Quadrant Online QED Woolly-Headed Socialism by Ray Evans September 22, 2012 A Review of Breaking the Sheep's Back . Charles Massy, UQP, 2011 "Let them note what has happened to rubber. It may point the moral that, whatever the apparent strength of a group of producers, short of absolute monopoly, which is a very rare thing, consumers can and will seek and find other supplies or substitutes rather than endure a rigged scarcity." 1 It is a fact that institutions which at a moment in history seemed to be built on foundations of solid rock, and immune to the impacts of changing fashions and beliefs, nevertheless contained within themselves the fault lines which first lead to decline and then to disintegration. The British Empire, of which Australia was once a proud member, is a good example. The Anglican Church of Australia which (except for the evangelical archdiocese of Sydney) is contracting year by year as congregations die and are not replaced, is another. Australia's wool industry is yet another very important example. At the time of the Korean War boom, wool was selling in May, 1951, at an unbelievable of 375 pence per pound, and Australia's terms of trade index had climbed from 50 in 1946 to reach 120 in 1951 (2007/8 = 100). This extremely favourable trade position was not to be reached again until the mining boom of 2011. When I was a primary schoolboy in the immediate post-war period, everyone knew that Australia rode on the sheep's