This is a good, balanced article outlining the sources and features of the crisis well. I agree that there are risks in current policy responses, particularly if measures like bank guarantees are sustained once the crisis is over. So often the seeds of past recession have been sown in policy responses to the previous ones – such as the expansionary monetary policy in the US that contributed to the recent housing bubble. While unusual measures are clearly warranted by the current crisis, many should be unwound quickly once it passes.

quote from lead article>>....As such, capitalism has performed well raising many societies from poverty to prosperity. For example, numbers earning less than $1US per day fell by one-half to one-third of their 1970 levels by 2000...<<

numerical inflation my br-other

i well recall the 70.s [as fuel rose to the absurd price of 30 cents a litre[thus as a referance using the price of gas at 1.20 a litre average ,those ONE third who are claimed in the ARTicle should if NOW on 4 dollars [will STILL BE IN LEGAL POVERTY]

and the TWO thirds STILL on [under] one buck
IN STILL in even WORSE poverty

..>> Australia experienced continuous, strong growth for 17 years with improving living standards..>>

effectivly [beginning with KEATING ,and con-pleted by how-hard and co$t-hell -o?] comunity standards have been shredded in every measure we can imagine,average wage ISNT even indexed to the FAKE figures it propagates as satisfactory 'numbers'

low inflation and LOW? unemployment are a delusion, 2 chours work doth not full time employment make,real inflation includes such inconveniant numbers such as house and the rampant price fluctuations of fuel [not just bannanas,]

please note the effect bannana shortage had [what of the REAl inflation rate IF [houses and petrol WERE in the figures AS they were meant to be ?]WHERE COULD [should] REAL WAGES for the CONtracted wage slaves be ?

in 2008 REAL wages and REAL conditions are at its lowest level in 34 years.[thats a fact][and those with a memory know what the lying numbers reveal [and also know why]''Those with longer memories have sounded warnings about “irrational exuberance” but have typically been ignored.''put upon [spat upon] ridiculed and criminalised , victimesed , accused abused ,despised and decieved

Under one god

The dollar-a-day poverty benchmark is adjusted for inflation.

In the past 34 years average male earnings have increased by 860% (6.9% a year) and the Consumer Price Index has increased by 600% (5.9% a year). As a result, the real wage has risen by 37% (0.9% a year) – not spectacular, but not bad growth. Real wages fell during the Accord years in the 1980s, but since then growth has been pretty steady.

My data are based on financial year averages from these ABS sources:

Inflation data from Table 1 from here
http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6401.0Sep%202008?OpenDocument

Recent earnings data from Table 3 from here:
http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6302.0Aug%202008?OpenDocument

historical earnings data from here:
http://www.rba.gov.au/Statistics/OP8ExcelFiles/4-17.xls

Can you supply any sources for your claims?

http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/6401.0Explanatory%20Notes1Sep%202008?OpenDocument
might reveal some of the manipulations
http://www.epionline.org/mw_statistics_annual.cfm
has an interesting graph

as for the 30 cents measure i quoted that increase was achieved by a 2 percent shortfall in production
as for the 1.20 figure it is an average of the highs we just went though and a prersent price arround the dollar

the thing is who prepares your facts[must have acces to the facts]and funny thing is they work for govt ,thus GET PAID to present the govt spin ,

if your better off now than you were two mths ago
know you are in a very select group

if you need to believe the spin one third have bettered their situation at least factor in inflation[radio reports recently reveal a 200 opercent price increase this year alone for a bag of rice ,by some abc/bbc news reports

But as Chancellor in 2003, Brown switched to the Consumer Prices Index (CPI), hich strips out some of the largest household expenses such as council tax and rent.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=429519&in_page_id=2

further egsamples
http://www.itulip.com/forums/showthread.php?t=482
http://elainemeinelsupkis.typepad.com/money_matters/2007/09/elaine-meine-17.html

http://books.google.com.au/books?id=0hggJhQQQboC&pg=PA81&lpg=PA81&dq=real+inflation+level&source=web&ots=09YhyxYJkO&sig=5_xUVNlB-d5bEwF2L6Y4bhsE3k4&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=8&ct=result#PPA82,M1

Name-calling is no substitute for sound argument.

There is more ground for calling government economic management ‘fundamentalist’ since public ownership of the means of production is impossible and causes mass starvation and economic chaos, whereas a society based on private property is not only moral and viable but is the necessary basis for the existence of all governmental expropriations.

The assumption that services provided by government are more socially beneficial than by private firms is based on a double standard, and cannot withstand critical scrutiny. Payment for government services is coerced, the service provider is a monopoly, re-distribution introduces economic and moral incoherence into many services, the consumers are natural prey to all kinds of rent-seeking based on political power and privilege, you get one vote on all services once every three years, you have to pay for services you don’t want, and there is no legal requirement on politicians to actually perform as they promise: massive fraud is both legal and routine. By contrast, market transactions are voluntary, every single dollar is a vote, the consumer can distinguish wanted from unwanted services, competition makes monopoly a problem of theory not practice, fraud is against the law, and economic calculation enables clarity on whether any given transaction is worth it.

Your argument as to public goods presumes markets are anti-social and dangerous wherever they do not measure up to ‘Nirvana economics’ tests of perfect information, perfection competition and so on, which governments would fail far worse than private firms. You assume that government is stabilizing the economy and protecting the disadvantaged, whereas there is much more evidence and reason to show that it is the main cause of these economic and social problems it is claiming to fix: see mises.org

The fundamental issue between free market economics on the one hand, and Marxian, Keynesian and monetarist schools on the other is that the latter group believe that, left to itself, the market may produce permanent high unemployment. But the only evidence that the price mechanism won’t clear the market, is that government makes it illegal! Not much of an argument.

Under one god

The chart you point to is indeed interesting. It shows movements in the minimum wage, which only a tiny fraction of the workforce receives, so is far less representative of what people earn than the data I quoted. And it shows data for the USA – hardly representative of what’s happening here.

If you dismiss every official statistic as government spin then you should at least try to explain why the data are misleading

rhian it was barely in the news yesterday[about the polititions pay increase ,but the fact is average wages is not what the [or any] average person gets

[you see my bro rich people get a lot [poor people as you seem to noew understand very little[but the average medium is a pure fiction]

a non egsitant CREATED fiction
#
lets put it in simple words for simple people we have a boss and his fifty workers [but the 'boss' wage is half the number] polititions letting a govt body set its wage[a 100,000 dollar increase] allows the public servants and judges and state polititions et al to proportuinatly increase their wage WAY ABOUVE inflation too.

but the working slobs dont even get inflation
[do they even have the same board?]

GIVE the minimum wage earners
the same increase percentage polititions got on thursday

when we add the haves with the haveNOTS
you get the increasing medium wage

[but to the poor a wage decrease ,as ANYTHING below inflation level is a wage-cut in REAL wages]and wages for the poor are held under inflation.[even held below the fictional inflation number]

but heh you go boy [you talk about the fiction figures all you like
but average aint THE average wage for anyone]
[any 'real' wage earner that is]
# thus its a lie]