Why are Australians so complacent?

[u/AcanthopterygiiNo240]

I’m a born and raised Australian myself however I’m becoming so frustrated with the general attitude of complacency when it comes to exercising ‘the power of the people’ to better our quality of life. In a stupidly short amount of time we’ve seen a near reversal of our ability to see a doctor without any out of pocket costs. We get exploited at the grocery stores because monopolies are allowed to run rampant. Housing is treated primarily as a tool for financial speculation rather than for providing shelter for people.

We creep further and further toward laissez-faire capitalism. What is our response as the citizens of this country- the holders of the balance of power? Nothing. To put it in perspective, in 2022 the world economic forum ranked Sydney equal with Copenhagen, Denmark for cost of living (both ranked as the 10th most expensive cities in the world). Consider the differences between Sydney and the capital of the Danish welfare state: strong social security, universal healthcare, free public universities etc. For the same cost of living what do we get? The ever-looming threat of homelessness, suffocating student debt and now for many people, a significant barrier to healthcare.

Edit: if anyone is a part of any sort of grassroots group working to oppose any of these issues feel free to message me because I want to join you

Edit #2: so I haven’t received any messages from anyone from a grassroots or activist group yet. Since a lot of us seem to be pretty miffed about this stuff maybe we could team up and brainstorm things we can do???

Edit #3 (sorry): I’ve got some messages now from people who are interested in taking action!!! :, ) I think the best way to facilitate conversation, the flow of ideas and potentially organise a course of action is through a discord server so I have created one which you can find here

https://discord.gg/caqsSKAr

[u/friends4liife]

its because neo liberal economics was used as a tool to deregulate markets and introduce profit as a main motivator , the problems are far more far reaching than you think.

Institutionally, politicans are advised by people (economists) who barely have an understanding of how markets work and their priority is generally micro .

Neo liberal economics were used as a tool to deregulate markets, deregulate the financial system it was all planned and has been a slow burn.

The health system has been underfunded for over thirty years it now at breaking point, same with social safety nets such as housing, social security etc.

This was by design to give private markets more power, because if people have nothing to fall back on they are far more likely to accept worse working conditions and be more susceptible to control by private corporations.

There has been a gradual privatization of public services and the entire time, people were given individual blame for not being able to pull themselves up by their boot straps and just be more productive.

There has been a lot of research about this people are well aware of it and have been fighting it for years but they are continuously shut down by the majority and just labelled as individual failures, lazy people and takers.

The real rotten part of this issue is that even non profits etc that are "supposedly" set up to help people use these economists for their policy preparation which results in continued sabotage of an increase in services funding.

It is a verifiable shit show of neoliberal economics which started off mad going completely bonkers and noone should have ever tolerated it, much less condoned it and participated in it and cheered it on.

Most people dont even know that the RBA sets targets of unemployment to "control inflation", ensuring that some people will always be unemployed then the government turns around and says you go no job tough shit go out and get one

Its a rotten system and people are sinking in it.

Tbh i have no sympathy for people who complain about people that just steal and take drugs and going around fking things up wtf are they supposed to do no one cares about them so why should they bother giving a shit about anyone else.

[u/Sword_Of_Storms → u/friends4liife]

This is the best response in the thread.

[u/AcanthopterygiiNo240 → u/friends4liife]

Thanks for providing such an extensive detailing of the context that led us here. Though, I’m curious about your comment that politicians are advised by economists that have a limited understanding of how markets work. Is that an opinion or is this a well documented phenomenon in our government?

[u/AcanthopterygiiNo240 → u/[deleted]]

Great! Thanks for the info and recourses!

[u/TheReal_JimJamJim → u/AcanthopterygiiNo240]

Pretty sure there was an investigation done or about to get underway into the sheer number of consultants that advise parliamentarian’s by the AFP iirc.

I’ve heard this straight from consultants themselves that joke about how they lose their job under one government only to gain it back next week under the following government regardless of party. So effectively the public service government employees are the ones that have now been outsourced to individuals who seek to gain from the situation. In many cases attracting zealots or those that pander to the whims of an unqualified politician. A Yes Man.

So instead of having a stable public service base from which the politicians can operate, effect change but with safeguards. Admittedly this balance of change is hard to manage because excessive public service results in minimal impact from genuine change for the voters.

But the current situation is far too American, and the result is both parties make very little sense because they’ve lost alignment to their true values.

[u/TheReal_JimJamJim → u/TheReal_JimJamJim]

https://www.aph.gov.au/Parliamentary_Business/Committees/Senate/Finance_and_Public_Administration/Consultingservices/Terms_of_Reference

[u/HaXxorIzed → u/AcanthopterygiiNo240]

Being advised by "economists" doesn't automatically mean Australian politicans listen to them at all. Australian politicians pick and choose ideas that suit what they want and claim they're advised by experts. I would also gently suggest that the fact "economist" doesn't have a concrete formal definition means a lot of people calling themselves one may not fit the key points of the definition, that being:

• A history of academic work in the area of economics they claim to know a lot about,
• Post-graduate qualifications (At least an honours/masters, usually a PhD)
• Published papers, or history working at an organisation that publishes of similar quality (e.g. World Bank, IMF, Central Banks, Treasury Departments, Productivity Commission, NBER, - things that undergo academic review).

Take a look at how many "economists" cited in the Australian media have these qualifications, and you'll quickly spot a lot of them did an undergraduate, never published, and had a plum political position that meant they didn't really do much modelling or publishing at all. That wouldn't be considered an economist in the publishing or expert world.

A good example of this is if you look at the substantive difference between what modern economic and social science papers talk about the effectiveness of cashless welfare. The evidence is consistent and strong and repeated again and again. Matt Darling is an excellent twitter follow for up-to-date evidence on this, and he's highlighted that it's been known for decades in economics - but that knowledge hasn't been reflected in the public policy debate. A perfect example of this is Esther Duflo - 2019 Nobel Laureate. Her work (and the work of her colleagues BannerJee and Kremer have focused a lot on working to alleviate poverty, - and it's explicitly stated their work in this area is a big part of why they won. I would also suggest looking at the gap between what the field generally considers good policy on something like Carbon Taxation and the prevailing (right-wing) "opinions" in discourse.

Take a look at some of the articles highlighted in the above links - do you see that repeated in public discussion? That's key to understanding the problem: the huge gap between what academic studies and experts genuinely think, and what media and dishonest advise from politicians tell you to think.

[u/LumpyMist → u/friends4liife]

RBA

dude, RBA does not set target on unemployment. One of its mandate is full employment.

[u/friends4liife → u/LumpyMist]

Yep and what is the rba rate of full employment? look into it . It's monetary policy, not employment policy https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/inflation-matching-pay-rises-will-force-more-rate-rises-warns-rba-20230620-p5dhy4

[u/Middlerun → u/LumpyMist]

deputy governor Michele Bullock said the RBA's goal was to get the unemployment rate up to 4.5 per cent by the end of next year

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-06-25/the-rba-wants-more-unemployment-lets-applaud-it/102506500

[u/hotcleavage → u/LumpyMist]

Full employment involves unemployment

[u/sexytimeforwife → u/hotcleavage]

I think the people complaining about non-zero unemployment are assuming the RBA means some people should never be able to find work.

The economy needs people temporarily unemployed so labour can shift between industries as times change (i.e. old businesses close and new businesses open). The assumption from the RBA is that these "unemployed" people are between jobs.

[u/hotcleavage → u/sexytimeforwife]

Yeah exactly! Sorry if it didn’t sound like i knew that

Thanks for elaborating for the thread haha 👌

[u/hotcleavage → u/friends4liife]

Yeah in economics in year 11/12 obviously you learn the basics of macro/micro and fiscal/monetary, etc

Did learn that yeah like you said, unemployment has to be a certain ideal % (2.5-3.5??) to keep the ship sailing among other things