The federal government boasts loudly and at length about the low level of unemployment that it claims has been a feature of its term of office.
But too often we read newspaper articles like these:
Rubbery figures hide the real jobless tragedy
Keen to work, a million lost in the system
Both of these reports put the real unemployment figure in the 12-14% range.
And then in today’s Age, Tim Colebatch writes about figures released yesterday by the Bureau of Statistics:
Just 465,000 Australians were officially unemployed, but 322,000 were working less than 15 hours a week and wanted more work - while almost 1 million more were jobless and would like to work, though few were looking.
Why not? Of those not seeking work, one in four were carers, mostly full-time mothers. Another 13 per cent were studying, and 9 per cent were sick, injured or taking a holiday. But 10 per cent said employers saw them as too old, and 8 per cent said there were no suitable jobs.
Among the 627,000 trying to find more work, the problems were sharper. One in three said there were too few jobs or too many applicants. Another 17 per cent said they lacked the skills or experience they needed, and 13 per cent said employers don’t hire people their age.
Surely the unemployment number published by the government is not a true indicator. This is a serious matter and worthy of more attention and I wonder why the ALP is not more determined to call the goverment to account over it.
I think the reason the ALP hasn’t gone hard on this is that the way the unemployment statistics are calculated was the same under the previous government. I’d like to be wrong on this, but I was complaining about this recently to someone who works for the ABS in Canberra, and - IIRC - the present methodology was established under Keating.
As for Keating and statistics methodology, I have a vague memory of changes he was responsible for that made the CPI lower than the previous method of calculation.
I agree with Mr Lefty. Both major parties take advantage of the seriously misleading official unemployment figures while in power.
It would take a “very brave” government to adopt a more accuurate measure of unemployment.
Even if they cleaned up the stats it wouldn’t begin to show the destruction of liberty due to the of labour regulations (combined with measures which predjudice bigger over smaller business.) Its a most heartless thing since it condemns so many people to spend a great deal of their time and most of their energy at work they aren’t suited for and which they have no liking for.
The reduction in unemployment statistics can be attributed to a number of factors over the last decade, none of which involve jobs created by the government.
1) The introduction of the Mature Age Allowance approximately 10 years ago enabled those who were aged 55 and older and had been on unemployment at least 1 years to go on basically and early aged pension, removing them from the unemployment statistics.
2) Change to a waiting period for immigrants to get social security payments, this reduced newly arrived immigrants inflating the unemployment figures, most would have found employment by the time the waiting period was over.
3) Introduction of the Parental Income and Assets test, the group with the highest unemployment rate was the youth, this cut a lot of youth off the unemployment figures by virtue of their parents income.
4) The aging population, no doubt has had a big impact in the lower unemployment figures, with more people leaving the work force than entering it, vacancies still need to be filled but there are fewer people to fill them.
5) The change from counting people who were in receipt of unemployment benefits to those receiving unemployment benefits without 1 hours of employment.
Well of course a Labor Government would be just as keen to have understated unemployment statistics… you can’t expect them to rat out all the forms of Governmental vice and deceit, because they want to enjoy such priveliges as well.
I read a while back that comparing German and Australian statistics is disingenuous because Germans treat people who work 15 hours a week but want more as unemployed.
When you can work for an hour a day and be counted as employed that is ridiculous. Also Labor tried the employment game before, it didn’t work. Then there’s these economists who still reckon the employment figure is an indicator of employment
‘Surely the unemployment number published by the government is not a true indicator’
This statement indicates that you’re speculating, and don’t really have figures to support youir post. However, you are probably right that the figures are being bent a little, if not totally rubbery. The reason the ALP won’t say anything has beeen stated. They started the process, and their last figures would look even worse than they do. They’re caught in their own net.
The good news is that the true unemployment rate has almost certainly gone down under the Coallition. The bad news is that, as you imply, the figures, speculatively, don’t tell the true story. So who, in opposition, is going to have the nerve to say something about it?
Of the 5 points I made earlier, #1 was introduced by the ALP, #2, 3 and 5 was by the Liberals and #4 is just a natural course of events. While the ALP is not innocent in manipulating the figures, the Liberals have taken it to a whole new level.
Whether it is a correct sampling of the unemployment rate or not, the long term direction of the rate is is downward. Surely a good thing. With IR deregulation it will even get better.
There’s also a long term trend away from full time towards casual employment, JC. And I’d also be interested in figures on the numbers of long term unemployed. I don’t know that any labour market reform (setting aside for the moment the question of whether we have IR deregulation which I strongly dissent from) would make too much difference. How many jobs are there for a 30 year old male who’s never worked and has substance abuse problems or a 50 year old retrenched male former labourer or factory worker? I’d invite people to visit an inner city Centrelink to get some idea of just how far from “job ready” some on benefits are - there are many who need serious attention not just to skills and training issues but also to mental health and substance abuse issues who really aren’t going to get swept into the magically clearing labour market in a flash.
I’d be willing to admit that a lot of interventionist measures can cause net benefits at first. Socialism never works. But sometimes it can take a long time to fail. These trends you see, Mark, are not to be thought of as unrelated to decades of labour regulation.
The other thing about it is that the deregulation won’t necessarily get quick results. I’d be happier if it came in with raising the tax-free threshold up to $20 000 and nixing the payroll tax. Companies are on average larger then they would be but for many interventionist measures. And this could delay the benefits. So indeed a lot of working people COULD find their standard of living slashed by the new measures.
Experiences in New Zealand indicate that we can’t expect demand to raise wages quickly above what they would be with intervention until and unless we get very low rates of unemployment. But even given that we still must go for the long term.
For authentic liberty what you want is a situation where you can tell your boss to get lost in the morning and walk across the street and be working on the hour. In other words you need a sellers market. And if you have that all this credentialism and discrimination will be a bad memory.
I’d certainly agree that there needs to be some serious thought given to the taxation system as it intersects with welfare - both in terms of incentives to work and equity. This is something I’m doing some work on in the near future, so I’d be grateful for a good discussion of it.
The other two points I’d make are:
1. A lot of the unpreparedness that some of the categories of folk I’ve mentioned have for the labour market is in effect no-one’s fault. To take older male former blue collar workers, 30 or 40 years ago we educated people for routine unskilled jobs, and the school leaving age for the great majority was often under 15. Many of those jobs no longer exist, and some that remain require higher levels of literacy, numeracy and skill than this cohort has. But it’s very hard to turn around in the case of individuals in the predicament of little labour market prospets, and often because it’s compounded by depression and fatalism.
Even when I entered the full time workforce in 85, there were still thousands of clerical jobs in the public sector, banking and finance that people could enter with a yr 12 education. Computers in organisations were in their infancy, and many of these jobs disappeared rapidly over the next decade.
2. You always have to remember with NZ, it’s essentially a relatively seamless labour market integrated with ours, and its performance is distorted by the fact that lots of Kiwis come here - often for higher wages.
Facelift,
The figures quoted in the post are from the ABS according to Tim Colebatch. And did you read the two linked articles?
“I’d invite people to visit an inner city Centrelink to get some idea of just how far from “job readyâ€? some on benefits are - there are many who need serious attention not just to skills and training issues but also to mental health and substance abuse”
Mark,
At my inner-city (Melbourne) Centrelink, about 95% of the customers are 20- or 30-something. The majority of these, I suspect, have uni degrees or are at least drop-outs thereof. While such a cohort may well have (especially when unemployed) mental health issues (viz depression, for one), I’ve never seen chronic, visible substance abuse, except among the other 5%. Therefore, please refrain from generalizing about the unemployed* as an implicit polar-opposite of yourself (late 30s, educated male).
Paul Arrighi,
The Mature Age Allowance (and Partner Allowance) was closed to new applicants on 20/09/2003. At the time of its closing, one needed to be 60 (not 55) to get it.
* Centrelink benefit recipients other than the unemployed rarely have to go to an office in person. If they do, they usually have separate entrances, etc.
Mark:
My family has been in business for 35 years. They were there before Keating hardened up labor firing laws and they are there after.
Like most businesses they moved towards least regulatory resistence in terms of who they could hire and firse (they are very good to their workers incidently).
After Keating imposed the hardening they moved towards far more causl employment even when it didn’t appear superficailly sensible from a distance.
Casual labor is up because it is far less regulated (surprise, surprise). That’s why you made a comment like,
“There’s also a long term trend away from full time towards casual employment”.
New Zealand, since deregulating hiring practices has seen full time employment move in opposite direction to part time labor in terms of growth.
New Zealand has also seen massive emigration of skilled and unskilled workers to Australia. That’s what happens when people can’t get anything but short-term, entry-level casual work.
Paul, I didn’t intend to generalise. I implied that I was talking about specific groups who are long term unemployed. I’m talking about what I know from personal experience a few years ago when I was a Centrelink client at Fortitude Valley and from what people who work for Centrelink tell me, including psychologists and social workers who work closely with these clients. Nor do I intend to stigmatise anyone, as should be clear from my points about the need to engage with the actual issues of skills deficits and personal/medical issues which prevent people from making the jump into work that some would have us believe is so easy to make.
Yes, Centrelink reporting requirements distort the profile of welfare recipients who appear in offices. For example, Youth Allowance recipients can do all of their reporting over the web or via the post save for when there’s stuff ups, because they don’t have to do much aside from maintain enrolment to demonstrate mutual obligation. (Although I did go in in person for stuff ups before the web reporting when I wanted the money on the same day rather than the following day as when I posted it and I don’t recall ever having a separate entrance or waiting room at any of Chatswood, Marrickville or Redfern from Newstart or pension recipients.)
Dunno about the stats, but the ‘real indicators’ of full employment are there,a t least ot the local level here. Took a wander around a major shopping centre over the weekend, and about a third of the shops had ‘help wanted’ signs out.
I have not seen that since the early 1970s.
Perhaps the real question might be how big a class of unemployable/comfortably welfare dependent people have the social engineering experiments of all governments since 1972-73 created.
MarkL
Canberra
Would anyone here actually want one of these new, skill-free, future-limited, casual McJobs on offer?
Didnt think so.
I did a reference for one of my past students for a call centre job a few weeks ago. I was asked whether I thought she’d want to develop a career in customer service - and I answered honestly that I doubted that she did, and that I was sure she wanted to work in the area she was trained in but I thought she’d do a superb job. But all things being equal, she may not get the chance to work in what she’s qualified to do. I hope she does, but whether or not people see these sorts of jobs as a way station or a permanent prison is very much to the point.
“Would anyone here actually want one of these new, skill-free, future-limited, casual McJobs on offer?
Didnt think so.”
Well, LE, unlike you and I there are many people who aren’t well qualified to be the CEO of Citigroup and don’t treat work as a career. They need money to survive, so what do you suggest they do?
Are you actually saying the dole is a better offer than a paying job?
“They need money to survive, so what do you suggest they do?”
Unionise, and kick the bosses arses till they’ve got a decent, secure full or part-time job with paid leave.
then enjoy the hols!
MarkL,
If those shop help wanted jobs are like the ones in my area, they don’t want to know you if you’re older than 16 or so.
They don’t tell you that your too old though. For example, I applied for a job in the local bread shop and was told they wanted someone with at least 2 year’s experience. To hand over a loaf of bread and take the $1.80?
Or else they will tell you the job’s taken, they just hadn’t taken the sign out of the window.
Le
No one is stopping them unionizing, so haven’t they?
LE
I can see that little glint in your eyes through your writing that you are getting just a little tired of following slogans etc.
Remember I was one of you once and it’s not difficult moving moving over to the dark side. I promise you’ll fel better for it and you head will clear of all the inconsistencies you are requied to support.
So com’on down hear and join us. You’ll be a happier E without the L. Give us a little clue that you have jumped ship. Ocassionaly just frop the L from moniker. I’ll know then.
firstly, this may be a dumb question, but why *does* the government want to produce figures that indicate a low unemployment level? This is a serious question.
secondly, is there anyone here that is arguing for labour deregulation that is not over 35, anglo, male and maybe even a boss of some business or franchise?
[silence]
no, didn’t think so! so the only thing at stake for you is how you are going to hire exploitable labour to up-sell things to customers that they don’t really want.
yeah, awesome! tip top… so you want two king size mars bars for three bucks?
Actually here is a litle experiment for you who think labour deregulation is good, just to give you a taste of what those sort of jobs are like: every time you make a comment on any post on any blog for the next week you need to end it with “so you want two king size mars bars for three bucks?” or a version of that. Context doesn’t matter! The ethics of up-selling shit to people who don’t need it doesn’t come into it, neither does the demeaning corruption of ‘good will’. So any takers on that? You’d have to type it out by hand each time, no cheating, you can’t just cut’n'paste it like as if it were a mass-produced sign or anything. Virtuosic immaterial labour. Go on! Try it on!
Thanks JC, but I’d just feel like I needed a shower.
From the scent of that last post, I’d say you know exactly what I mean.
“I’d certainly agree that there needs to be some serious thought given to the taxation system as it intersects with welfare - both in terms of incentives to work and equity. This is something I’m doing some work on in the near future, so I’d be grateful for a good discussion of it.”
Well you could say that. That there needs to be serious thought put into it. I take the point of view that almost NO thought needs to go into that. Since whereas high taxes on a wealthy fellow might be counter-productive, and may be a hassle for him, may be a hateful anti-libertarian imposition, an initiation of force and bad for the economy. It may be all those things. But taxing poor people is government persecution. It makes no sense at all in a welfare state. And the madness of having a welfare state, having a minimum wage, BUT TAXING THAT MIMIMUM WAGE and using that money for the welfare state??????
Well its a funny old world isn’t it?
That is amongst the first step to helping the less well-off. All good policy starts with financial triage. But having found that extra cash the first thing you’d do is take any legislation to do with payroll tax and rip it up, then burn it, and blast it out of a canon. Then you’d lift the income tax free threshold at least above the minimum wage.
From there you can see if there’s anything left in the jar to help the able-bodied poor further. Further, that is, beyond just stopping from persecuting them. But at least after that you’ve got a reasonably high bar for non-defense spending proposals to jump over.
But of course I’m being ridiculously picky with your wording. The wider topic of how to help those on the lower rungs is enourmously complex and involved.
I believe I have a book to recommend you which ought to be a pre-requisite for your upcoming project.
It may not at first be apparent when you’re reading it how it relates to the topic of welfare. Its written by a non-economist. An historian who is a centrist. A very good historian named David Hackett Fischer.
” The Great Wave. (Price Revolutions and the Rythm Of History).”
I have a great deal more to say about this subject. So much so that this forum may not be the best place for it.
Glen I don’t see a great deal of economics in your post. Did you suppose that the laws of supply and demand can be overcome by the laws in Canberra?
Paul Watson,
I am well aware that the Mature Age Allowance ceased to new applicant, that does not change the fact that upon its implementation it removed a number of unemployed people from the statistics with out them actually finding employment.
*In nearly 10 years working for Centrelink, I had never come across a Centrelink office that had seperate entrances for unemployed and other recipients, some had seperate reception desks but never seperate entrances.
Paul Arrighi, if your standard of literacy is any guide, I wouldn’t take your insider knowledge of Centrelink as being worth much at all. (Reminds me of a custom letter I recently received from a reasonably senior Centrelink officer, which contains several glaring misspellings - I meant to put it up on my blog, for posterity).
Anyway, re the issue separate entrances for unemployed (and youth allowance) vs other recipients, my “own” Melbourne Centrelink definitely has separate floors along these lines, including human queue-combers on the ground (= dole etc) floor, to make sure that the boomers/oldies don’t have to suffer the indignity of queuing alongside – or even in sight of – Xer scum.
Mark, I was once at Fortitude Valley Centrelink about ten years ago, and it is as you describe. Which is to say, it is NOT representative of inner-city Centrelinks in Melbourne. (Dunno about Centrelinks in other places, except Darlinghurst (Sydney), which is also a cesspit of hell). Plus, there is a logic flaw in your argument: the more screwed-up on drugs one is, the easier it is to get the DSP, and so, Hello Gold Class Centrelink. Meanwhile, less-troubled uni graduates get kicked around downstairs, their relative well-behavedness and intelligence rewarded by being treated as exemplars of welfare bludgerdom.
supply and demand? of what? there are many things exchanged in a wage labour contract and money is just one of them. have you ever had a proper job, graeme? you know, if i was going to sit here writing about what i don’t see in other peoples comments then I would be here forever. In fact it would be like a trip to a level below hades called tantalus.
but, seriously, can anyone explain why the government wants to represent the rate of unemployment as being low?
who benefits from this representation?
is it merely the social side of things where they think people would revolt if the true facts about the rate of unemployment and the complexities and precarity of non-full time employment came out?
Sorry for the typing but doing several things at once here and I don’t claim to be a great typist but I won’t use that as an excuse. Paul Watson certainly shot his credibility to shreds when he indicates he has visited 2 Centrelink offices and has a better idea than someone who has worked at over a dozen Centrelink offices and visited numerous others.
Perhaps he would like to make a relevant comment in regards to my first post and the introduction Mature Age Allowance affecting the unemployment statistics.
My nephew is one takes whatever job he can but fulltime work is not offered because of his age. We tried to help him finish his papers for an electrician but the union makes it very hard to do that. He’s also not all that good with paper exams but put him in front of anything practical and he is off and running. There is a whole group of young men like him who do want to work but through circumstances are becoming a lost generation.
With all this talk of Centrelink it struck me that the way that folks would wish to end poverty is different from my own. The way I’d do it is:
1. End unemployment by deregulation of the labour market.
2. Try and make things easier on the working poor.
There ought not be a Centrelink. Its humiliating even being there. At least they’ve got TV’s now. But it’s a depressing and confidence destroying place anyway. One suspects that if any decent employer saw you there that it be the end of your chances with him.
This is what the interventionists have done to so many of us. Using brute force against employers they have ended or at least harmed price competition in the labour market.
Therefore they have opened up other forms of discrimination. So now you have to show everyone your resume. And references. And any number of other violations of your privacy. And you have to be hyped up at the interview. Like your whole life up until that day has been one long sequence leading only logically to the job that you are going for that very day. Whether that job be wiping old peoples bottoms or batting softballs through the tax department windows. Whether it be amongst the worst or the best of all possible jobs.
And because the interventionists have slaughtered the number of jobs out there the interviewer, who will not take risks, is able to determine what your life will be like for the next few years. If not forever. Which is a soul-destroying position to be placing people in.
Under economic liberty there would be (relatively speaking) a seller’s market for labour. So you would just move about improving your skill set in accordance with your ultimate goals. And then if you were ambitious, once you’d got the skills, you’d leave to get the cash. You’d open your own business. It’s about that simple.
But consider opening your own business in this Keynesian world. For one thing it costs a fortune just to buy some office space. Or some extra living space. From which to lauch your business. Try buying a building with a shop floor anywhere near Sydney these days. That’s just one in the many hundreds of obstacles that leftists have thrown in prohibiting people going into business for themselves.
Try running through the lyrics of the old song “King Of The Road” in your head. See if you can find a clue to how the job market used to be before the interventionists of the pacifist veneer decided to use brute force on employers in furtherance of whatever bait and switch goals they had going at the time.
Try running through the lyrics of the old song “King Of The Road� in your head. See if you can find a clue to how the job market used to be before
Think you might want to listen to those lyrics again, mate. Poverty and petty theft by the itinerant homeless isn’t really what I want the labour market to encourage.
You try running through them first. But I’ll check to see if I haven’t been circling the wrong lyrics around my head all this time.
There’s a chunk of about 13 words that I’m referring to. I don’t remember the petty theft in the song? You aren’t sending me on a wild goose chase are you Amanda?
Birdman, don’t argue country music with Amanda.
You. Will. Lose.
That is unless you pipped her in the country music trivia quiz at the Tamworth Festival this year, in which case I am happy to be corrected.
The bloke in the song is a hobo who rides trains from one menial job to another (”four hours of pushing broom”) which is enough for a fleapit to sleep in but not enough to buy cigarettes, but he finds stogies sometimes so that’s OK. Chronic unemployment is very good for the litter problem! He don’t pay no union dues, ’cause he doesn’t have a job.
And he “knows every lock that ain’t locked when no one’s around.” Wonder why? Nips in to do the washing up as a surprise I guess.
http://www.lyricsfreak.com/r/randy-travis/114197.html
That explains why I can’t afford to buy a house in New Farm! Leftists!
Graeme, in regard to the unemployed, going to Centrelink being a humiliating experience is not such a bad thing, all the more incentive for some of the less motivated to go out and find a job. You must also remember that Centrelink deals with a lot more than the unemployed, in fact pension and family payments make up the bulk of the work in Centrelink.
“That explains why I can’t afford to buy a house in New Farm! Leftists!”
Damn straight. Height restrictions on buildings and currency debauch is the reason you can’t afford an APARTMENT in New Farm. No doubt about that at all.
But the Liberals are just as bad. In NSW hanging it on Bob Carr’s sardine city. They didn’t like the idea that Bob wanted to allow high-rise development near train stations. Truly bizzare.
Yeah I checked out those lyrics Amanda. I didn’t have that part about the locks memorised. But the reference to the song was to do with an argument about barriers to entry into the labour market. And no endorsement of the gentleman’s chosen lifestyle. It was what we call an ‘example’. The song would not have been written that way in 2006. Because the prospect of going into some town and getting a couple of hours work on the spot and getting cash money on the same day is one liberty that has been done away with.
I probably could afford an apartment in New Farm. I’m currently renting one, might buy later this year.
Right. But you will buy it for an incredibly overblown price. You will be treating it as an investment good rather then a consumer durable. And it will be so much smaller, with less rooms, smaller rooms, lower ceilings then you could get in a better world.
An environmentally responsible future lies with homo sapiens quitting the idea of a quarter acre block as the dream and replacing it with the idea of most of us living in massive ’sky houses’ of a spaciousness that would seem unbelievable to us in the crummy interventionist world we find ourselves in.
Well, I don’t know. The apartment I live in is very large (it’s a 3 bedroom one, built in the 60s) and in a very pleasant and well situated tree lined street so given that the rent is considerably lower than the mortgage on a much smaller place, I might just stay here.
“Graeme, in regard to the unemployed, going to Centrelink being a humiliating experience is not such a bad thing, all the more incentive for some of the less motivated to go out and find a job.”
Hmmmmm. The humiliation and confidence-beating approach to seeking full employment.
You know its SO crazy it might just work…….. (not).
If you deregulated the labour market and rolled all able-bodied welfare into a bit of income support for low-paid workers all this business would be academic.
*****does anyone know why the government represents unemployment figures in such a way that makes it appear as if unemployment is low?*****
I know how it does it (it is purely discursive, defining ‘unemployment’ and ‘employment’ in certain ways), but I want to know why.
graeme, firstly, you need to wake up to the fact your economic determinism hits a massive wall when it tries to account for a sustainable economy in terms of social and environmental impacts. The logic of capitalist exchange, that is, to maximise the extraction of surplus value, means that there is a tendency to exploit those people and things that can not defend themselves, such as those born into structural poverty and the natural environment.
Second problem you are not realising because you have bought the government’s ideology hook, line and sinker is that it is not a ‘job market’ but a ‘labour market’ with employers having the upper hand. You can thank the Liberal Government for that.
Third problem with what you are saying that ties the two points together is that a job, and employment as such, should pay enough in wages to sustain people so they can live a decent life. A ‘decent life’ is not the bare minimum of survival but a life that is worth living. Any other definition of life is nonsense and you end with societal mental health and substance abuse problems. Calculate how much it cost to live a ‘decent life’ (whatever that is, but certainly more than a ‘living wage’) in various places in Australia, figure out how long it would take to earn this amount on the minimum wage, and then you have the minimum amount of time someone should be working before they are classified as employed. It makes much more sense than the government’s arbitrary figure of 1 hour a week or whatever it is.
“graeme, firstly, you need to wake up to the fact your economic determinism hits a massive wall when it tries to account for a sustainable economy in terms of social and environmental impacts.”
Stop right there.
1. I’m not a determinist of any sort. Least of all an economic determinist. But labelling me an economic determinist will not repeal the laws of supply and demand. You still haven’t repealed the laws of supply and demand. And calling people names won’t make the spell no matter how many times you do it. The laws of supply and demand still exist. So we will apply them and see how what you are saying stacks up.
2. There is no school of purely economic determinism. But there is a school of historical determinism. Though why people still take Marx seriously is just one of the mysteries of life. What I’m saying is that this may have been an example of leftist projection.
3. I don’t need to wake up to anything in this discussion. You’ve got to wake up to the fact that no matter what you do the law of supply and demand will still be there no matter how many marxists or hard-leftists you read or hang out with.
4. We see here that you became aware early on that you couldn’t make a good argument on its own merits. So you had to reach into an whole other subject in order to conflate and confuse the issue. We were talking about employment. But you needed to bring in the environment. And you needed to use more then one meaning for the one word “exploit”.
“The logic of capitalist exchange, that is, to maximise the extraction of surplus value….” This statement is based on the “labour theory of value” which is a false theory in economics. A theory that took hold in Calvinist Scotland and which Marx took up along with a great deal of the English-Speaking world.
We still haven’t found a refutation for supply and demand yet. But I’m sure its coming up.
“…means that there is a tendency to exploit those people and things that can not defend themselves, such as those born into structural poverty and the natural environment…”
Notice how you had to bring in another issue since your argument won’t quite take without conflating and confusing. But since you haven’t repealed the law of supply and demand its as good a time to point out that it is just these people you speak of who are most grievously harmed by interventions into the labour market.
“Second problem you are not realising because you have bought the government’s ideology hook, line and sinker is that it is not a ‘job market’ but a ‘labour market’ with employers having the upper hand.”
I did no such thing. But there is a scintilla of truth here. If the size of firms is bigger then it ought to be. That is to say to the extent that our economy is dominated by a rigged market that predjudices against small business (and I think that is true to a degree) then we have a bit of a problem. If we want to make things better for the less fortunate we have to get everything right. And in fact if you read some things I wrote earlier on this thread you will see that I have recognised some of these concerns already.
“Third problem with what you are saying that ties the two points together is that a job, and employment as such, should pay enough in wages to sustain people so they can live a decent life. ”
No no no. It should pay everyone millions so we can all be rich. Here you go off into fantasy. A fantasy made possible only by this failure to always keep in mind supply and demand. You have brought a value judgement into an essentially technical matter.
And so the rest is all irrelevant.
Try again. But this time say nothing that ignores supply and demand. Now I think there IS a problem with the distribution of wealth. As you can see by earlier posts on this thread. But in order to create greater upward mobility, to help those who you are implying you wish to help. Or indeed, in order to get anything done, it does no good to ignore realities, unpleasant or otherwise.
the _law_ of supply and demand?
what law?
are you on drugs? or just ‘on’ dogma? you have just attempted to refute everything I have written by arguing that everything relates to a _law_ of supply and demand, which I have apparently ignored?
[bangs head against wall repeatedly]
you need to look up what ‘economic determinist’ means and then think about who is describing what as a ‘law’. I am not having an economics argument, ffs… I am in the humanities!
My question has been repeatedly (phrased in various ways): WHY DOES THE GOVERNMENT REPRESENT UNEMPLOYMENT IN SUCH A WAY AS TO IMPLY THAT IT IS LOWER THAN IT ACTUALLY IS and THAT IGNORES THE COMPLEXITY OF THE POST-FORDIST LABOUR MARKET AND WORKPLACE?
The ‘official’ unemployment rate serves as a masquerade. It constructs a certain economic reality of the social conditions of late capitalist society. That particular reality is to the advantage of people who do not want to address the social and environmental problems. Why this is to the advantage of people who do not want to address such problems? Firstly because the only measure they will accept of social problems at a societal or structural level is an _economic_ indicator, not social or cultural indicators. Hence, the chief ‘indicator’ that the current neo-liberal regime uses (that began 20 years ago, across differnt governments) are rates of unemployment not rates of meaningful employment or rates of sustainable livelihoods, but rates of unemployment. It represents not how well the government is doing to make sure people lead a good life, but how much surplus labour there (allegedly) is (or isn’t) in the ‘labour market’ ie for the devices of business and investment capital. Even this is nonsense, because excess labour is distributed across groups of people and not embodied ina single labourer, hence the under-representation of casual workers.
What is a social indicator? Mass depression. What is a cultural indicator? Race [ethnicity] riots. The neoliberals are extremely good at administrating capital and extremely poor at social governance.
Asking me to relate this to laws of supply and demand is like asking a pacifist to shoot the warmongers.
GLEN SEZ
I am not having an economics argument, ffs… I am in the humanities!
I SEZ
Can you expand on this one point so that the taxpayer can see what his money is buying us and what a tragic waste it is to fund education and research by such ill-gotten revenues………………….
I am not having an economics argument, ffs… I am in the humanities!
So sez Glen. And I say: Nothing is really REAL to you people is it?
Paul “worked at over a dozen Centrelink offices� Arrighi,
I don’t want to get into an endless pissing contest with you over who’s got the better handle on Centrelink. Quite apart from the two atypical offices (= highly transient, if not actually homeless clientele, who most likely will get the DSP when/if they’re settled) that I’ve earlier mentioned as having once passed through, I’ve been engaged in what you might call a qualitative (look it up, note NOT quantitative) study of one inner-Melbourne Centrelink office, off and on for the last eight years. So I do know what I’m talking about – from a front-of-counter, current perspective, anyway.
Accordingly, I have virtually zero interest in how the now-obsolete* Mature Age Allowance may have historically affected unemployment statistics c.1990-2003. However, I am quite fascinated by your insider observation that:
“going to Centrelink being a humiliating experience is not such a bad thing, [as it gives] all the more incentive for some of the less motivated to go out and find a job�.
No surprise there, that a Centrelink officer actually has the mentality of an Abu Ghraib prison guard. And while you’re probably a lost cause, Paul, here’s some news: sadistic “incentive� practices (which at the extreme end are called torture) DO NOT WORK. That they (sometimes) *appear*, at least to the incentive-isers, to work is due only to sadists’ transference: the need to find a sense of outward legitimacy for one’s private, guilty pleasure.
* Some currently 63 and 64 y.o. men, who got in before 2003, would still be on it, but obviously these will all be on the old-age pension by 2008.
Man do I ever agree with the anger behind that second to last paragraph. I almost wanted to stand up and start clapping. The idea that these low-level geeks should be given that sort of power. To cut off benefits. To give them back. To make you fill in so many names of employers that you’ve allegedly called up. To waste your time (and therefore your life) with such impunity, to force you to violate the privacy of your flatmates. To act as if it is THEM that are giving YOU money. To talk as if it came out of their pocket…………
If the labour market was totally de-regulated and all able-bodied welfare were rolled into income support for low-paid work none of these attacks on the dignity of our fellow human beings would be necessary.