mikk. Good point.
The "Pay peanuts get monkeys" brigade have conveniently ignored the fact hat the highest paid industries tend to boom and then collapse.
"Pay millions, get greedy pigs" should be the lesson learned. Encouraging short term profit grabs at the expense of long term viability has killed most industry in the West and transferred the future wealth generation to Asia.
So yes, we desperately need some wealth re-distribution away from corporations and dead capital towards people, who can work to build up a capability again.
Economics states that for utility to be maximised, profits must be minimal. Competition is the assumed way to minimise profits, however in the real world many industries just don't have any real competition. This is evidenced by record profits in last decade.
To those who say Socialism is dead: Surely the massive bailout of US, European, and Australian capitalist institutions by public money shows that the ultra-capitalist model is also fatally flawed?
Letting the rich get richer has been the age old human economics that has been going on for thousands of years. A progressive society is pretty recent and for a while it put Australia near the top of the world in quality of life. I'd like to return to that.

It is good to read nostalgic stuff like this.
It takes us right back, at least to the 60s and almost to the 50s in Australian political discussion.
At that time it did seem that perhaps socialism and government control of the economy (necessary to achieve what the writer wants) were the inevitable consequence of the more or less free markets failings. And the evidence of the War when government control over even even small parts of society seemed to have contributed to victory. If the government can defeat our enemies, surely sorting out the economy should not be too difficult?
Since then we have seen attempts to manage societies with various grades of socialism: from highly coercive down to moderately coercive, and in many different cultures around the world.
Nowhere has it produced wealth and a happy society.
So how can one still argue rationally for socialist solutions?

mkk
Ho hum, labour theory of value, perhaps if you keep repeating fallacies they will become true eventually? You have not got to square one yet.

Ozandy
"To those who say Socialism is dead: Surely the massive bailout of US, European, and Australian capitalist institutions by public money shows that the ultra-capitalist model is also fatally flawed?"

The fact that governments took money from the people to give to political pet favourites as part of a government scheme for economic management proves that it wasn't 'ultra-capitalist'. It was just another flawed socialist scheme for trying to manage the economy by central planning.

If it was ultra-capitalist there would be no:
government control of the money supply
government credit creation
government creation of banking cartel
artificial boom
consequential depression
bailouts
'too big to fail' doctrine
stimulus packages
... and so on.

You are simply confused as to the meanings of the words you are using.

mikk, you ignore the "risk vs return" basis behind why those that own capital, and those on high incomes get such high returns. Many run the risk of having periods of time when no money is made (or indeed large losses). Higher income in other times is the systems way of rewarding this risk, and also helping to buffer against it. Then you have some earners who are at high risk of litigation and losing all their wealth - your dunny cleaner is much less likely to be sued for a botched job than is a doctor who has a botched job - hence reward is higher for the risk taken (not to mention said doctor can work anything up to 100 hr a week instead of the 40, thereby infringing significantly on their private and family time, so there is a compensation factor for this too).

Lets not forget while we are on the topic of loss, that small business owners (you know, those that provide the most jobs in Aust), rarely make more than their workers. Sure the profits might be higher, but by the time ou take out taxs then reinvest a significant part of income back into capital, there is often not that much left over. Those that make good profits and are arrogant enough not to reinvest in thei business often find themselves without a business pretty quick smart!

And then your said dunny cleaner can also buy shares in the corporates that are ripping him off - way to go to share in the profits, he can be as capitalist as the next person.

Aaaaah, the nostalgia, mikk

>>Taxation should be progressive up to 90%+<<

"Let me tell you how it will be;
There's one for you, nineteen for me.
'Cause I'm the taxman,
Yeah, I'm the taxman.

Should five per cent appear too small,
Be thankful I don't take it all.
'Cause I'm the taxman,
Yeah, I'm the taxman.

if you drive a car, I'll tax the street;
if you try to sit, I'll tax your seat;
if you get too cold, I'll tax the heat;
if you take a walk, I'll tax your feet.

Taxman!

'Cause I'm the taxman,
Yeah, I'm the taxman.

Don't ask me what I want it for,
If you don't want to pay some more.
'Cause I'm the taxman,
Yeah, I'm the taxman.

Now my advice for those who die,
Declare the pennies on your eyes.
'Cause I'm the taxman,
Yeah, I'm the taxman.

And you're working for no one but me."

(Taxman: Lennon/McCartney)

The only problem, as they discovered back in the sixties, is that you will drive your taxpayers overseas.

Not just the individuals, but companies too.

Nor is it a really great idea to remove aspiration from the mix of motivations that get us to work every day.

It's tough enough as it is.