Individual wrote: “What it really boils down to & the same applies here in Australia is not the rich becoming richer but the unproductive but costly bureaucracy of he Public Service protecting it's bandwagon !”

The above is nonsense.

I do not understand the animus against people employed in government jobs. The fact is that one is part of a bureaucracy whether one works for a government agency or a private corporation. As part of a bureaucracy a person has an assigned function. I have worked for both private corporations and government as a technical person. In both situations I was answerable to someone above me as I was neither the CEO nor a political appointee heading a department. I did not feel that I was essentially in a different situation whether I worked for government or in private industry. In both cases there were people who performed their function to the best of their ability. In both cases there were heads of departments who made their departments into little empires. In both cases some got by doing as little as possible. Governments must pay salaries comparable to those of private industry if government wants to get employees with similar levels of competence with those doing approximately the same function as a person in private industry.

As employees of a private corporation organise in unions to protect themselves against the demands of the bureaucracy they find themselves part of government employees organise themselves in unions for the same purpose. I was pretty much the same whether I worked for the government or worked for a corporation. In any bureaucracy, government or corporate, there is an amount of deadwood. I have never heard of any evidence to show that the proportion of deadwood is different in the two situations.

The above is nonsense.
david f,
You call it nonsense, non-bureaucrat/academic call it close to the bone !

david f,
In conversations with Public Servants it is painfully obvious that by far the greater percentage defend Labor & malign the Coalition which to me is evidence of the Public Service being Labor orientated ! I even had a Health Union President & Health bureaurcrat tell that she'll "do everything she can not to co-operate with that (Qld LNP) administraion". She still works for Qld Health !
I have taken particular notice over 38 years of Public Servants & literally 95% Labor are orientated.
So, it's no surprise no 'studies' have been done !

Dear Individual,

Is it possible that people who work for government mostly support Labor because they are concerned with the public good, and they think Labor is also concerned with the public good more than the Coalition? The Coalition must also be concerned with the welfare of the general public to a degree or they would be voted out of office. However, the Coalition serves the interests of the big end of town to a greater degree than Labor.

We live in a capitalistic society, and the interests of capital and labor are served by both parties. The degree of that service is different in both parties

..they think Labor because they are concerned with the public good,
david f,
My experience from working alongside staunch Labor supporters is not like that at all !
I found that as long as they were ok nothing else mattered.
AsI said, that's my experience, yours obviously differs !

Dear individual,

We can make generalizations and see what we want to see. However, all Coalition supporters are not the same, all Labor supporters are not the same and all supporters of any party are not the same. Every party is going to get some things wrong if they are in power. The other parties can call them to account. In a one party system such as China there is no such accountability.