![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Australia is heading for trouble. Some say troubles abound.
1. The Australian Reserve Bank met (monthly), and for the eighth consecutive time did not raise the benchmark interest rate above the current 5.25%. This has resulted in the Australian Dollar continuing to slide against the USD, CAD, Euro, and Pound Sterling. If we don't take more steam out of the housing market especially in Sydney and Melbourne we will face a runaway train. Who can afford the average price for a unit @ $300,000 (yanks=apartment), and a house @ $450,000 or service a loan at 90-95% of that amount?
Sure while the dollar remains low exporters can reap a bonanza but we import more than we export. Sure tourists visiting Oz get a great deal on converting their money to the Aussie peso, but do I really want to pay the equivalent of $12 for a Big Mac in London! Investors are dumping their AUD investments for greenerback pastures.
2. The current Australian Government has been in power too long and it's gone to their collective heads. Uncle Johnny (yanks=John Howard, Prime Minister), can smell the testosterone in the cabinet office.
a) New anti-terrorism laws are terrifying. Being held without arrest. Being denied legal representation. Shoot-to-kill policies. We all saw what the famed New Scotland Yard did with that kind of power in the aftermath of the recent London bombings. Using the military as Police. What exactly does the Australian Defence Force know about law and order? Civil law and civil order. Zip, zero, nada.
b) New employment laws. The current setup is that all state governments are responsible for employment law within their respective jurisdictions. Uncle Johnny wants (and will get) to take this power away from the state governments and the state courts and state administration and appeals tribunals and shift it all to the federal authorities. While at the same time reducing some 133 pieces of employment legislation to 2.
Individual employees will now be expected to come to terms with their employers as to what employment contract they are faced with on the job. I can see employers standing over employees to win big discounts all in the name of a competitive market place. Out goes overtime payments, penalty rates (yanks=higher pay rates for crazy hours like working after midnight and Sundays), holiday pay and any other perk that makes the job sufferable. Most surveys put 50% of workers as hating their job/boss.
I'm sure most employees would be in a poor position to argue workplace contracts with HR directors/managers.
Employee: "Now look here boss I don't like these new terms and 10% more work for 10% less pay is not fair."
Employer: "Take it or leave it."
3. Work ethic. So many under the age of 25 just don't have one. So sad.
1. The Australian Reserve Bank met (monthly), and for the eighth consecutive time did not raise the benchmark interest rate above the current 5.25%. This has resulted in the Australian Dollar continuing to slide against the USD, CAD, Euro, and Pound Sterling. If we don't take more steam out of the housing market especially in Sydney and Melbourne we will face a runaway train. Who can afford the average price for a unit @ $300,000 (yanks=apartment), and a house @ $450,000 or service a loan at 90-95% of that amount?
Sure while the dollar remains low exporters can reap a bonanza but we import more than we export. Sure tourists visiting Oz get a great deal on converting their money to the Aussie peso, but do I really want to pay the equivalent of $12 for a Big Mac in London! Investors are dumping their AUD investments for greenerback pastures.
2. The current Australian Government has been in power too long and it's gone to their collective heads. Uncle Johnny (yanks=John Howard, Prime Minister), can smell the testosterone in the cabinet office.
a) New anti-terrorism laws are terrifying. Being held without arrest. Being denied legal representation. Shoot-to-kill policies. We all saw what the famed New Scotland Yard did with that kind of power in the aftermath of the recent London bombings. Using the military as Police. What exactly does the Australian Defence Force know about law and order? Civil law and civil order. Zip, zero, nada.
b) New employment laws. The current setup is that all state governments are responsible for employment law within their respective jurisdictions. Uncle Johnny wants (and will get) to take this power away from the state governments and the state courts and state administration and appeals tribunals and shift it all to the federal authorities. While at the same time reducing some 133 pieces of employment legislation to 2.
Individual employees will now be expected to come to terms with their employers as to what employment contract they are faced with on the job. I can see employers standing over employees to win big discounts all in the name of a competitive market place. Out goes overtime payments, penalty rates (yanks=higher pay rates for crazy hours like working after midnight and Sundays), holiday pay and any other perk that makes the job sufferable. Most surveys put 50% of workers as hating their job/boss.
I'm sure most employees would be in a poor position to argue workplace contracts with HR directors/managers.
Employee: "Now look here boss I don't like these new terms and 10% more work for 10% less pay is not fair."
Employer: "Take it or leave it."
3. Work ethic. So many under the age of 25 just don't have one. So sad.
