred generally to the selection of bishops and archbishops. It has particular relevance to the process which will now be put in motion for the appointment of a successor to Cardinal Pell. In its conversation with the Bishops, the National Council of Priests refers to comments by Pope Francis about the qualities he was looking for in bishops. The Council also described the issues which the Council believes should be followed in the appointment of bishops and archbishops. John Menadue

March 22, 2013

The Flow of Asylum Seekers to Australia follows world trends. John Menadue

The Australian Parliamentary Library has just released a Research Paper showing that the flow of asylum seekers to Australia since 1999 follows the trends of asylum flows to OECD countries generally.

Reading the Australian media one would think that we have a problem with asylum seekers that no other country has.

At the Centre for Policy Development, in a report we issued in April 2011, we pointed out that the trend of asylum seekers to OECD countries, including Australia, showed that civil unrest and persecution in source countries are the major influences in asylum movements around the world and far more influential than the deterrent policies of any one destination country including countries like Australia.(p 32)

September 8, 2015

Paul Budde. The NBN - from bad to worse.

I am sure that I am just as frustrated as most Australians – especially as month after month, year after year, it becomes clearer that what I, along with others, have been saying since 2011 – that a cheaper and faster NBN such as the Coalition Government is trying to install by retrofitting ageing copper networks is not delivering.

First of all the minister promised a quick six-month turnaround for the policy change; but now, two years later, apart from pilots, none of the so-called multi-mix technology (basically a retrofit of the old copper and coax cables) has eventuated. Now the government has also admitted that this retrofit might cost up to $15 billion more than expected.

July 27, 2014

Another Israeli massacre of Palestinians.

One thousand and thirty-five Palestinians in Gaza, mainly innocent civilians, women and children have been massacred and so far the world turns its head away. And the number is increasing by the hour. We don’t want to feel the suffering of the Palestinian people.

Alongside this 1,035 dead Palestinians there are 42 Israeli’s who have died. Just imagine what the Israeli lobby would be saying if 1,035 Israelis had died.

May 31, 2024

Will Australia proceed with the recognition of a Palestinian state? No visible progress

Australia’s foreign minister Penny Wong has recently said that Canberra would consider recognition of a Palestinian state. However, there is no visible progress towards that recognition.

December 1, 2014

John Menadue. The ABC should stop kicking own goals.

There is not much doubt in my mind that the budget cuts to the ABC are part of a vendetta against the ABC and to oblige Rupert Murdoch who intensely dislikes quality competition. The ABC is the most trusted media organisation in the country and News Corp is the least trusted.

But the ABC looks to be kicking some own goals.

Walter Hamilton, John Tulloh and I have pointed to the very disquieting cut backs in the ABC regional coverage when it should be dramatically increased given the rapidly increasing importance of our region. We still have a ‘white man’s media that clings to the North Atlantic.

May 30, 2015

Peter Day. Grappling with same sex marriage

Current Affairs.

Human sexuality is a complex and fragile thing – far greyer than black or white. It is best tended to by gentle, wise, and humble hands.

There hasn’t been much gentleness or wisdom surrounding the same sex marriage debate.

Like most issues of public importance, we tend to be led to the voices of fear that inhabit the extremes, and both extremes certainly have fiery preachers who are skilled at trotting-out the emotive and incendiary; all taken-up with alacrity by a mass media and consumer market that revels in confrontation - confrontation that is too often devoid of intellectual rigour, dispassionate reasoning, and wisdom.

February 24, 2016

Terry Laidler. All Roads Lead TO Rome?

So, the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse will take Cardinal Pell’s final evidence next week by video link from Rome. Tim Minchin’s song and the associated crowd funding effort will allow some victims of abuse to attend, but both are symptoms of fairly widespread community disappointment.

Commissioner McClellan was also clearly disappointed at this outcome. Given the complexity and probable seriousness of material still to be canvassed with Pell and the varied reliability of technology, the cardinal’s prior commitment to attend had had the obvious advantages that observation of the totality of the free exchanges under cross-examination brings. McClellan’s remark that perhaps the cardinal could come by boat was a little ungracious, but understandable on a calculus of the relatively small risk involved in contrast to the trauma and damage suffered by the victims of abuse with which the Commission is dealing daily.

December 7, 2014

Frank Brennan SJ. The Cardinal Pell precedent.

Speaking of the financial reforms in the Vatican, Cardinal Pell says:

‘The first principle was that the Vatican should adopt contemporary international standards, much as the rest of the world does.

The second principle meant that Vatican policies and procedures would be transparent.

The third important principle within the Vatican was that there should be something akin to a separation of powers and that there would be multiple sources of authority.’

January 19, 2016

John Menadue. Media censorship and the NBN

The ABC’s outgoing editor of its Technology and Games subsite, Nick Ross, has claimed that he has been ‘gagged’ by ABC management from publishing further articles about the NBN. He has now left the ABC.

For link to an article on this latest gag on NBN coverage, see link at bottom to article by Renai LeMay of 14 January, in delimiter.com.

There is a continuing pattern of failure by the mainstream media to expose the mess that Malcolm Turnbull has left us in the NBN. It has been almost entirely social media, including this blog, that has carried stories about Malcolm Turnbull’s failure in his administration of the NBN.

August 13, 2016

GRAHAM FREUDENBERG on Brexit. ‘They are not laughing now’.

‘They are not laughing now’. So the UKIP leader Nigel Farage gloated in the European Parliament in July 2016. It was not the first time these exact words have been uttered, in the same spirit of vengeful vindication in a European parliament.

January 11, 2016

Vale Malcolm Fraser

Repost from 21/03/2015

I am sure that Malcolm Fraser’s concerns for human rights were always there. But as he grew and matured, that concern flourished and became obvious to all. He became our moral compass on human rights.

I was first conscious of Malcolm’s concern for human rights when I listened to his speech in September 1975 at a luncheon in Parliament House Canberra to honour Helen Suzman. She was an anti-apartheid campaigner who for 13 years was the sole opponent of the apartheid regime in South Africa’s parliament. For the first time that I can recall, Malcolm Fraser spelled out his opposition to apartheid and white rule in Africa. It surprised me. But, I found it very encouraging. It was the beginning of my better understanding of Malcolm Fraser.

August 16, 2017

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.

September 16, 2015

Bruce Kaye. Refugees in Australia and the Good Samaritan.

When I was a teenager a famous preacher of the day, Dr Gordon Powell, was the minister at St Stephens Presbyterian Church Macquarie Street Sydney. I recall hearing some of his sermons and in particular a sermon from a series of sermons he preached on the “Hard Sayings of Jesus”. He remarked at the beginning of the series that the really hard sayings of Jesus were not those that were complex or oblique. Rather the hardest sayings of Jesus were those whose meaning was all too clear. The difficulty was in how to work out those sayings in everyday life.

May 12, 2017

IAN MCAULEY. There’s more to Morrison’s conversion on debt than appears at first sight

There is nothing novel about Treasurer Morrison’s discovery that government debt is all OK provided it’s applied to funding useful assets. But it may be an indication that the government is disillusioned with monetary policy as a means of stabilising the economy, and is moving back to fiscal policy.

October 15, 2014

Ian Webster. Suicide prevention.

September 10th was World Suicide Prevention Day – Suicide Prevention - One World Connected and from the 5th to the 12th October Mental Health Week ran in Australia. The week’s highlight was the ABC’s “Mental as” which ran through the whole week. Over three nights “Changing Minds – the inside story” on ABC TV involved us with the staff and patients of Liverpool Hospital’s in-patient mental health unit. It was riveting television. The program portrayed the relationships between staff and patients with disordered minds as they slowly regained their sanity. There was much humanity.

June 6, 2015

Pearls and Irritations - Policy Series and Current Affairs.

Fairness, Opportunity and Security. Policy Series edited by Michael Keating and John Menadue.

With many other people, we are concerned about the policy vacuum and the poor level of public debate on important policy issues. We began a series of articles on policy issues in Pearls and Irritations on 11 May. They have now all been posted. There are forty-nine articles on fifteen policy areas from over thirty contributors. They are linked to the contributor’s name (below).

December 17, 2014

Michael Keating. The Government's mid-year budget update. Part 2.

Where to from here?

So what is the Government’s strategy to return the Budget to return to surplus as the government has promised over the medium term?

The May Budget was almost universally criticised for its unfairness. While restoring fiscal health of the nation may require sacrifices, the evidence clearly showed that in the May Budget the Government did not demand equality of sacrifice (for example, see my comments on the Budget posted on this site last May).

December 18, 2014

John Menadue. Normalising Crime.

I was astounded when I read what Archbishop Antony Fisher told The Australian last week. The report said ‘Australia’s most senior Catholic cleric has proclaimed that families are more likely than priests to abuse children and rejected a church report that linked celibacy to sexual abuse. Archbishop of Sydney Antony Fisher said that celibacy could not be to blame for abuse, which occurred in every church, regardless of whether it was celibate. The thing about child abuse is most of it happens in families. It is an awful thing we hate to even touch on it, but it can’t be about celibacy because you look around society at the moment, it’s in every church, celibacy or not. It’s in many families and their not celibate, generally speaking.’

April 16, 2015

John Tulloh. An inconvenient centenary Turkey prefers to ignore.

The Gallipoli battle aside, you can be sure that Turkey will not be commemorating the centenary of another major event in its history this month. A few hours before Australian, New Zealand and other allied forces landed at Gallipoli on April 25, 1915, what has become widely known as the Armenian genocide got under way in Constantinople (Istanbul). But Australians visiting Gallipoli for the other centenary should be careful about what they say. For a Turk to say it was genocide is enough to get punished for insulting the country.

December 3, 2016

JOHN MENADUE. White man’s media

The Australian media behave as if Australia is a large island parked off London or New York. Our media is remarkably derivative as a result of media systems laid down over a century ago. It is very unresponsive to the needs of Australia in the 21st Century in relations with our own region. Our media remains North-Atlantic centric.

March 18, 2013

Could this be a John XXIII moment. Guest blogger: Monsignor Tony Doherty

Announced in every news outlet, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, an Argentinian Jesuit who is the first in his order and the first from Latin America has been named as the bishop of Rome – Pope number 266.

In these early hours of the announcement, we are left with the crumbs of his story. Theologically conservative, we are led to believe. Socially active and human – left his Episcopal palace and lives modestly, catches public transport, a seventy-six year old who loves to walk, and interestingly cooks for himself. Never underestimate a man who cooks.

November 11, 2017

DOUGLAS NEWTON. Armistice Day – narrow nationalist naiveties and voodoo vindications of war

Every year, in the days leading up to Armistice Day, a little crop of opinion pieces appears urging Australians to do more than merely remember the dead of war. Various writers argue that we should also recognise the justice of the cause. These frankly nationalist opinion pieces are based on a naïve understanding of the Great War.

June 9, 2014

What to do about growing inequality in Australia.

On Wednesday 11 June at Parliament House Canberra, former Liberal Leader, Dr John Hewson will launch a report on ‘What do do about growing inequality in Australia’. The report has been prepared by Australia21, ANU and the Australia Institute. The report can be found by clicking on below. It is embargoed until Wednesday at 11am.

Final InequalityinAustraliaRepor (1)

If you would like more information please contact CEO Australia21, c/- Lyn.stephens@australia21.org.

April 21, 2015

David Stephens. Atatürk’s famous words of 1934 questioned

Those heroes that shed their blood and lost their lives … You are now lying in the soil of a friendly country. Therefore rest in peace. There is no difference between the Johnnies and the Mehmets to us where they lie side by side here in this country of ours … You, the mothers, who sent their sons from far away countries wipe away your tears. Your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace after having lost their lives on this land.

February 15, 2015

Don't arm Ukraine.

In July last year, Tony Abbott and Julie Bishop were eager to commit Australian police and Australian troops to Ukraine in the aftermath of the shooting down of MH17 by Russian separatists. Their plan didn’t work out as they hoped.

I have carried blogs by Richard Butler and Cavan Hogue about the geopolitical risks of NATO and the West expanding to the border of Russia.

As the war in Ukraine is now escalating, there have been increasing calls within the US for the arming of the Ukraine. John Mearsheimer in the New York Times of February 8 presents a compelling case for not arming Ukraine. He urges that the best outcome would be a neutral Ukraine. For NY Times article see link below. John Menadue

March 9, 2015

Brian Johnstone. The execution of Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran.

The deaths of these two men now appear to be inevitable. The key argument of President Joko Widodo is that this lethal means (death by firing squad) is justified for the purpose of saving his people from the addiction and death caused by drugs. The Indonesian government claims that, in that country, approximately 50 victims of drugs die every day. The number of persons who die each year as a consequence of drugs in Australia is around 1,500. The damage to lives from drugs is amply documented by the recent book by Dr. John Sherman and Tony Valenta, _Drug Addiction in Australia (_Melbourne, 2015). There can be no denying the harm caused by drug trafficking; the moral question is whether capital punishment is an effective and morally acceptable way of dealing with it.

December 7, 2014

Refugees - some middle ground is opening up.

See below a speech made in the Senate on 4 December by Senator Xenophon. The Senator was one of six cross-bench senators who negotiated with the government for a compromise on the contentious Migration Bill.

Senator XENOPHON (South Australia) (12:17): Australia’s migration policies have always had a long and vexed history. They have been, and rightfully so, open to significant scrutiny from international and domestic courts, independent experts, interest groups and the electorate. It has and will continue to be a passionate debate about a wicked and vexed issue. For me it is always important, always, to remember that we are dealing with legislation that relates to people, our fellow human beings. They are not numbers; they are not the myriad of labels that have been applied to them by all sides of the debate; and they are not political inconveniences, punching bags or props. They are mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, friends, neighbours and acquaintances. They are, in short, people just like you and me who have found themselves in extraordinarily difficult circumstances—some, unimaginable circumstances. So I would like to approach this debate with respect, with compassion and with dignity.

May 16, 2024

Over 700 Australian lawyers call for the Australian government to take immediate action to ensure a lasting peace in the Middle East and uphold international law

In another significant show of solidarity by the Australian legal profession, more than 700 Australian lawyers (including practising barristers and solicitors, legal academics and law students) have signed a further letter to the Australian Government calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza.

December 11, 2016

RICHARD WOOLCOTT. New series. We can say 'no' to the Americans.

The present situation offers the Turnbull Government - or its successor -an opportunity to move beyond policies towards Asia based on fear of China and on compliance with United States wishes.

May 9, 2014

Peter Menadue. Should corporations have political rights?

There is an old legal saying that a corporation has no body to be burnt or soul to be damned. In other words, it is just a legal fiction designed to confer limited liability upon its shareholders.

Despite that, there is an insidious and very dangerous notion abroad that corporations have political rights and should be allowed to make political donations and engage in political advertising. That notion is a terrible threat to the health of our democracy.

March 18, 2013

Next step for Pope Francis. Guest blogger: Michael Kelly SJ

So Pope Francis said to himself when he was elected Bishop of Rome, as he told journalists in Rome on last Saturday, what about the poor? Bishop of Rome means Pope and his question was what does it mean to take the poor seriously as Bishop of Rome?

That’s Pope Francis’s question. But it’s far from clear how Jorge Bergoglio is going to handle the practical consequences of becoming Pope Francis.

November 21, 2016

IAN McAULEY. Opportunity Knocks: The Economics Of A Trump Victory

There’s ever reason to believe Donald Trump policies will hurt Australia. But there’s some important differences and insulation. Trump’s election has energised Australia’s far right. Abbott, Abetz, Bernardi, Canavan, Christiansen and Hanson have all said, in one way or another, that Trump’s victory vindicates their own policies.

On the day after the election the Telegraph portrayed Trump as America’s saviour, and blamed Obama for everything that has gone wrong in America over the last eight years.

March 1, 2016

Kerry Goulston. Postcard from Vietnam. Health and medical cooperation with Vietnamese doctors and nurses.

In 1998, Dr Phillip Yuile visited Professor Ton That Bach, Rector of Ha Noi Medical University, with a letter of introduction from Professor Kerry Goulston, Associate Dean of Medicine at the University of Sydney who had been appointed by the then Dean, Professor John Young, to explore possible links between the two universities. Subsequently Professor Ton That Bach invited Professor Goulston to Ha Noi to discuss a collaborative association between Sydney University and Ha Noi Medical University which had been established by the French in 1902..

July 8, 2014

Tessa Morris-Suzuki. Another Australia-Japan Relationship is Possible.

Today, Australian Prime Minister Abbott and Japanese Prime Minister Abe meet in Canberra, and Prime Minister Abe presents an address to the Australian parliament. This is a historic occasion, and will be remembered as a pivotal point in Australia-Japan relations.

In their discussions, the two leaders are highlighting the crucial economic and security ties that bind Australia and Japan together, and emphasizing the vital role that both countries play as leading democracies in the Asia-Pacific region.

December 2, 2014

Kieran Tapsell: The Holy See, Torture and the UN

On 26 September 2014, the Holy See rejected the demand of the United Nations Committee on the Rights of the Child for it to impose through canon law mandatory reporting of all allegations of child sexual abuse by clergy. The Holy See said its only responsibility under the Convention was for the handful of children who reside within the 44 hectares of the Vatican City. This is despite the fact that since 2001, it supervised or conducted disciplinary hearings against 4,000 clerics accused of child sexual abuse which had no connection whatsoever with the Vatican City. The Holy See further said that to impose mandatory reporting under canon law would be to interfere in the sovereignty of other nations – a surprising objection since it does not regard canon law’s imposition of the pontifical secret on all allegations and information about child sexual abuse amongst clergy everywhere in the world as interference in national sovereignty.

November 29, 2014

Michael Keating. Capitalism and the Economy.

As both John Menadue and Ian McAuley have argued in recent posts there are good social reasons for governments to intervene to modify the outcomes from a purely capitalist economy. Right now rising inequality and taxation avoidance by companies and wealthy people are priority issues that should be addressed. It is also possible that the impact on the government budget from increasing inequality could have a negative impact on future economic growth.

Pearls and Irritations

John Menadue's Public Policy Journal