Electoral Funding

Another cool little graphic to play around with. Ever wondered how much and where it all comes from?

US Candidates – Electoral Funding 

Liberal or Labor

With Rudd 10 points ahead in the polls and Howard shelling out billions in tax cuts we are set for two months of political bombardment. It begs the question – are you Liberal or Labor? I found an interesting test at news.com.au. Re-affirms me as a Labor voter. 

Take the test

Also interested to hear why you are one or the other.

Market Failure

This is both a question about what market failure is and assuming I have it right, a bit of a multi choice question on how you would fix it.

The term market failure get bandied around a lot and like most over used terms I think a lot of people who use it don’t really know what it means. Instead of trying to define it I will give an example I what I think constitutes market failure and you guys (Alex or Leigh) can tell me if I am right.

Example – Car manufactures are producing cars in an un-regulated industry in terms of environmental considerations. All of a sudden people realise that the pollution from the cars exhaust systems is at ridiculous levels and people are getting all sorts of respiratory problems in major cities because of it. However because there are no regulations in place, the car companies are in no hurry to change the way they make the cars as they are making lots of money and don’t want to waste time and money on R&D into how to cut down pollution. Is this an example of Market Failure?

Assuming it is here are three strategies that could be implemented to fix this failure; do you think that any of these would work, and which one do you think would work best?

1. The government passes legislation that forces car manufactures to install catalytic converts to all cars exhaust systems that cut down the pollution significantly but are costly to make and add to the overall price of the car.

1. Tax or fine car manufactures by the amount of pollutions their cars make but do not force any particular solution on them, there by allowing them to develop the most innovative, efficient, and cost effective way to cut down on pollution.

1. Do nothing about it and let natural forces fix the problem, i.e. as the pollution rises and other costs besides monetary costs associated with car manufacturing increase other players will enter the market who create far less pollution and will take market share away from the high polluters and as such they will have to change their ways or be forced out of the market altogether.

Which of these do you think would work best and why? I have an opinion but will hold off until later as this post is getting too long.

The Vote

I just found out the other day, to my shock, that voting is not compulsory in the UK. I would have thought that it would have been and that is where we got our system of compulsory voting. I would have also thought that the fore-most leading proponents of democracy (USA, UK), who constantly tell us about our right and fight for our ‘freedom’, don’t require their citizens to fulfill one of their core entitlements and responsibilities…have a say in who runs the country!

Does this not sound hippocritical? Isn’t democracy all about ‘for the people and by the people’?
All you need to do to win an election is have the right lobby/special interest groups (usually based around religion – christian right, zealots…or business – farmers, corporates etc) on your side and away you go!
So it seems that the ’socialist’ values of democracy are basically a falicy in these countries? This is also seen at a higher level as well and brings me to another question…what has happened to the ‘left’?

It appears to have disappeared at all levels of society…media, politics and in the minds of the people. Leftist parties have moved so close to centre that they are bordering on becoming the Conservatives II. This is seen in Australia (Rudd), the UK (Brown) and the USA (Obama/Clinton).
Many people would say, “why vote”…they are both the same and in the long run will end up implementing that same policies given the time. I think I am starting to rant so will cut this short….but to finish with a final question:

Where has the choice gone and why are we not being presented with an alternative?

The Israel Lobby & US Foreign Policy

This is a paper written recently by two guys from UChicago and Harvard. It has come under heavy criticism, calling them anti-semites amongst other things. It seems we live in a world where any healthy criticism of the actions of Israel is met with claims of racism and post-world war II prejudice, god forbid we should ever forget (thats going to sound harsh). But I would ask, how long before we realise that Jews are no longer oppressed, no longer need special treatment, should be treated like everyone else…no more special hand outs!

This article goes into describing the power of the Jewsih lobby in the USA and the rammifications it has throught the States and the rest of the world. An edited version can be found at:

http://www.lrb.co.uk/v28/n06/mear01_.html

It has also been recently published as a book:

http://www.amazon.com/Israel-Lobby-U-S-Foreign-Policy/dp/0374177724

I have also attached a pdf:

Israel US Lobby

Who says they don’t do fish and Chips here

This is an actual poster for one of the political parties that is running in the election over here. Makes One nation look a little weak on the rhetoric really.

Pay fat people to lose weight

Would this work??
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2007/09/12/2030497.htm

“A doctors group has proposed that overweight people be given a $170 subsidy to attend an accredited weight-loss program.”

At first glance this idea seems to have merit; the obesity crisis is apparently worsening in Australia and as such obesity related diseases are also on the increase. Plus on a more shallow level, they’re unsightly…

But would paying people work?

I am going to argue that it might in some cases but on the whole it would be ineffective and using some shaky ‘economic logic’ that I have read and now think I know I will try to explain why.

At the moment there is for many people a certain level of moral, social, and ‘health’ obligation to stay in some sort of decent physical shape. This can come from other people telling them ‘that it is for their own good’ they owe it to them selves to get healthy. The problem then with using money as a motivator is that money becomes the overriding incentive to loose weight and people will stop loosing weight for more personal reasons and only do it for the money. This may seem at first to not matter a whole lot, after all, they’re losing weight so why does it matter what their motivations are? I guess it doesn’t really matter, but the problem with having money as an incentive is that it is too easy to just say ‘I can’t be bothered doing it, it’s only a small amount of money anyway, and I’m not actually loosing money’. This effectively negates the only remaining incentive and people will fall back into their old habits content with the knowledge that they are not loosing money, they are just not gaining any. There are many other factors in play here but the main point I am making is that using money as the main incentive for something as personal as a person’s health and well being is not necessarily the most effective scheme.

 

Here is an example of a similar situation from ‘Freakonomics’ in which a child care centre charged $3 per child every time a parent was late to pick up their kids. This backfired terribly and the rate of late pickups increased. The main reason being that the $3 fee negated any moral obligation the parents felt to pick up their kids on time; they obviously thought ‘well they obviously don’t care too much about late pickups; anyway, they are making more money off of it’. I suppose you could make the late fee $100 but then people would most likely not use the service at all.

Anyway, let’s hear your thoughts on whether this scheme would work and if not, what would work better?

A difficult topic

Howard’s recent move to send military support into the Northern Territory has been met with mixed reactions. Some are calling the move to send in the military ‘draconian’ however most appear to be supportive of a move aimed at addressing the abhorrent conditions faced by children growing up in these communities. 

My old man wrote an interesting piece in the Australian Financial Review yesterday in which indicated that the policy initiatives announced by Howard were not as revolutionary as he would have us believe. John suggested that many of the initiatives were simply restatements of existing policies such as the banning of alcohol in regional camps (full text here img-7061032-00012.pdf).  My concern is that Howard is using the issue as an election platform similar to the way he exploited the ‘children over-board’ and national security to scare people into avoiding change and re-electing the incumbent government. I watched Ray Martin tell his story of a visit to the NT seven years ago and the disgraceful living conditions that he witnessed there. He apparently took this to Howard immediately after his trip but was told the issue was politically ‘too hard’ to deal with. It is only now in an election year that Howard chooses to address the issue, and even then not in a meaningful way. 

Aboriginal welfare is something that concerns me quite deeply, despite some of the jokes that I make (which I hope are taken in jest). In many ways we should be ashamed of the conditions that people are living in within what we call a developed nation. It is easier for us to ignore the problem than to deal with it, which is what we have been doing for a long time.

I’ve written an article on HECS…

… and I’d love to get some feedback and input from the crew.

How does a HECS-HELP debt effect your life?

Have a read over at my blog, and let me know what you think.

Iran Hostage’s

I’m sure you are all aware that 15 British sailors were captured by troops as they strayed into Iranian waters, 14 Men and 1 Woman…

Doesn’t take a genius to figure out who was reading the map does it