I'll make the question simpler. How long would it take to buy a median priced house on an average wage today? How long ten, twenty, thirty, fifty years ago? This would mean more to me than knowing how many Big Macs/Apple Macs someone on a median wage could afford.

The economic success of a country isn't everything either. The Black Death was an economic disaster on a national level, but greatly improved the living standards of surviving labourers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/british/middle_ages/blacksocial_01.shtml

"Ginx may prefer personal experience to data and reason when considering this question. I don’t.
Posted by Rhian, Thursday, 13 September 2007 4:34:37 PM"

(Data......'and reason'. Skillfully inserted! Data has little to do with reason...)

Rhian may prefer data to TELL US what how we stand. I don't.

"As to what takes you an hour, takes me about 30 seconds..." (Quote:Yabby).

Two clever people. I mean it.

If it works for me; it works for all.

If it's in the stats; it is correct.

What hallowed ground you occupy.

In the '70's when I wanted a job I went in, talked to the boss and was hired, or no job existed at that time. If I fell out with my boss and told him to stuff it, I could quite literally go down the street and have another job the same day. By 1980 you couldn't do that. You had to have some training or education before you could start. By 1990 you had to almost make an appointment to see HR and if any job was available, and you had to have specific training and experience. Today, I work by contract and don't even do my initial leg work. I use an employment service who send my CV to only select companies able to answer my personal expectations. I get back to them if they have checked the appropriate boxes.
Big difference from the first job I ever had. I walked in asked for a job and was handed a broom. Two weeks later I was at a bench grinding machine parts and before three months was up I was learning to weld with an experienced work mate. Can you still do that today? I don't think so. Much has changed. Some for the better, some most definitely not. Change does!

(continuedfromabove at http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=6326#93410 also at http://candobetter.org/node/162#comment-749)

If the people in control had done their job properly we would not have had to deal with either by now. Can you show us, BTW how we all stand to come out ahead, in your economic model, with the predicted increased frequencies of events like Hurricane Katrina which devastated New Orleans in 2005, no doubt helped by Australian coal exports?

If you had read my article I had conceded that significant numbers of ordinary Australians were likely to be somewhat better off, notwithstanding the negatives I have mentioned.

However this has almost nothing to do with Howard's economic management. It is simply their good luck to be sitting on our bounty of our finite non-renewable mineral wealth at a time when the Chinese and Indian economies are expanding with all of the grave hazards that this poses for our global life support system

----

Yabby,

Firstly, I have provided many examples. Why have you disregarded all but one?

In regard to claiming Medicare rebates, why do you presume that your own system is relevant to myself?

Unlike you, I am not in the habit of regularly banking cheques, so if I want the money from the rebate cheque, it is necessary for me to make a special trip.

No, my local GP doesn't have the system in place that you described, so all the steps I itemised are necessary. If you can accomplish all of them in 30 seconds rather than an hour and a half, then you are both a genius and a super-human athlete.

My simple point was that once there was a simple straightforward system that made it possible for us to visit our GP without any need for having to carry extra cash and deal with claim forms and cheques, and now, for many people, there is not.

This is only one of many ways in which the additional time-consuming complexity of life is not accounted for by the indicators which ostensibly measure our prosperity.

---

Rhian wrote, "Accusing Yabby of misrepresenting others' arguments is rather hypocritical, ..."
(tobecontinued)

(continuedfromabove)
He did and I have shown that he did. If you say that I misrepresented yours then show me where and I will discuss it.

---

Rhian, you wrote, "Yes, job applications take longer now than they used to. Still, 2 weeks?"

Is it your intention to discuss the issue at hand or to discuss your own perception of my personal adequacies?

If you must focus on the latter, then why not go back and read, very carefully, what I have written and then try to apply what has been demonstrably lacking on your part so far, that is, empathy.

Just try to understand the task that many job seekers face when contemplating a job description and a set of selection criteria which don't match the credentials and experience that they have, knowing that that there is a huge glut of other applicants.

Try to understand that many people would rather devote their time and talents to more productive and socially useful activities than updating and massaging CV's and addressing selection criteria, as once was possible. Try to understand, as I have already explained, that people who have been in the situation that I have been go through depression and face writer's blocks when faced with this task.

If, after all of that, two weeks still seems inordinately long to you, and if you are not simply taking a cheap shot at me in order to divert the attention of forum visitors away from the glaring weakness of your case, then let's have that discussion elsewhere.


---

In regard to your indignant protestations at Alun Breward having labelled those economists who fiddled figures to give a misleading picture of housing affordability, as 'economic rationalists' (http://www.abc.net.au/rn/science/ockham/stories/s1335462.htm) I think it is a safe bet that they were. Perhaps Breward neglected to disclose how he came to that conclusion, but his central argument is still highly relevant to this discussion.

There are mountains of evidence that show that economic (ir)rationalists are not only 'threat to our economic wellbeing', but, indeed, a threat to human civilisation and the life support system ...
(tobecontinued)

Daggett,
I’d prefer not to discuss your personal inadequacies, but as you illustrate you points with your own experiences, it’s hard to avoid. Anyway, you posed a direct question to me about the time it takes to full in a job application. You can hardly complain when I respond.

You misrepresented my arguments:

a) on the difficulty of comparing unquantifiable measures of quality of life such as declining youth suicide and rising drug taking, which you misrepresent as an attempt to “prove” that life is getting better

b) on the gratuitous nature of Breward’s comments, which you misrepresent as a defence of economic rationalism

c) on economists’ views of GDP, which you infer are discussed only “among themselves”, rather than being widely known

d) by accusing me of not answering your arguments, when I clearly have

e) by representing me as an apologist for Howard, when my only reference to him was to say Keating and Hawke deserve more credit than Howard for our economic success

f) by claiming that failure to share your views, and insistence on examining evidence, comprises a lack of empathy.