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The Forum > Article Comments > A chasm of inequality? Really? > Comments

A chasm of inequality? Really? : Comments

By Peter Saunders, published 14/6/2005

Peter Saunders argues the St Vincent de Paul report is alarmist and hysterical.

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Rhian,
The Australian public funding support of private schools is almost unique in the western world, a strange hybrid which largely arose because of the Catholic/Anglican sectarian divide from last century.
I'm all for innovation and diversity in schools, but why not in public schools available to every kid regardless of whether their parents can or will pay for it?
Many government schools are getting "worse" because all their good kids are being drained away from them by both low fee (and often not very good) private schools and public selective schools. Government propaganda encourages this shift, its cheaper for them to pass the cost of educating their kids to the middle classes. But public education doesn't have to be second rate or monolithic, it just needs the community will to change it. Now the middle classes have largely deserted public schools, there is no real will to change them. The tragedy that is setting up for all our futures will cost us an enormous amount in the long term. We cannot isolate our kids from one another. You may believe your kids are alright, but if a whole lot of other kids are not alright and know perfectly well their talent and opportuntites are of little value to the rest of us, we, and our kids, will reap what we sew.
Soon the falling birthrate will demand we close schools, currently the only schools we can close are those open to all kids. Soon, rather than increasing parental choice, current policies will leave many parents with no local public schools at all. Heaven forbid they fall on straightened circumstances or the private schools decide they don't want to accept their child.....
Thank God Vinnies, at least, can see the writing on the wall.
Posted by enaj, Thursday, 23 June 2005 11:44:31 AM
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Saunders bogus right wing "stink tank" research is just the kind of pseudo-research that neoconservative policy-makers love. It hasnt any serious validity or credibility within the academic community. Prediction; more cries of "hysteria" as the budget cuts begin to blow out into the prison, charity and mental health systems. Yeah, right, they are all only suffering from paranoid delusion.....
Wake up and smell the coffee; this is only the beginning.
Posted by subversity, Thursday, 23 June 2005 11:59:52 AM
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Arjay wrote, "Govt is the most wasteful and inefficient way of doing anything."

This article of faith of the least last 25 years has led to massive inefficiencies in our economy which false measures of prosperity, such as the GDP, have concealed from effective public scrutiny.

As I wrote in another forum, based on another article by PS, the Housing Trust of South Australia never cost taxpayers a cent, and yet helped keep decent housing affordable for all South Australians for many decades. Compared to the massive overheads that many of us are forced to pay in today's almost totally privatised housing market, I would say that that is pretty damned efficient!

If other Government enterprises have been inefficient and excessively feather-bedded, I would suggest that it is because of a lack of a political will. In a healthy democracy, with accountability and transparency, the HTSA example shows that there is every reason to expect that Government run services should be more, rather than less, efficient than private buinesses, particularly in natural monopolies such as Telecommunications.

(PS, in regards to your quip about St Vinnies "attack(ing) the privatisation of Telstra as a social crime", could you please tell us all why you believe the privatisation of Telstra is in the public interest? If you have already written an article about it, I would see to it that it gets put on http://www.citizensagainstsellingtelstra.com).

Many private charities require huge overheads to raise funds. Remember how most of the funds raised in a recent Cancer appeal went to pay $200,000 to Cherie Blair and an equivalent amount to the organiser of the appeal? So, whilst I am in favour of charities, I still think (and I suspect that St Vinnies would agree) that we would be far better off if Govenments assumed much greater responsibility for areas now looked after by charities.
Posted by daggett, Saturday, 25 June 2005 6:07:52 AM
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The table of "average private household income" for the period 1994-95 to 2002-03 provided in Ann Harding's NATSEM Paper, dated 31 March 2005; is sourced from ABS income surveys, and ignores households with zero income.
These data have been variously interpreted since, by the Prime Minister, the Society of Saint Vincent de Paul, and Peter Saunders from CIS.
I too have subjected the data to a rigorous back-of-envelope analysis, projecting the trends now evident for the second decile and the highest decile, to a longitudinal study of the current period
2002-03 to 2010-11
A reported 53% increase in decile 2, and of 38% increase in the top decile, results in 2010-11 figures of $462.00 and $3842.00 respectively, a difference of $3342.00. Compared with the documented $2450 difference at the end of 2002-03; this does suggest to me the rightness of the St. Vincent de Paul claims of an ever widening chasm.
Peter Saunders' sarcasm and indignation is just business as usual for the CIS
Posted by clink, Saturday, 25 June 2005 1:56:26 PM
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clink,

Could you please explain your point further? The figures you have given indicate to me that the gap is narrowing rather than widening. If the second decile are to be 53% wealthier in 2010-2011 and the top decile are to be only 38% wealthier in the same financial year and the trend were to continue indefinitely, then surely the gap would eventually close, regardless of the absolute values of the respective increases?

If the effect of John Howard's policies were to be the redistribution of income back to the poorest, as your figures seem to indicate, even if it were not as fast as I would like to see it happen, then I, for one, would be pleasantly surprised.

Perhaps, you can convince me that I am wrong, but it looks as if you have also based your case on a flawed mathematical argument.

However, as I have said earlier, it should not be necessary to resort to such arguments. The ABS income and GDP figures are obviously not giving an accurate picture of our overall prosperity, and are unlikely to be a useful guide in the future.

For example, the claims that we are all, on average, twice as prosperous now as we were in the 1960's, when, today, two incomes, instead of one, are normally required to pay a mortgage, and the work week for the full-time workforce is being extended, are clearly nonsense. Obviously many factors have not been properly taken into account when measures of prosperity are calculated.

The late Bob Santamaria, was clearly much closer to the mark, when he stated that incomes have fallen, and not risen, since the mid 1970's.
Posted by daggett, Saturday, 25 June 2005 8:10:26 PM
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Wow, Peter Saunders and those like him really do live in fantasy land. Anyone with half a brain that has experienced real life, will tell you that the gap between the elite and the people is getting wider and wider. When those in power give themselves pay rises and tax relief that is worth more than lots of peoples total annual income, you have all the evidence you need. It is all well and good to sit in ivory towers provided by the people of Australia by their hard work and gloat. Luckily, reality certainly doesen't favour the elite academics that seem to have this idea that they are the only ones that know anything. Just go and live with people and not illusions, travel and spend time in the rural and outlying areas of the cities. It won't be long before you see the real world. I may not be that academic, but I have spent a lot of time with those that academics put down. What right do they have to live in luxury at the expense of their fellow citizens. If you have a look at the track record of the beaururcatic academics, you will find that it is they that have brought about the situation we have and they fail to accept. Mind you when the reality overcomes the illusion, lets hope that those in power get what they deserve and the people get what they have a right to. Rather than the dregs handed out by the elitists within our societies. History will show you that in the end, those that force their control onto those that have supported them, by being bled dry to support the elitist lifestyles, will in the end provide the proof that elitism fails all the time. Pity they don't learn from that fact.
Posted by The alchemist, Saturday, 2 July 2005 1:29:04 PM
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