Category Archives Economics

The OECD has released its Economic Overview for Australia for 2014. The OECD report suggests Australia’s material living standards and well-being compare well internationally, reflecting a well-managed and successful economy. The economy is slowing as the prolonged mining boom recedes. Output growth of about 3% is expected for 2014 and 2.5% in 2015. [Editor’s note – Growth of 2.5% is seen…

"Capital in the Twenty-First Century", written by the French economist Thomas Piketty I am yet to finish reading this, but earlier this year, the economist said: "Capital" is built on more than a decade of research by Mr Piketty and a handful of other economists, detailing historical changes in the concentration of income and wealth. This pile of data allows Mr Piketty…

Did you know? Every $1 spent on a child's education yields $10-$15 in economic growth over that person's working lifetime #educationfirst— UNESCO (@UNESCO) July 11, 2013  

Tim Harford wrote a piece in ft.com earlier this year, documenting the [not-so-surprising] inaccuracy and just-plain "wrongfulness" of economic forecaster[s] [ing]...... In the 2001 issue of the International Journal of Forecasting, an economist from the International Monetary Fund, Prakash Loungani, published a survey of the accuracy of economic forecasts throughout the 1990s. The record of failure to predict recessions is…

Book - Limits of Growth

[Source: Club of Rome] I was a school student when this first Club of Rome Report was widely heralded. I was in University studying Geography, History, Literature and Politics when I looked closely at its research and findings. I was teaching when the "20 year old" report was critiqued as flawed and plain wrong. As Limits to Growth concluded in 1972:…

The first five points from the Executive Summary of IPCC's latest regional report for Australasia: The regional climate is changing (very high confidence). Warming is projected to continue through the 21st century (virtually certain) along with other changes in climate. Uncertainty in projected rainfall changes remains large for many parts of Australia and New Zealand, which creates significant challenges for adaptation.…

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