Always good to be reminded of the old solid economics foundations of business, industry and trade. What’s disturbing is the silence of our industry leaders. Some, we know, love the prospect of an ever growing flow of government dollars to kick start and grow doomed enterprises. But surely there are still some wise old captains of industry left who are sickened by the ignorance of our government and dismayed by the inertia of its Opposition. Have they all gone woke or given up in dismay? Please tell me no.

Hi Graham

I admire your courage in your OLO article also appearing in the Epoch Times at http://www.theepochtimes.com/opinion/what-can-we-expect-from-the-inflation-reduction-act-2-0-post-5627528

With the Epoch Times' affiliations http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Epoch_Times my own articles drew unwelcome interest from Chinese-PRC agents (under "student" cover) in rural NSW and from Chinese MSS "diplomatic" surveillance teams in Canberra with no evident protection given by Australian security services or police.

No protection? That was, of course, at a time that even Australia's security services, were beholden to the then Labor Government's pro-China Sinophiliac "bendover" political and economic policies toward the PRC. So even the protection of Australian citizens in Australia was being adversely effected.

The authorities protect Australians from PRC agents today, even under a Labor Government, I fervently hope.

This is not to say former senior Labor Politicians are not rewarded by the PRC, even today - what Mike Burgess was talking about.

Cheers Mavs

One problem that appears to effect Australian manufacturing is the huge asymmetry between China and The World with respect to postage costs. This is something that may need to be addressed by tariffs. Apparently the international agreements on postage favour Chinese trade in the age of web consumerism. A $5 item can have a $10 delivery within Australia but $0 from China- despite the greater distance (to the Green's unstated chagrin)- making Australian production unviable. In the long term Australian over reliance on Chinese production will likely hollow out Australian capability and capacity and wealth. In my view Australian's need to change their consumerist vision of life away from the impetus of the Hebrew- Edward Bernay's and his emotional consumerism- in favour of more needs based durable goods including foodstuffs

From memory it was David Ricardo that talked about comparative advantage of nations (not so much Adam Smith- but I'm sure there are principles that lend themselves to nations) but the point probably still stands- but sometimes other issues such as politics are important considerations. Also prices are dynamic. I've come to mistrust David Ricardo.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Ricardo