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The Forum > General Discussion > Record low uneployment?

Record low uneployment?

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"the Menzies Mckeon government, things were much then better they are now, for example my house cost 4 years of my salary, (now 10 equivalent salaries). Then, this country was paying its own way"

Ah, the good old days, when Aus rode on the sheep's back, until the
poor old sheep collapsed from all the weight. Tariffs were high,
so the Melbourne establishment got rich, on the back of screwing
poor old consumers for every dollar.

How bad things are now. Consumers get to vote with their wallets,
unlike the "good old days", when they were forced to buy any old
crap manufactured in Melbourne and Sydney.
Posted by Yabby, Sunday, 14 January 2007 10:31:47 PM
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"How bad things are now. Consumers get to vote with their wallets,
unlike the "good old days", when they were forced to buy any old
crap manufactured in Melbourne and Sydney."
Come on Yabby! You must surely be having a laugh? Everything made today (and made overseas) is crap and made that way on purpose. Designed obsolescence I believe it's called. DVD's with a one year guarantee, CD players the same, TV's, washing machines....in fact, buyers of most white goods today only get a one year warranty and it doesn't stop at whitegoods alone. In fact, most things we buy today are crap and made to throw away. My mother used a Stamco washing machine up until only recently. It lasted for decades until a small part broke. It was consigned to the shed only because nobody stocks parts for them any more. I believe the machine was manufactured in Sydney. Her "Fridgadaire" refrigerator still runs well after 44 years and has never seen a repair man, although I seem to remember the interior light bulb had to be replaced at one time. At least when things were made locally, one could source parts for them and in fact most things could be fixed in the home workshop by dad, but no more! Now we're forced to throw items into landfills and be charged for the privilege. You can't even get $2 for an old battery at the scrap merchant any more. You have to pay to dump it, then the manager of the recycling/transfer station takes them to be sold. And you're trying to tell me todays "throwaway" world is a better place to live than it was even as little 20 years ago? Yep! You're having a laugh alright Yabby.
Posted by Wildcat, Monday, 15 January 2007 11:37:20 AM
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Ah Wildcat, what you of course forget, is that today I have
choice! I can buy an el cheapo dvd for 50$, or a flash
Japanese one for alot more. Given that the Aussie repair
man wants 100$ just to take a look to see what could be wrong
if it breaks down, on some items the el cheapo model, like
with dvds, is the prefered option!

My Holden used to give me 12 months warranty. My imported
4wd gives me 3 years warranty. If they made them not to
last, it would cost them bigtime.

Choices is what its all about Wildcat! The Melbourne club
boys got rich on those Govt monopolies, now they have to
actually pull their fingers out of their butts and let
consumers choose! Dread the thought...lol

We farmers compete on global markets, its time for you
city slickers to do the same.
Posted by Yabby, Monday, 15 January 2007 1:20:44 PM
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The danger is that if Australian labour has to compete directly against global pricing tey will not have any money to buy Australian produce. Already tuna canned in Thailand is 66% of the australian price. The cheapest canned fruit is from South Africa, and you can buy fresh green beans grown in China. NOw why don't we import all our dairy products and apples from New Zealand and our bananas from the Phillipines.

Hey lets not horse around, the latest ABARE statistics say that australian agriculture contributes 3% to our GDP and gets 5% of our GDP in farm subsidies. This sounds like the grateful taxpayer is subsidising the farm sector.

Rest assured the gilded scions of the Melbourne Club are still collecting their primary producer rebates while the unemployed car factory worker is buying the cheaper imported food.

I personally don't think that Australia should subdivide all its best farmland into suburban tract housing and I don't think Asutralia should import food but in a globalised economy its cheaper for Australia to import food and ditch farm and droughht subsidies.
Posted by billie, Monday, 15 January 2007 5:45:12 PM
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Well Billie, perhaps some of those car workers will have to move
industries, to where the work is. Meat companies are screaming for
workers, can't find them. In WA there are plenty of jobs, no takers.

All those mining developments mean another 70'000 direct jobs. Add
the many add ons, thats 250'000. But its not going to happen
in Melbourne.

Yup, I eat canned guavas and grapefruit from South Africa. Delicious!
Nope, I won't buy Chinese beans lol.

No 5% of GDP in subsidies sorry, where did you get that from?
Yup, some subsidies paid, nearly all over East, it doesent seem
to come to WA, the most efficient agricultural producer. We just
pay pay pay.

You are free to import your milk, dairy, wheat, meat etc, from
overseas. Only it would cost you heaps more.

So feel free to end farm and drought subsidies, most of that seems
to go to NSW anyhow, certainly not the West!

All we need is enough workers to run our meatworks. Politics gets
in the way of us flying them in from overseas, when we need them.
All the East is doing is holding us back from our potential.
Posted by Yabby, Monday, 15 January 2007 7:54:38 PM
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“Ah, the good old days, when Aus rode on the sheep's back, until the
poor old sheep collapsed from all the weight. Tariffs were high,”

Yabby, this is anecdotal popular myth and the trade figures prove this.
Up to June 1974 the tariffs were high but averaged over 3 or 4 years our current account was balanced. That is the difference between what we all spend on imports and what we all earn on exports was zero, that is we were earning our own way.

In June 1974 the Whitlam government made the first across the board tariff reduction and immediately the unemployment began to climb and the third quarter Current Account (CA) was in deficit, we did not pay our way. We have not paid our way since for 32.5 years we have been running CA deficits.

We have use two methods to cover these deficits firstly we sell assets (akin to a family selling the family silver) and secondly we borrow (akin a family second mortgage and pawnshop). The assets we have sold include companies such as Arnotts, Speedo, etc. and physical assets such as mineral deposits in WA the east, the rest we must borrow at interest rates which are higher than US rates.

We are running out of assets and the US interest rates are going up. Now the banks borrow this currency on the world market to cover their deficits when converting currency and they are left with the Australian dollars that they converted. This is made available by the banks as endless credit enabling us to “vote with our [borrowed] wallets”.

Because we are running out of saleable assets interest rates must continue to follow the US rates up.

But we have a “Minerals Boom” oh yeah. Last year the CA deficit was 54 billion dollars even with the boom.

But we have “Economic Growth” oh yeah. Last year the growth was entirely borrowed and covered by assets sales and then some.

We appear to be the worlds first successful Cargo Cult. Long live Ekarnomic Groath, praise to the Cargoe Gods.
Posted by brightspark, Tuesday, 16 January 2007 12:55:12 AM
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