Think of the money canneries could save if their sardines could co-create themselves into cans, pickle themselves and then zip up the tin lid.

Its time to INVEST in canneries and Australian GOVERNMENTS I think.

What a wickedly profitable GOVERNMENT idea put forwrd by an even more wicked monopoly state media. For those above living in overcrowded multicultyral communities it would be hell but that's tough luck: Shrink wrap their lives to make room for more Christmas Island thug detainees for example. And they do it all by their little co-creating selves.

Ah to be in government, the Media or a monopoly corporation in Australia --- Sheer HEAVEN!

Squeers
Well I'm glad you guys have decided that supposed AGW is not a catastrophe after all. Looks like it's about just a bit of fine-tuning other people's values to make them behave a bit more like you think they should?

Let us know when you've found the "science" that proves AGW justifies taxes that won't affect the climate anyway.

Until then, you and bonmot can just impress each other reiterating personal arguments and assuming everything that's in issue I guess.

Peter H
Yes semantics might be important in context of what you are saying if it were used in policy documents. I have never seen a policy document that uses words like "should" or "we" and I have read my share. Most are pretty dry outlining suggested reforms and desired outcomes with costings and risk assessments.

I think you may have missed the thrust of my questions, Peter Hume.

Just to remind you:

"Which aspect of education do you regard as "indulging in ineffectuality"?"

And:

"Would you prefer i) no taxation at all, and an end-to-end user-pays education system, or ii) just a bit of taxation, but the right to direct it at those subjects of which you approve?"

You are of course under no obligation to reply. But this doesn't constitute a response:

>>Pericles If people were willing to pay taxes, taxes could just be abolished, couldn’t they?<<

For a start, it makes no sense. Taxes are levied so that the government may provide services to the community at large, based upon the community's collective ability to afford it, as against the individual's. At another level, they ensure that the supply of those services is less influenced by the ability to profit from them, than the need for the services themselves.

We can discuss till the cows come home whether they do this perfectly, or even optimally. But the alternative to a system that is neither perfect nor optimized from the consumer's viewpoint, is not to scrap it and replace it with a system that is designed to favour the service provider.

So, to simplify the questions to their basic level, are you for or against a purely "user-pays" education system?