Did you ever have a wander, as I did, through China when their communist' jobs for everyone' nonsense was being touted as utopia? No? Thought not.
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But the Chinese in their new city apartments are now contacting westerners, speaking good English, and arranging trade opportunities for small manufacturers, sourcing components and finished goods from elsewhere in China, usually nearby. They have taken the initiative. They are now very good capitalists. They will increasingly consume a bigger portion of the world's resources, as they have a right to do.
Maybe Craic is right, too many are not working hard enough over here to get themselves a job, or to (shock horror) create one with their own efforts.
But my point is also that govt has a role in encouraging enterprise. They have a role in not abrubtly making a whole lot of people redundant on their watch, through ill-thought-out policy. They have a role in leading the country as a whole.
From my point of view, and regardless of the international state of play, they are letting us down.
EZ your singleminded,dogged determination to lay the blame on anyone and everyone and particularly the Govt is admirable in that it shows your perseverence. Somewhat less admirable is your apparent lack of ability to recognise and ahknowledge the responsibility of people to be proactive in taking control of their lives and their employment. Many, many of us have probably had or done jobs that we didnt really "want" or perhaps even hated, maybe at s**t wages. However we did it and probably used it as a springboard to haul ourself up the evolutionary ladder. Expecting the Govt to do that for us is just wrong....if you have special needs, or disabilities or mental health issues then the Govt should and does help. If you or your needy buddies are "waiting for the job that suits their status" or dont want to move away from Mum doing the washing for them then this falls into Craic's "loser" category. There is only so much any Govt. can do. Governments and political parties come and go. People who think, hope or expect the Govt. will rescue them just because ...well thats what Govt's should do are naive in the extreme and blinkered in their outlook. Take off the blinkers EZ... there are two types of people in the world...those who MAKE things happen for themselves and others and those who allow things to happen to them.
Only two types of people in the world? You don't think that maybe there are extremes that fit that statement, and that most of us sometimes take control, and sometimes go with the flow?
Your only problem is that you are on the right, politically. From what I've seen, this means that you'll have to take a very fixed black and white view, or none of the policies from the right will make sense. Armed with this philosophy, you can banter at great length about how the economy can be fixed simply by the govt doing nothing, and letting the market fix it all. Thus, apart from social services, education, and maybe roading, the govt has no right to take taxes at all. Brilliant!
Except, as you have stated, some of us are lazy. I think we're all a bit lazy, some of the time. So for the common good of everybody, what is going to prompt someone to go off the dole (assuming they cannot start their own job), and into work? The market will need to provide an interesting job, good conditions, and pay that makes it worthwhile for them to give up a big chunk of their life. Because that is the nature of work, and an employer has obligations to play fair.
By running down the state sector's performance and constantly reminding us that we're in deficit, coming out of a recession, the govt at once justifies sacking a lot of people, and tells the private sector to buckle down the hatches. So employers get lazy too. I have, for a year or so. I intend to do better in 2013, but I won't be taking on any new staff. Forget about me - what if you extend that to all the other employers out there? For example are you taking on extra staff, or are you sitting comfortably?
Oh Dear! Tonights Colmar Brunton tells us that we still support JK and Labour are still losing?
Not too many happy with the school closures, except the bean counters.
Results from 19th Feb.
Brainwashed or smarter than the average bear? Teachers are put in the top 25% of a bell-shaped curve for IQ.
Australia, meanwhile, has decided that the biggest firms don't need R&D tax credits. Anyone with turnover above $20billion that is. There's a rate change at the $20mill level, and for smaller firms the tax deduction is 45% of the spend. The saved $1billion cash is being spent on new innovation hubs around the country.
Quote:
Federal government announces manufacturing innovation precinct
18 February, 2013 Brent Balinski
http://media.rbi.com.au/MM_Media_Lib...ctory1_300.jpg Cuts to R&D tax credits to some of Australia’s biggest companies will fund a network of innovation precincts, the first of which will be dedicated to manufacturing.
Prime minister Julia Gillard and members of her government made the announcement yesterday during a visit to Boeing Australia’s headquarters in Melbourne.
Industry minister Greg Combet said that a three-point plan to boost manufacturing - focussing on local content, growing SMEs and establishing innovation precincts - would be funded through an end to research tax breaks for companies with revenues of $20 billion or more.
The tax break is equivalent to a 133 per cent tax deducation, according to Fairfax Media.
This would affect 15-20 companies and save an estimated $1 billion over four years.
"We think it's a prudent saving that targets the resources that are available in the most effective way to achieve jobs growth," Combet told reporters.
The plan for industry, called “Building On Australia’s Strengths”, was the result of six months’ work by Combet and bureaucrats. It is in response to the report released in August by the non-government members PM’s manufacturing taskforce, which made over 40 recommendations.
The Courier Mail reported before the announcement that “the innovation hubs will dovetail with the Asian Century White Paper by promoting export potential.”
The first innovation precinct will be dedicated to manufacturing and will extend over two locations in south-east Melbourne and Adelaide. The second will focus on the food industry and be based in Melbourne.
The delivery of the 10 precincts is budgeted at $504.5 million. They aim to examine ways of commercialising research.
“We need to increase the level of industry-led research and get better economic and business dividends from our research so that our economy can realise the opportunities of the future," said Combet.
The opposition claimed the innovation precinct plan was a re-announcement of a 2011 scheme for research innovation hubs.
"I was hoping for something of substance today," said Sophie Mirabella, the opposition industry spokeswoman.
"Like so many workers in the manufacturing sector, I'm bitterly disappointed."
Either Colin hasn't done the maths on the funds budgeted for Callaghan Innovation, or he has a very good idea what's going to happen. It's unlikely there will be an increased spend.
Quote:
Colin James's column for the Otago Daily Times for 19 February 2013
The challenge of being a small, smart country
Bill English has set the budget date nice and early -- as John Key did the election date in 2011 and is likely to do in 2014. Now are English and Key -- and Steven Joyce, who is to make a science speech on Thursday -- up to the fiscal science challenge?
That science challenge -- not to be confused with the Prime Minister's science challenge for scientists themselves -- is to match richer small-countries' commitment. Governments here for two decades, including Key's, have not committed to science the public resources better-performing small countries do. Contrast the European Union's increase in its science budget this month while cutting its overall budget.
Joyce, who as boss of his new superministry is the minister in charge of science and other innovation, would protest that in the 2012 budget the government did lift investment in science and innovation and project a continuing lift over the next four years.
But even at the end of that trajectory -- and note that Key is talking up innovation as the key to enrichment -- Joyce would be investing below 0.6% of GDP, that is, below the OECD average and far below that of smart-rich-small countries with which Key's Chief Science Adviser, Sir Peter Gluckman, has been building a relationship. That investment underpins the success of Nordic countries, billed by The Economist this month as "the next supermodel".
Sir Peter brought together Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Israel and Singapore in Auckland in November in a discussion which linked science and innovation with economic analysis by David Skilling, once of the Treasury and now in Singapore, who argues that small countries, being flexible, can, if they act strategically, navigate global ups and downs better than big countries with lumbering political systems.
Gluckman, like the legendary Sir Paul Callaghan a notable innovator in his own right, is now teasing out with those countries a programme of joint projects.
There is a parallel with United Nations Ambassador Jim McLay's pitch for a Security Council seat in 2015-16: that small countries have different priorities from big muscly ones, not least in needing good global governance. McLay argues that small New Zealand contributes disproportionately to peace-building and other cooperative activities, has an independent foreign policy which gives it good credentials as a broker and conciliator and thus can be an accurate and energetic representative for small countries.
Another way of putting the McLay line is that New Zealand is a small, smart country. That is what Sir Peter wants us to want to be -- more than our fiscal commitment shows.
Joyce would protest, with reason, that his Callaghan Innovation Crown entity, with a tight focus on working with businesses to solve technical challenges and help them innovate, will do that by making more effective use of some of our scientists.
Actually, Industrial Research Ltd, out of which the new institute was created, was increasingly doing what the institute is to do. Callaghan Innovation looks less an innovation and more a managerial reshuffle.
There is also a risk, which will need careful management, that too tight a focus on technical assistance to firms will distract scientists from doing the science that generates unexpected commercial innovations, as Sir Paul's science did -- and that scientists decamp to another country (one of Sir Peter's other five?) to do that work.
The more scientists who do that -- after an expensive education at taxpayers' expense here -- the less will they be able to meet another Gluckman ambition.
Joyce's speech on Thursday is to a two-day conference of science communicators which will focus on natural disasters science's role in warning the public and public agencies of risks and explaining events. Gluckman's on the same day is to the Institute of Public Administration on "communicating and using evidence in policy formation".
Quote:
Gluckman will develop a theme that has been a hallmark of his Chief Science Adviser's role: that good policy requires good advice which requires the best use of the best evidence -- and that science has a big role to play.
Most policy reflects politicians' instincts, prejudices, values or pragmatism and the inevitable tradeoffs politics and electoral success require. It is informed by advice from public servants who do usually trawl through evidence, including scientific evidence, but often, Gluckman says, the science is misunderstood, misused or misapplied. Politicians, interest groups and the media also often cherrypick or otherwise employ science to support a case or, as in climate change, declare the science "confused" as an excuse for inaction.
A report is due soon on a survey which found wide variations in government agencies' use or misuse of scientific evidence. Gluckman says protocols are needed, including peer review of expert advice.
That is quite a science challenge for Key and Joyce -- perhaps as big as their and English's fiscal one.
-- Colin James, Synapsis Ltd, P O Box 9494, Wellington 6141
Ph (64)-4-384 7030, Mobile (64)-21-438 434, Fax (64)-4-384 9175
Webpage http://www.ColinJames.co.nz
There's been a bit of a debate on minimum wages lately. Rod Oram has waded into this.
But first, I have been berated by those on the right (who appear to still be in the majority!) because I have not provided a balanced view.
I don't have to - I'm not a journalist, but this popped up on a google search.
Why low minimum wages are a good thing..
http://www.aei.org/article/economics...mum-stupidity/
This article from the American Enterprise Institute has to be seen in context. This is a neo-conservative think-tank, also with impressive history, with over US$30mill of funding p.a. and nearly 200 staff. They seem to be keen on funding from Exxon Mobil, partly directed towards offering scientists $10,000 to critique the IPCC on climate change.
John Key not keen on a higher minimum wage. Of course he wouldn't need to live on that, he has got ahead OK, he's probably in the top percentile of IQ. It's what we do with the 'long tail' that is important here.
And now Rod Oram, who has been paid a smaller amount perhaps, to write a weekly article in the SST, based on his impressions of the state of play.
Rod Oram: "The Wages of Stupidity" Feb 17 2013, Sunday Star Times. Not available on the web, anywhere.
FAQ from Livingwagenz.org.nz.
Here's a leftish blog site with an interesting blog on Shearer. A good summary of all the main political blogs on the RHS of the page.