Archived publication for August 2009
Recent publications
Does fiscal stimulus work? What Nobel Price winners say
We have been told that ‘you don't need a PhD in economics' to understand why fiscal stimulus packages increase economic activity. Senior government ministers, the Treasury, a host of business economists, and a legion of journalists - amongst...
20 Years On: Western liberty and Soviet tyranny
2009 marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall-the moment which signalled the end of the short and brutal totalitarian 20th century. The movement had actually begun much earlier. The disintegration of Communist rule in Hungary...
Open letter: Institute of Public Affairs climate change research
In this letter sent to Federal senators, John Roskam and Alan Moran outline the results of the Institute of Public Affairs climate change research program, which has been going since the 1990s.
The underground Australian movie renaissance
There actually are good Australian movies, and they're popular, writes Dean Bertram. You're just never told about them. Almost two decades ago, a handful of young filmmakers were revitalizing American cinema. Included in their number were Quentin...
Volume 61 Number 2
John Roskam on the Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, Richard Allsop on wowsers, Chris Berg on the Nanny State's worst ideas, Dean Bertram on Aussie movies, Greg Melleuish on greed is great, Tim Wilson on John Brack, Sinclair Davidson on Wayne Swan and...
Wowserism may be different, but it's not dead
‘I'm not a wowser but...' Those words seem to have become the standard introduction for anyone proposing a new restriction on what should be matters of individual choice. The Rudd Government are masters of it. In an interview with 4BC last...
Editorial, August 2009
2009 marks the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall - the moment which signalled the end of the short and brutal totalitarian 20th century. The movement had actually begun much earlier. The disintegration of Communist rule in...
What have the neo-liberals ever done for us?
The Life of Brian is not the best Monty Python film.* Its satire of religion, unlike general Python jibes against authority, looks dated. Its political satire though-‘What have the Romans ever done for us'-is an entirely different matter....
The GST is a massive fat tax
Many public health activists claim that a tax on fatty food is necessary to tackle obesity. The critics of this fat tax idea point to a number of studies revealing the limitations of such a scheme. A 2005 US study of a 10 per cent fat tax on dairy...
Not your house. Not your land.
Normally, if your house is heritage-listed, you have a problem if you want to knock it down, or renovate it. Robert Masters of Gunbower in northern Victoria is happy to leave the home his great-grandfather built in 1863 exactly as it is. So where...