We are at an interesting and somewhat dangerous place at the moment, as we are now starting to feel the knock on effects of the new way of running businesses here in Oz.

I said back in 07 that if we take an axe to IR, that somewhere down the track we would pay for it dearly, and perhaps that somewhere is closer than we might think.

When you think about it, we have recently come through the largest mining boom in our history, yet, we are in worse shape now, than we were pre boom, with the CSG infrastructure phase being our last real source of job creation, and that has an end date of approx 2016/17.

Our coal industry is in meltdown, and even manufacturing icons like the top end smelting plant are closing shop.

Furthermore, with our car industries in turmoil, and the likes of Qantas, a national icon, buckling under the strain, one has to wonder just where we will be by say 2020, especially given our collective powers to be expect us to cut emissions during the next seven odd years as well. A move THAT MUST add to costs.

Our schools are in poor shape, we have unfunded dreams such as the gonski, NDIS and the so called NBN that is becoming ever closer to the white elephant that many of us predicted it would.

Even the die hard labor supporters would have to admit that the labor experiment of 07&10 were dismal failures and have set the tone for what looks to be decades of struggle street for generations to come.

I'm fear the lucky country ship has sailed and we've missed the boat.

Butch you have your dream govt; installed. Yet you don't seem happy. Abbott has got things under control as he told the people of AU before the election. So work choices will return, but the cost of buying will remain the same, will that fix your concerns. GST will rise to 18% and that will get a few extra bucks. The sale of medibank will be a great help also. You must have faith in Abbott and co to guide the ship.

Gee 579, if any of what you say is true, and actually occurs, it's a disgrace that it will only occurr as a means to try to pay down labors useless debt.

I say useless, because what did they achieve with the billions the spent/wasted.

Notice the Decline in the boats lately!

I have little doubt work choices, of some form, will one day return, so we can stop paying ridiculously high wages for the losers, and increase the wages fir the real workers, which in turn will increase productivity.

You see when you over pay poor workers, the good ones sit on their hands.

Point in case.

too easy
you rekon..their going bust
bet on/them going down..[you cant buy shares..in them/only bet if their going up/or down]

BUT WHOCARE WHAT CAPITALISTS WANT?
govt only needs put ina lasw..[that our tools remainin oz]

and dont get sold for scrap value

TAX DEDUCTIONS..means the tools
tax-deducted..to minimize tax..[that govt compensated..them for]

..stay here
simple..you can go..but the building and the tools BELONG TOTHE WORKMAN

its why you got the sack[to carry YOUR tools/home]

the TRADES MAN OWN THE TOOLS
unionists fought for that

so..sure..mr/gmh..you can go
BUT*..your tools STAY

removing them means you..gottta pay back..the deductibles[depreciation/your..too clever lawyers used..to scam..us/all.

exporting tools/machines..is treason

thieves..must/not gain..from their LIES
you..signed..it..YOUR PERSONALLY LIABLE*

ex-us

579, you think Rechub is unhappy even though the Lib/Nat were elected.
Well I have to tell you that neither Lib/Nat or Labour know what is
happening but as it does happen the Lib/Nats I believe will be better
able to adapt to the circumstances.

They do not understand that we are entering an era of zero growth and
if not managed properly will put us into contraction.
Neither will at first understand that this is a PERMANENT condition.
It is not something that can be overcome by money manipulation or by
nationalisation of banks and businesses.
The situation in Europe and the US illustrate this brilliantly.

Peter Costello warned that we cannot pay off the current debt ever !
If so how much worse off is the US ?
What do you think will happen when the world accepts that US bonds and
debt will never be paid off ?

It is a fundamental change that is just now starting to happen.
The government will now start pouring money into a 2nd Sydney airport.
I will bet quids that it will never be more than half done when it is
abandoned due to falling air traffic. Overseas, air traffic has fallen
in some areas already.
The airport may be abandoned earlier because the government will not
have the money. Indeed, if anyone thinks government money is tight
now, it will be party time compared to the next 15 years.

IR rules will become irrelevant as unemployment rises.
Imports will decrease as everything becomes local and
"chuck it out and buy a new one" will be what grandpa did.

"""
so we can stop paying ridiculously high wages for the losers
"""

Should we not pay people a living wage?

Coz if you don't, we the tax payers fill in the shortfall, welfare for the rich!

I'm sick of paying burger flippers through my taxes because companies refuse to pay a living wage, Wake up!

Butcher I forgive you and hope at one level we remain friends.
See no taunting involved it is my view the big bad wolf you fear does not exist.
Yes during the last 6 years *LIKE ALMOST EVERY* ALP rank and file member I was often disgusted.
But in upsetting me and nearly all the party,s base great things got achieved.
The removal of work choices was a proud highlight.
Rechtub do you not see it was an attempt to introduce a working class poor?
That in an effort to kill unions John Winston Howard put in place a system to entrench poverty on some workers.
The degree of B**tardy was opposed even by solid Liberal voters.
Yesterdays ALP the one inflicting defeat on us, is no more.
Any honest sideways glance at them first will show improvement to be proud of.
And take that glance at Abbott,s big top, Surely Australia deserves better than that?

Butch has been taking lessons from Arjay. The roof is going to cave in.

Sorry Belly, but if assembly line workers at GMH, not exactly the most demanding of employment, are being paid S100,000 a year, your unions have a very great deal to answer for.

I won't blame the unions or the workers for the ridiculously high money being paid in the mining industry, that is down to bad management not being prepared to train enough people in the semi skilled work, most of them do.

It is a pity that that lack of training effort by the miners is about to drag us all onto poor street. We have priced ourselves out of just about every market there is, so now we pay.

579>> Butch you have your dream govt; installed. Yet you don't seem happy. Abbott has got things under control as he told the people of AU before the election. So work choices will return, but the cost of buying will remain the same, will that fix your concerns. GST will rise to 18% and that will get a few extra bucks. The sale of medibank will be a great help also. You must have faith in Abbott and co to guide the ship.<<

579 should just get a job writing paid political comment. If the benchmark is fact his words make no sounds.

In 2007 Rudd was given a $20 Billion...six years later we owe $370 Billion.

LABORS BENCHMARKS
HIGHEST MINING TAX REVENUE IN THE COMMONWEALTHS HISTORY
HIGHEST DEBT IN THE COMMONWEALTHS HISTORY
FASTEST GROWN DEBT IN THE COMMONWEALTHS HISTORY

And all in six years, that deserves some sort of kudos,....579 has a touch too much of the Ioseb Besarionis dze Jugashvili.

Belly>>.The removal of work choices was a proud highlight.<<

As was the removal of jobs due to the Carbon Tax.

As for the workers friend the Unions:
ABC News>> “Australian Workers Union national secretary Paul Howes has warned the Government that "if one job is gone, our support [for the carbon tax] is gone".<<

Well the jobs went and the unions still supported the tax. The Labor Party knocked it over in the Senate just last night in league with the Greens.

Belly what new party, what changes, what shedding of past idiocies....they are the same....absolutely hopeless...not an opposition any longer...just a legislative pain in the rectum putting ideology over the peoples mandate....Remember Gillard won because she promised no carbon tax.....I want Labor out of Australia’s life until the next election...hopefully some premise for a double dissolution in the new year. Labor is a joke and it got flogged, but it hasn’t changed.

579 , Rechtub will never be happy, even though his hero Abbott and the Libs are in power.
We continue to be the lucky country Rehctub, no matter what Government is in power.

No matter what bad things happen in his world, the Labor Party are to blame.

Every bad policy that Abbott announces will be because of previous labor bad policies.
Every good policy that Abbott announces will be because of previous labor bad policies.

Gee, the world according to Rechtub is always so predictable as to be ....well....boring!

it's going to take at least three terms of Coalition Government just to nudge the damage from the ALP/Rudd Government. Who knows what condition the US & China & Russia will be in by then ?
Australia probably has a better chance than most countries to recover if real education can be made a priority beefed up with a National Service. Once australian teachers can spell properly again & the kids have a tiny dose of responsibility drummed into them, things will have a chance to improve. The recent & the present standard of australian education are a recipè for progressive regress.

National service, Individual?
Great idea.

Let's teach all our youth how to shoot to kill.
Then we could be more like America, where shooting guns is a national 'right', and a gun is considered part of their morning routine when dressing.

I think our country is too bright to resort to such violence, and I also believe our youth have had a good education in the main.
People around the world are clamouring to live in Australia, so we must be doing something right...

Let's teach all our youth how to shoot to kill.
Suseonline,
where does it say anything about shooting ? How can our young get good education with the system here unless the Coalition is changing it ? It's all about discipline & pulling your own weight. Don't get stuck in the mentality that we're all public servants. Some of actually do work & produce something.

Butch, said "I (rehctub) have little doubt work choices, of some form, will one day return, so we can stop paying ridiculously high wages." Are new starters in the meat trade, still told to "get your wages through the scales?". Maybe Abbott can incorporate that philosophy into his "new" work choices, just for butchers.

Paul you should know better.
Rechtub may well be a good bloke.
But his posts ALWAYS IGNORE workers rights.
He and thousands of right wing Tory,s will be unaware of this weeks significant birth day.
Eureka Stockade, birth place of unions and too the event that stopped a under class of workers being thought of as cattle.
Any thought we are doomed because we think a worker has the right to a liveing wage, not survival is worth fighting against.
And too the idea this country is doomed is like that famous poem about Hanrahan a funny joke but not true.

I cannot recall any government over a long working life that was of any real value. State or Federal for that matter.
With few exceptions politicians of all stripes produce little that is of benefit to the country.
You get on with life, working your way around these fools who waste their time and our money in Canberra.
The previous Labor government and this current Liberal Government would possibly be the worst of a bad lot.
Every circus needs a clown but appointing the clown as ringmaster is not a good look, a few laughs at best.
In my opinion they are both indefensible.
SD

The ship has not sailed, it can't find it's way out of port. We have an act of govt; that is indecisive and hamstrung by a raft of promises, with one objective in mind , that was to deceive the people of AU. Now that has come to roost, they are lost, with no plan B. Abbott is to blame, with his policy on the run, with no restraints and now we are in turmoil. Anything to deceive the people.

yes..we missed the boat
first the queen..follows my advice
now obama..[see as sovereigns..ANYONE..has this right

Obama’s Trillion Dollar Platinum Coin

Ryan J. Reilly
huffingtonpost.com
December 3, 2013

The Obama administration was serious enough about manufacturing a high-value platinum coin to avert a congressional fight over the debt ceiling that it had its top lawyers draw up a memo laying out the legal case for such a move, The Huffington Post learned last week.

The Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, which functions as a sort of law firm for the president and provides him and executive branch agencies with authoritative legal advice, formally weighed in on the platinum coin option sometime since Obama took office, according to OLC’s recent response to HuffPost’s Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. While the letter acknowledged the existence of memos on the platinum coin option, OLC officials determined they were “not appropriate for discretionary release.”

HuffPost submitted the FOIA request when there was increased speculation about the use of the platinum coin option ahead of the debt ceiling crisis this fall. Under the compromise reached between the House and Senate following the government shutdown, the U.S. will hit the debt ceiling once again on Feb. 7, though the Treasury can use extraordinary measures to extend that deadline.

Supporters of the platinum coin option say that under a 1996 law allowing the Treasury Department to mint a platinum coin in any denomination, the president could order the manufacture of, say, a $1 trillion coin that would be deposited in the Federal Reserve. The Treasury Department would then use the platinum coin funds to meet government obligations without the need for Congress to grant any additional spending powers.

Read more

the good news is

http://www.infowars.com/trillion-dollar-coin-idea-to-save-the-economy/

http://www.infowars.com/if-obama-can-just-create-a-trillion-dollar-coin-then-why-do-we-have-to-pay-taxes/

no need to thank..me
it was my pleasure

I disagree. I think Australia is still very much the Lucky Country that Donald Horne so perceptively described all those years ago.

"Australia is a lucky country, run mainly by second-rate people who share its luck."

This is the publisher's blurb:

"The phrase 'the lucky country' has become part of our lexicon; it's forever being invoked in debates about the Australian way of life, but is all too often misused by those blind to Horne's irony.

When it was first published in 1964 The Lucky Country caused a sensation. Horne took Australian society to task for its philistinism, provincialism and dependence. The book was a wake-up call to an unimaginative nation, an indictment of a country mired in mediocrity and manacled to its past. Although it's a study of the confident Australia of the 1960s, the book still remains illuminating and insightful decades later. The Lucky Country is valuable not only as a source of continuing truths and revealing snapshots of the past, but above all as a key to understanding the anxieties and discontents of Australian society today."

http://www.penguin.com.au/products/9780143180029/lucky-country

Nothing much has changed, it would seem. Illuminated perfectly, it has to be said, by this very thread, on this very Forum.

Suseonline
i might remind you that Churchill gave every citizen in England a 303 rifle and two clips of ammunition for the specific purpose of killing German if they invaded England.
Where anyone gets the idea that workers have 'rights' I don't know.
Workers have privileges and expectations that can be taken away when and if their work does not come up to the standard the employer requires.
A worker should be paid on the basis of his production and profit for the 'boss' not because he has social or economic needs.

....But his posts ALWAYS IGNORE workers rights.

No Belly, only the poor workers, you know, the ones who have now set the bar, or should I say, lowered it.

It's a joke beyond belieif and one that will cost us dearly in years to come.

As for the birth of the unions, boy arnt they up to their old tricks, dragging selected groups of workers off a site for a meeting, knowing full well the job stops, only to then grab another group after that meeting.

I will bet they also feel a sense of achievement with what's happening to Qantas at the moment.

Pretty much sums them up. Thugs!

One boot fits all. Butch You seem to be against unions, as well as various other things. You are looking to far ahead, what about now and your govt; It's solved or don't you believe Tony is up to it. You are talking as if we didn't have a govt; There will be changes as Tony said, there will, so have faith and give the man a go.

I'm afraid I have to call cobblers on that one, chrisgaff1000.

>>Suseonline i might remind you that Churchill gave every citizen in England a 303 rifle and two clips of ammunition for the specific purpose of killing German if they invaded England.<<

.303s were issued to the Home Guard. Outside this and other near-military organizations, no civilian was provided with arms. No rifles, no pistols, no hand grenades. Nothing.

I do wonder, quietly, what motivates people to invent silly, easily-checked stuff like this. It happens so frequently.

Any clues for us, chrisgaff1000?

Any clues for us, chrisgaff1000?
Pericles,
Plenty ! Just learn how to see them.

<The Eureka legacy

The Eureka rebellion is considered by some historians to be the birthplace of Australian democracy. It is the only Australian example of armed rebellion leading to reform of unfair laws. The Southern Cross flag has been used as a symbol of protest by organisations and individuals at both ends of the political spectrum.>

http://australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/eureka-stockade

Recently Australians tipped out the rubbish in Canberra for similar reasons and more.

Eureka was a failure, it was a pointless waste of 30 lives,democracy and responsible government were on the way anyway and it was the mass political action which had the authorities rattled.
Violence makes the system stronger and the system can absorb or buy out any dissenting position which plays by the rules, the Police intelligence reports leading up to Eureka stated that the best case scenario for the system was a stand up fight, if the rebels had taken to the bush and waged a hit and run guerrilla war the military would have been compelled to withdraw to Port Phillip or face annihilation .
Lalor & Co played by the rules and lost, that's the limit of democracy and it's why the Taliban won in Afghanistan and why Occupy failed in New York.

Pericles, you are absolutely correct "no civilian (in England) was provided with arms. No rifles, no pistols, no hand grenades. Nothing."
But the evidence has never prevented Constable Clod from securing a conviction. If you don't have the evidence you simply manufacture it, is that not so Constable Clod?
"Workers have privileges and expectations that can be taken away when and if their work does not come up to the standard the employer requires.
A worker should be paid on the basis of his production and profit for the 'boss' not because he has social or economic needs."
The begging bowl mentality, straight out of the 19th century, Dickens Oliver Twist stuff. No sense of a modern society at all. Constable Clod from your post, I see you as a Mr. Bumble character. When you were in the "Force", as you claim, were you paid by your "production" ie the number of convictions? If so you must have gone hungry quite often. LOL.

You're not making sense again, Paul1405.

>>But the evidence has never prevented Constable Clod from securing a conviction. If you don't have the evidence you simply manufacture it, is that not so Constable Clod? <<

At a guess, I'd say this was a response to those voices in your head, am I right? 'Cos I fail to see its relevance to anything here.

>>When you were in the "Force", as you claim, were you paid by your "production" ie the number of convictions?<<

It's that voice of yours again.

Have a good day. Stay out of direct sunlight if you can.

<<You're not making sense again, Paul1405...Have a good day. Stay out of direct sunlight if you can>>

ROFL

So you noticed it too!

"At a guess, I'd say this was a response to those voices in your head, am I right? 'Cos I fail to see its relevance to anything here."
Constable Clod = chrisgaff1000. = ex copper
The claim by Chris that "Churchill gave every citizen in England a 303 rifle and two clips of ammunition for the specific purpose of killing German." is untrue, such a thing never happened. Even Hitler didn't arm the general populous of Germany, he might have if he had the guns and ammo, but he didn't.
Pericles you were doing well with the "voices in your head" stuff until SPQR stepped in to back you up, the kiss of death there. Support from SPQR is like having a character reference signed by Bozo the Clown.