Comments

The following was posted in response to Disappearing Arctic Ice of 17  August on johnquiggin.com. The peril this planet faces at the hand of expanded coal mining may prove to be even more terrible and immediate than what Bandicoot has described in this article, if it is not stopped.

So, why are Australia the US and other countries now apparently resolved to dig up coal even faster than before with technology of a scale which dwarfs even the massive coal mining machinery used thus far?

From 1939-1945, when the world faced peril at the hands of German Nazism and brutal Japanese colonialism, our parents and grandparents were able to find the resolve to meet that threat.

Why should we be any less resolved today with the even greater threat of global warming? We should demand of our federal and state mis-rulers that the scale of coal mining be immediately scaled back to, at most, what it was a generation ago, before the expansion of recent years commenced and to hell with those who have invested their money in destroying the prospects of future generations.

Melbourne today was again declared the world's most "livable" city. [1] But last night, the Victorian Upper House of Parliament passed a planning amendment to further extend Melbourne's Urban Growth Boundary (UGB) by 6,000 hectares following on from the previous government’s 40,000 hectares extension in 2010. The current government’s extra 6,000 hectares are endearingly called "logical inclusions". Well really, is up to the authors to call their brainchild "logical"?

If Melbourne is the most livable city it is somewhat dispiriting to think of the cities that came 4th 5th and 6th! Melbourne is jammed with traffic; its trains are overcrowded – such that the “solution” is to remove seats. There is practically no public transport at all in the outer suburbs. Houses all through the established suburbs are demolished in random fashion to make way for higher density living and the urban landscape is becoming one of generic non- architecture with non- gardens taking over. Areas of nature on the urban fringe are continually swallowed up with housing, roads and associated commercial use with no respect or provision for wildlife. Expect more of the same – forever.

Footnote(s)

[1] See, for example, Radio 3AW's current home page, on which the main embedded image at the top proclaims "MELBOURNE NAMED WORLD'S MOST LIVABLE CITY". The presenter on Radio 3MP just made a weather announcement, "Currently, the world's most livable city is 15 degrees!"- Ed

The following has been adapted from a response to my last post on johnquiggin.com which is also posted above. This post raises a number of important issues which I cannot attend to immediately.

Although I agree that neoliberal reforms started by the Hawke-Keating government are the main cause of the problem, I would like to present a different viewpoint on this situation.

My view is that the job market is facing such a problem is mainly due to the widening income inequality, and the significant loss in job security after the neoliberal reforms, rather than privatisation (although I oppose privatisation as well). The widening in the income inequality gap has made more people to weigh the income from different sectors of the economy more heavily. In the recent history, the income gap between the STEM sector (which usually requires tertiary education) and other sectors such as the manufacturing sector, and the agricultural sector etc. has caused people to obtain tertiary education. This increase in the STEM sector labour supply reduced the need for employers to offer positions to people who need training. While the excess jobseekers created by the market (when government refuses to employ them) will have to take on any job to survive, which includes the job that Freelander described: "Would you like fries with that?".

The significant loss in job security have also caused a tendency for people to choose an industry with higher pay and more job demands (especially since manufacturing sector employment is declining in Australia from 21.2% in 1978 after the oil crisis to 12.6% in 2000). This loss in job security has also forced the labour market to be more competitive, so most of them went on the gain a competitive advantage from education. Over time as the excess labour who holds tertiary education have to find other jobs to survive, a situation was created where clerk level job (which a high school drop out is more than capable of performing if training is provided) are filled with university graduates. This inefficiency of distribution of resource and the time wasted for people to gain low-skill requirement position is not being translated to an issue that requires policy attention somehow.

I attempted to post this comment here and then here and failed on both occasions. Update, 14 Aug 12:15pm +1000: My comment has been published on the first site, but not the second. The article has also been published on Global Research.

Whilst I thank you for a most informative article on the struggle of Quebec students, I take exception to the way that electoral strategies of some student leaders have been dismissed.

What should be obvious is that the vicious attacks on the Quebecois students' standard of living and democratic rights have been made possible precisely because Canada's and Quebec's parliamentary democracy is not functioning properly. The Federal Harper government got to power because of electoral rorts and it seems that the Quebec regional government is in power, at least in part because the voting system allows a government which represents only a minority of Quebecois to win office.

Had Quebec and Canada as a whole had a fair electoral system, then it is unlikely that such nasty governments would have got to power in the first place.

I think that the only way that the Quebecois students can win in the long term is to show fellow Quebecois and Canadians that this government does not represent Quebecois and is therefore illegitimate. It think this would be best done by:

1. demanding fair electoral system; and

2. demand that there be new elections.

Given that elections are to be held on 2 September under the current unfair system., I think the Quecebois students have no choice but to participate and try to maximise the vote for any party which opposes the attacks on the students. If such parties were shown to have obtained a higher combined vote in the elections than the parties which are in favour of the attacks on the students, then the illegitimacy of a government formed by the latter would be self-evident to the population of Quebec. In such circumstances, the justification for students to continue their struggle using extra-parliamentary would seem far more evident than if they had abstained from the elections.

So, I think it would be a mistake for the students not to participate in the election campaign.

Richard Heinberg will be visiting Australia and lecturing in most or all Australian state capitals in September. In Melbourne he will be appearing on September 22nd, 2012, at the Wheeler Centre. Richard writes about oil depletion and survival and is the author of ten books, including The Party’s Over, Peak Everything, and the soon-to-be-released The End of Growth.

Jenny Warfe and Vivienne Ortega will be organising the event in Victoria on behalf of Sustainable Population Australia (Victorian Branch).
$5 entry.

Information: www.population.org.au/heinberg2012 Inquiries: Jenny Warfe warfej[AT]bigpond.com

If our population doesn't grow, the economy stalls
July 16, 2012, Matthew Kidman

THE first policy a new federal government should dust off when elected next year is ''Big Australia''. The Kevin Rudd initiative aimed at growing Australia's population from 22.3 million to 35 million by 2050.

Within weeks of taking the top job, Julia Gillard scrapped Big Australia realising that few votes would be garnered from the initiative. A combination of xenophobic and anti-growth feeling swelled and that was enough to bin the whole exercise.

The reality is though that without population expansion Australian economic growth will stall, placing pressure on company valuations and the performance of the sharemarket. Live examples of this already exist in Japan, Italy and Greece. Australia needs a demographic policy that involves targeted population growth.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, the economy grew at an annual pace of 3.2 per cent in the 1990s of which 1.5 per cent was contributed by population growth. In the first decade of the new century, the local economy ratcheted up its growth to just under 4 per cent per year of which population growth can be credited with 1.8 per cent.
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As is well documented, the Australian population, like many other Western nations, is getting older.

In the latest census released last month, it stated that the median age of Australia was 37 years old, up five years in two decades. This is not in itself a concern given that the working population, defined as those people aged between 15 and 65 years, actually increased as a percentage of all people during the same period. The working population is the productive component of society.

This, though, is about to change. It is estimated that by 2015 the median age of Australians will jump to 39 years and the working age will start to shrink from about 67 per cent of the population to 66 per cent. While it does not sound significant, it effectively means demographics will go from being supportive of economic growth to a handbrake.

The Reserve Bank of Australia released a report in 2010 analysing the impact of demographic change on economic growth in a number of countries. It concluded that from 2011 to 2020 demographic changes relating to population growth and the size of the working-age population would reduce economic growth by a full 1 per cent per year in Japan. In the prior decade it had contributed a positive 1.1 per cent.

That is enormous burden to carry for a country that is struggling to grow because of the Japanese penchant for saving instead of spending.

The US is in a better position, but will suffer from a similar fate. In the period from 1996 to 2005 demographic change boosted economic growth by 1.3 per cent each year. But this is forecast to drop to just 0.5 per cent from 2011 to 2020.

A study by the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco in 2011 said the ageing population was already having a significant impact on the sharemarket, with the price-to-earnings multiple investors are willing to pay for equities already falling as the median age increases.

The second-largest economy in the world and Australia's biggest trading partner, China, will see the impact of demographics move from 1.4 per cent a year to just 0.2 per cent in this decade.

Many pundits will argue that growth is not compulsory but the economic contractions taking place in Europe should remind everyone how painful and socially disruptive it can be.

Australia's population has grown approximately 1.4 per cent a year over the past 20 years. If this rate continued to 2050, then Australia's population would hit 38 million, some 3 million more than what Rudd's Big Australia would contain. So fears of the population growing out of control are ill-founded. If a targeted population growth policy was implemented, it would require a careful selection process that kept the nation's median age down and, more importantly, retained a similar-sized working population.

The case for an orchestrated increase in the population gains currency when one considers the decline in the other two major contributors to economic growth - terms of trade and labour productivity.

The terms of trade have been a major driver of economic expansion in recent years, but it may have peaked recently with the crest of the mining boom. Meanwhile, labour productivity has been declining in relative terms for a decade with no signs of reversing.

There are strong arguments against population growth, mostly concerning social change, environmental pressures and a lack of infrastructure. Policy must accommodate all of these concerns but none should be insurmountable if a detailed plan is constructed. In fact, if Australia managed to come to terms with its poor infrastructure, dearth of water and lack of geographical planning, the country would be significantly improved from a lifestyle and productivity perspective.

Finally, the world is forecast to grow from today's 7 billion people to about 9 billion by 2060. After this it is expected to stall and then eventually shrink. With less than 23 million people, Australia, as a developed nation, should be expected to contribute to accommodating more people in a crowded world.

Former fund manager Matthew Kidman is a director of WAM Capital.

Read more: http://www.theage.com.au/business/if-our-population-doesnt-grow-the-economy-stalls-20120715-22445.html#ixzz22m029471

Published on PressTV on 25 July 2012.

Syrian security forces and armed gangs are currently fighting in the cities of Aleppo and Homs, while calm has returned to most parts of the capital, Damascus, Press TV reports.

Foreign-backed armed rebels have attacked security checkpoints in Aleppo, while there have been reports of sporadic clashes between Syrian troops and armed groups in Homs.

The security forces are battling rebels in the al-Bab and Sha'ar districts of Aleppo, where many members of the armed opposition have reportedly surrendered.

Syrian security forces engaged the rebels all across the country on Tuesday, with Naher Aisheh, a suburb of Damascus, being the latest area fully cleared of foreign-backed armed gangs. Most neighborhoods are now calm in the capital.

Meanwhile, security forces have foiled repeated attempts by armed groups to infiltrate into Syrian territory from neighboring countries.

Syria has been experiencing unrest since March 2011, with demonstrations being held both against and in support of President Bashar al-Assad's government.

The Syrian government says outlaws, saboteurs, and armed terrorists are the driving factor behind the unrest and deadly violence while the opposition accuses the security forces of being behind the killings.

Damascus also says that the chaos is being orchestrated from outside the country and the security forces have been given clear instructions not to harm civilians.

See also: Syrian forces destroy armed gangs hideout in Homs, seize weapons of 16 July 2012, Syrian forces, gunmen clash in Aleppo of 22 July 2012, Syrian troops clear Khan Sheikhun in Idlib of armed groups of  July 2012, Syrian forces kill terrorists in Douma suburb of the capital Damascus of 29 June 2012, Calm restored in Damascus, fighting continues in Homs, Aleppo of 24 July 2012.

The above strategies would be a reversal of Gillard's betrayal of the Australian Nation.

More simply I suggest a financial governance protocol for Australia's Annual Foreign Aid Budget.

Like any nation, Australia has a limited budget and a fair and reasonable quota for its foreign immigration to respect social carrying capacity.

Once asylum seeker limit is reached, it is a case of adopting New Zealand's internationally accepted policy, and so subsequent illegals are to be returned to the country of illegal/unauthorised departure - Indonesia mainly. The full economic cost of receival, processing and return flights is to be fairly deducted from Australia's total Foreign Aid Budget, including the exorbitant cost of Australia's' US crusades in Afghanistan.

So, for our nation's fair and sound international governance that respects its citizens' finances and carrying capacity, means that the asylum seeker problem may be resolved fairly, expeditiously and supported by targeted media become an effective deterrent to people smugglers, would-be asylum seekers and negligent Indonesian coast watch.

Not only shall the the excess illegals be lawfully returned to their country of departure (complicit Indonesia mainly), but the associated costs are deducted from Australia's annual Foreign Aid Budget, including patsying to the US strategic war in Afghanistan.

The LibLabs can stage crocodile tears in our Nation's Parliament, but their joint uselessness in border control demands a National Citizen Initiated Referendum to overrule Party Politics incompetence.

Labor's bottomless overdraft is unconstitutional Treasury theft that demands a double dissolution of parliament.
No government has an electoral mandate to bankrupt the Natiomal Treasury.
Gillard has always been a Labor puppet. Her spend thrift addiction has set new lows beyond electoral pock barrelling, beyond chronic cheque writing Ruddism.
Exceeding Treasury Overdraft is a seditious crime and so ought to be life imprisonment for the Prime Minister.

John Marlowe

The end is in sight for Australia's mining and investment boom, according to Deloitte Access Economics' June 2012 quarter Business Outlook, but HSBC says there is a lot more still to come.

"The government has built a budget that is wholly captive to the mining boom and the taxes to be collected from mining taxes," Joe Hockey told reporters in Sydney on Monday. "Now it's apparent the budget is unravelling because it was built on smoke and mirrors."

All booms inevitably end.

The Labor Government indicated that there would be a further increase in the permanent-entry immigration program from 163,000 in 2010–11, 185,000 in 2011–12 and up to 190,000 in 2012–13. The government is making immigration decisions assuming that the minerals boom will require a huge increase in skilled workers who must be drawn in part from migration.

The official immigration program doesn't count the nearly 14,000 migrants who arrive in the humanitarian program, or a number of smaller categories. It doesn't include the 25,000 or so Kiwis who cross the Tasman each year, or the international students for whom visa requirements have again been loosened or the sub-section 457 temporary work visas which have been recently embraced and promoted by both sides of politics. The 457 program is uncapped and untargeted.

Dr Bob Birrell, says our skilled migration intake was more than enough to service the mining boom. “But the bulk of current migration has little to do with providing scarce skills to the resource industries,” he says. “Rather, it is delivering two major streams. One is a predominantly professional flow to the big cities where the immigrants are being employed in people--servicing industries such as health and welfare. The other, is a mass of people on temporary visas such as students and working holiday makers work on a casual basis".

Our government also assume that the rest of the Australian economy will surge, generating a nation-wide shortage of skilled workers. Most of the migrants in the record-high intake will end up in Sydney and Melbourne. Now, according to Deloitte Access Economics, Australia's budget surplus has evaporated and its mining investment boom has only two years to run.

This year's forecast $1.5 billion budget surplus is no longer there, and Treasurer Wayne Swan will have to decide whether to cut back spending again in order to create a surplus.

Feast of famine, apparently Australia will need more highly skilled workers regardless of economic conditions, and more tertiary education funding is essential to ensure the supply of qualifications, according to Skills Australia Amendment (Australian Workforce and Productivity Agency) Act 2012. They report that demand for high-level qualifications would grow more than twice as quickly as supply whether Australia faced boom or bust. It's a denial of our unemployment rate, and the heavy costs of tertiary education. Universities and TAFES are underfunded, and operating under a business model. It's assumed that the Economy, based on infinite numbers, is the basis of our future, our growth, rather than finite natural resources and environmental capacity to provide for living standards - and the inevitable pollution/waste from a growing economy/population. Immigration is driving rapid population growth and causing cost of living and congestion problems – pressures on food, water, land and energy supplies, housing affordability and species extinctions.

What will happen after the mining boom ends, many Australians ask. The hundreds of millions of people being taken out of rural poverty to the urban lifestyle must eat food that they buy rather than grow. However, swathes of agricultural land is being sold to foreigners grabbing land.

Once the boom is over, it could leave the economy vulnerable to crippling tourism, manufacturing, and education services, said BIS Shrapnel in its Long Term Forecast 2011-26. Australia, unlike many resource-rich countries, does not have a “sovereign wealth fund” to save the wealth of its resources boom. Norway has an enormous fund which has strict rules meaning it can’t be spent in a hurry. Even northern neighbours East Timor and Papua New Guinea have some form of sovereign wealth fund. The minerals boom is sucking skilled labour and investment out of other sectors. The high Australian dollar is killing manufacturing export industries and tourism.

Service industries are surviving, but other industries such as manufacturing, tourism and agriculture are going backwards.

BIS Shrapnel chief economist Frank Gelber says rather than channelling the financial benefits from the mining boom into a prosperity fund, they should be invested in infrastructure. As MP Kelvin Thomson says, numerous studies show that new arrivals come with a big infrastructure requirement – they bring their families with them, and all require houses, roads, schools, hospitals etc., and many require English-language and other forms of assistance.

Australia's two-speed economy could slow to Victoria's snail-pace, and struggle to provide infrastructure and jobs to keep abreast with our politically-determined population growth - based on dubious "skills shortages"!

See also: The end of the mining boom? Access Economics' warning may be premature of Monday, 23 July 2012 by Cara Waters. Comment: In any case, the 'boom', based upon the extraction of humankind's finite bounty of non-renewable fossil fuels and metals could not possibly last for more than one or two hundred years at most, a miniscule period of time in comparison to the 30,000 years for which intelligent human communities have inhabited Earth. If Vivienne's more pessimistic economic prediction is borne out, then, at least, future generations stand some hope of getting a share of the mineral bounty that our greedy corporate elites want to dig up now. If we succeed in taking back the control of this country from the greedy foreign and domestic elites, we may find a way to have a more fulfilling future whilst also preserving some of our bounty for future generations. - Ed