I chortle quietly to myself when "right" voters acclaim their humanist tendencies by saying they support gay marriage, aren't religious, support charities and equal opportunity. You and Joe Mac have both done something similar in this thread. We're virtually brothers Scotty.
You ignore the decrease in public debt during the Clinton years.
The first two suggest your theory may not be as clear cut as you suggest and the third blows it out of the water.
You say that good economic management is not exclusive to conservatives but the only good economic manager from a Labor/democratic party I can think of was the Bill Clinton's Democratic party in the 90's. Can you name another?
But do you really think that's an objective review of the economy throughout Labor's term? Are you suggesting that foriegn investment would be much higher if none of those actions would be taken? Where is the evidence for this?
Most of what you've listed would barely have a measurable effect on investment and economic growth.
Cheap shot, JM, cut out the personal crap. I realise he's a difficult bastard to argue with but there's no other alternative.
PS. Old buggers like Scarfy and I remember Keating well, some with affection, some not. I reckon history will judge him as a very good Treasurer. Don't forget the silly prick sent his son to SIC.
PPS. Don't belong to any political party. Nor am I an urger for any of 'em.
Cutter, I'm not supposed to be here, but do you think Joe is old enough to have heard of Paul Keating? I'd ask him that if I were you.
Using a generalisation such as you have (ie all liberal governments are bad economic managers and all conservative governments are amazing economic managers) will leave you open to criticism unless you can point to analysis showing this to be the case.
Who is to decide how fervent an ideological belief is? And how to measure its fervency? And how to measure prediction success? This sounds like extremly unlikely research, although if you've got it, go ahead and share.
If I am being honest I have no direct figures on this, but at my job I am currently working with two very well known Australian organisations who are world leaders in their field. I am helping these two companies relocate overseas (one to the UK and one to Switzerland) because in their own words of "measures put in place by the Labor governement."
I also know from a colleague that BHP have strongly considered relocating to Switzerland since this governement got into power.
What measures?
Yeah, I doubt that. For one, they have been planning to move into this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/City_Square_(skyscraper) . 2ndly, they make billions out of Australia, I doubt they will cut or sell any projects here.
I am just studdying economics and finance at the moment. And was skeptical of what you are saying because Labor and Liberal are so similar economically, a company claiming to leave Australia due to the government can't really single out one party (well I certainly couldn't say otherwise in an assignment/essay without loads of evidence). If a company leaves Australia and blames 1 policy in particular, maybe they weren't performing very well in the first place and that was just the tipping point?
And what you said is exactly what I'm thinking. BHB moving a few corperate jobs overseas will not be a big deal, and will hardly be the fault of the government. They are becoming a worldwide brand now. If they do follow that idea, they still pay tax in Australia for all the mining they do here, and will still do here. There is really no big significance to the idea of them "moving" overseas.
It's not that you don't have a point, I just prefer to look at the big picture rather than the minor problems of individual businesses when reviewing the government's performance, or the national economy. There are downsides to the mining tax, but there are downsides with every tax. The point is that the pro's outweight the cons. The profits BHP are making are crazy, as commodity prices have been rising over the long term, their tax-rates haven't risen nearly as much. It ended up creating a kind-of 2 speed economy. We could be taxing them loads more and they'd be fine, but the government chose to cave in and make all sorts of deals/concessions.
Didn't BHP agree to the mining tax anyway? I don't know what the fuss is about. If I were them I'd take this deal as well, in 5-10 years time they will be making shitloads once again. Commodity prices will continue to rise and their tax rates will remain steady.
That's not a good argument against introducing a new tax though. The system is complex, but that's why we have accountants and tax consultants. We should be trying to simplify the system where it can be, but most of those taxes are themselves convering loopholes. The fact is, some businesses will look for any way possible to avoid paying a particular tax, and then complain when the government introduces a new tax to stop them trying to cheat the system. (not talking about any tax in particular here, just generally).
The idea of a carbon tax is the capitalist/right wing way of tackling our co2 emissions. All we ever hear is how great the capitalist system is, but whenever we attempt to do something using these "free market" mechanisms, people complain that it's complicating the tax system. But that "problem" in my eyes is just a by-product of how our society operates.
Same goes for the mining tax. The industry is growing incredibly large/very fast and the state government's just sit there watching. So when the federal government steps in and attempts to at least ensure the industry doesn't speed way ahead of the rest of the economy, and are at least being taxed fairly. Suddenly, the government shouldn't be allowed to do it's job because we don't want to give businesses any "uncertainty" or "complexity" to deal with.
Anyway I will stop now because I'm going way off topic. The point is, Liberal will have the same duty when they get back in power and will take action where it's needed just like Labor have been doing. They agreed to the emission targets just like Labor, and they know it's not healthy to let the mining industry speed way ahead of the general economy as commodity prices double/triple/quadruple into the future. I don't know what massive differences businesses are expecting when they get back into power. Maybe the ability to fire employees with slightly less complications will stop hoards of businesses going offshore? We'll have to wait and see. Anyway, I actually enjoyed discussing this. Have a good day.
Sounds like I should become an accountant and vote Labor, set for life.