From: suter@fawlty8.eng.monash.edu.au (Mr D. Suter)
Newsgroups: aus.politics
Subject: Re: Will Victorians vote stupid yet again...?
Date: 7 Oct 92 02:11:33 GMT
Distribution: aus
Organization: Monash University

In article <6511@otc.otca.oz> brendan@otc.otca.oz (Brendan Jones) writes:
>in article <3252@ariel.its.unimelb.EDU.AU>, jcollier@ariel.its.unimelb.EDU.AU (John Donald Collier) says:
>> A lot of the economic problems in Victoria are a result of incautious
>> deregulation, just as they are in the US and Britain. I have also seen 
>> it happen in British Columbia and Alberta where I used to live.
>
>I must agree.  I've just returned from a business trip to the UK, whose
>economy appears even more stuffed than ours from my experience there.
>
>Their unemployment is still going up (they don't give it as a percentage, and
>they 'seasonally adjust' it, but as near as I could work out it was over 11%),
>their interest rates are about 3 to 4% higher than ours, their inflation is 4
>to 5%, and they run a trade deficit on goods and services (we run a surplus).
>Their social safety nets don't appear to be as nearly as good as ours.
>
>Britain doesn't have tax breaks for R&D like we do.  There is no Government
>science policy.  They don't have accelerated plant and equipment depreciation.
>I saw little evidence of an agressive export psyche, as we are building here.
>
>Australia isn't a utopia, but it was eye opening to see that a lot of what we
>do appears to be so much better than what other countries do (despite our
>almost universal cultural cringe that every other country in the world is
>doing better than ours).
>
>Britain is still sliding deeper into recession - Australia is slowly coming
>out.  Britain has to now cope with a markedly devalued pound at the depth of
>a recession.  Australia adjusted to the realities of a floating exchange rate
>years ago.
>
>All this goes to prove that adoption of rationalist economic policies, a GST
>(or VAT as its called in England) and a Conservative Government don't prevent
>recessions, bankruptcies and unemployment.  England's had a Conservative
>Government, rationalist policies and a VAT for the past 11 years, and they're
>in a worse state than we are.
>
>So blaming Labor for all of our economic ills is stupidity.  Other countries
>have fared worse with politicians of exactly the opposite colour.
>
>The most amusing thing about my stay over in the UK was that the opposition
>(Labour) is saying exactly the same things about the Government over there
>that the Liberals are saying about the Government here!!!
>
Hold on! I (for one) was not attacking the Kirner govt. just because it
was Labor (I in fact voted for that same government in the decade
they were in office). However, I was becoming increasingly alarmed
at their failure to do anything about rising debt (in particular)
and a general lack of good managment/paralysis that they themselves
have now admitted. It's all very well to say that others made a mess
of thier countries/states (or at least appear to have done no better)
in GENERAL terms - its another to then say that we can't try to
push the governement the way we feel we ought to be going by
exercising our only real power at election time. Need I say it:
I (and most other critics of the Kirner govt and or
"supporters" of a GST etc) have never made the claim that
we can magically prevent recessions, bankruptcies and unemployment.
I do claim we can be doing much better than we are and I do think that,
on balance, the conservatives seem to offer a better basket
of mixed blessings than the Labor parties (nationally and federally).
I also think that much of the attacks on the GST are simply unfair
(KEATING HIMSELF advocated the very same general policy not
so long ago so its not part and parcel of some conservative
plot).
Furthermore, we can go on for ever debating without any objectivity
whether Britain now is better or worse off than we are and,
more importantly, whether that difference is due in any significant
part to VAT and other policies you dislike. I haven't been there
since June last year (and then 10 years b4 that). My impressions
from my visits and close friends and relatives that live there
(and some of which are quite far to the left), for what its
worth (since you offer your opinion to support your criticism)
is that things got very much better on average in the
early to mid eighties than it was for anytime since the war.
True, in my last visit, I saw some indication that they
were diving badly. Perhaps the conservatives are as much a tired
and ineffectual govt as the Kirner govt was here. Perhaps
Britain just has made too many bad decisions in it's jockeying
with the other EEC powers. Perhaps....... (perhaps even you are right).
It still has relatively little bearing on our discussion except
to point out that a GST/VAT alone can't make things much worse
(your 11% unemployment is not good but doesn't eclipse ours).
d.s.

-- 
David Suter - Dept. of Electrical and
Computer Systems Engineering, Monash University,
Clayton, Vic. 3168, Australia
ph 565 5682 Fax 565 3454
Newsgroups: aus.politics