Archived publication for 2008 in IPA Review article
Recent publications
Baby bonus rise bad for babies
Sometimes a policy is so irredeemably bad that nothing short of abolition is the appropriate course. Unfortunately, sometimes the awful policy is a political superstar, beloved by all but the worst curmudgeon. The baby bonus is such a policy. Set...
Labor flirting with neo-protectionism in trade policy
It is only early days, but the Rudd government's pro-growth reform credentials are already being put to the test. Since the 1980s, both major parties have favoured free trade. At the last federal election, then Shadow, now Minister for Trade,...
Fear of school profit holding quality back
In Australia, schools are operated either by the government or by not-for-profit private organisations. It is prohibited to run a school to make a financial profit. In the United States there is no such prohibition. And a recent study published by...
New satellite data casts doubts on global warming models
New NASA data from their Aqua Satellite throws doubt on the validity of climate change models currently being used by the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. For the first time scientists have found a strong negative cloud...
Parking beyond the pale of planners
It took a car users group to blow the whistle on the stupidity of public transport planners restricting the potential growth in public transport. A recent NRMA report found that a critical shortage of commuter car parking at railway stations is...
How many football teams should there be?
Competition is good for consumers-it leads to lower prices and better quality, with less efficient firms exiting the industry. Sports, apparently, are an exception to that rule. Consumers are better off when teams compete on the playing field, but...
Can government be restrained?: Making the state small is a huge task
The 2007 election illustrated clearly how at both the federal and state levels the Labor Party has moved further away from socialism towards the centre of the political stream. In that sense the coalition parties can claim a ‘victory',...
Can we starve the government beast?
‘This reckless spending has got to stop'. With those words Kevin Rudd outflanked John Howard's economic policy from the right. Australia's traditional centre-left party won the 2007 election with smaller government rhetoric than the...
Can regulation be reduced?
Numerically, Australia now has more regulations than at any time since federation. If we are to pare back government interference in the economy, we need to attack more than just the national income share of government, but also the regulatory web...
From the executive director
Kevin Rudd might have learned a thing or two from Louis XIV. The Pursuit of Glory: Europe 1648-1815 is a magisterial new history by Tim Blanning, Professor of Modern European History at the University of Cambridge. In The Pursuit of Glory,...