The state of the economy at the street level

[PZ.]

The jobs are there already. The incentive to find them is not.

Even my GF's pet robot is too lazy to make the coffee.

 

[luutzu]

Jobs are being created aren't they ?

That's what the government keeps telling us.

Yea, driving for yourself while driving for Uber, AustraliaPost etc. is a job. It's being your own boss except you're being told what to do, have no negotiating power and barely make any money while your real boss takes a large chunk of earnigs you help generate, put it towards automating your job.

On the lower pay scale people are earning jack. On the higher white collar pay scale, people earn better but the parasite still managed to do jack all and get about 30% of their pay.

Gotta admire the genius that goes into rigging a system where you make money by doing nothing and call it entrepreneurialship.

 

[SirRumpole]

Yea, driving for yourself while driving for Uber, AustraliaPost etc. is a job. It's being your own boss except you're being told what to do, have no negotiating power and barely make any money while your real boss takes a large chunk of earnigs you help generate, put it towards automating your job.

On the lower pay scale people are earning jack. On the higher white collar pay scale, people earn better but the parasite still managed to do jack all and get about 30% of their pay.

Gotta admire the genius that goes into rigging a system where you make money by doing nothing and call it entrepreneurialship.

You are quite right to point out that the quality of jobs is not often measured or communicated.

A job is defined as doing more than one hour of paid work per month.

Probably not even enough to buy a pizza.

 

[sptrawler]

Obviously a massive shortage of fruit pickers, shame we can't find Australian's, with the skill set.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/fed...ought-and-visa-shortages-20181017-p50a6g.html

 

[luutzu]

Obviously a massive shortage of fruit pickers, shame we can't find Australian's, with the skill set.

https://www.smh.com.au/politics/fed...ought-and-visa-shortages-20181017-p50a6g.html

Don't they have machines to do that kind of stuff now? That's why the Yanks are deporting illegals in droves past few years isn't it?

Seasonal, part time, hourly contracts... those aren't really jobs. They're "gigs".

We all take gigs now and then don't we? Doesn't have to be fruit picking or working at properly licensed Woolies.

Don't think you can build a strong economy on gigs though.

For one, it's unstable. Bankers will not lend money; earners will not live in security.

Two, life expectancy is pretty long. Even jobs with education at graduate or post graduate level would most likely be redundant a couple times over within a lifetime...

You'd want to train your workforce so that they can earn (and pay taxes) on it long enough without needing to become lazy no-good (name your race) and seek entitlement.

That not only reduce welfare for the peasants (so more can be given to the distinguished ones); have a skilled workforce with enough training they might invent something new... or just enough reading and learning they can teach their kids (you'd want future leaders and mandarins, not rebels and hooligans)... dignity and all that fluff.

But then I guess we can just call them names, use them as examples... and privatise prisons to get free labour and plenty of profit for friends and masters.

 

[sptrawler]

I really don't know I haven't been involved in the industry, but it seems crazy, that fruit is just allowed to fall and rot. Due to lack of people to pick it, or lack of equipment to pick it.

 

[luutzu]

I really don't know I haven't been involved in the industry, but it seems crazy, that fruit is just allowed to fall and rot. Due to lack of people to pick it, or lack of equipment to pick it.

Yea, that is crazy.

 

[Smurf1976]

You could live right next to some of these farms but they won’t employ you because the labour hire companies only take backpakers who then spend much of their wages renting accommodation from the same company.

So long as that goes on, I’ll have precisely zero sympathy for the farmers with whatever problems they’re having. Give local workers an opportunity and I’ll change my view.

Obviously that won’t be happening everywhere but it’s a definite problem.

 

[CBerg]

You could live right next to some of these farms but they won’t employ you because the labour hire companies only take backpakers who then spend much of their wages renting accommodation from the same company.

So long as that goes on, I’ll have precisely zero sympathy for the farmers with whatever problems they’re having. Give local workers an opportunity and I’ll change my view.

Obviously that won’t be happening everywhere but it’s a definite problem.

Labour hire companies should be outlawed in my opinion in agriculture, it's just too easy to blame really bad situations on each other & nothing ever happens, possibly a new labour hire company is used. Out of the roughly 20 agriculture companies I've worked for(I'm in IT myself) only about 2-3 have good relations with picking/seasonal staff, the rest treat those workers like garbage. It's a real shame considering the amount of support farmers expect the community to show them.

 

[sptrawler]

Things must be getting bad.

http://www.thebull.com.au/articles/a/77785-roger-david-menswear-enters-administration.html

I bought my wedding suit from them, 42 years ago.
Wish I could still fit into it.

 

[SirRumpole]

No one knows what the economy is up to says Ross Gittins.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/bu...-are-the-experts-20181012-p509a9.html?ref=rss

 

[SirRumpole]

Small business is no big deal says Ross Gittins.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/bu...l-sauce-for-jobs-20181012-p5099r.html?ref=rss

 

[luutzu]

Small business is no big deal says Ross Gittins.

https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/bu...l-sauce-for-jobs-20181012-p5099r.html?ref=rss

He's playing a fair bit on the "growth" claim. But his own stats show why small [and medium] businesses are important.

Employing 44% of the workforce, as he quoted, is pretty important I reckon. If medium businesses are included, they'd both employed some 60%.. that's important.

He's right that the tax cuts wouldn't create more jobs, just handed more money back to the business owners. But it's misleading to say that small/medium businesses isn't important because it doesn't show high job "growth".

Most small to medium businesses would employ local more than international labour. That has its own benefits.

 

[SirRumpole]

He's right that the tax cuts wouldn't create more jobs, just handed more money back to the business owners. But it's misleading to say that small/medium businesses isn't important because it doesn't show high job "growth".

I don't think he's saying that small business is "not important", just that it's not as important as the small business owners think it is. Everyone talks up their own book.

 

[luutzu]

I don't think he's saying that small business is "not important", just that it's not as important as the small business owners think it is. Everyone talks up their own book.

Yea, true. I guess I was focusing on the attention grabbing title.

Fairfax gotta sell ads I supposed.

 

[sptrawler]

I don't think he's saying that small business is "not important", just that it's not as important as the small business owners think it is. Everyone talks up their own book.

Including Ross Gittens, I have never found his articles, very enlightening. I suppose that happens, when you have to write a column on a regular basis, you tend they tend to write the same thing 1,000 different ways. IMO

 

[sptrawler]

I don't think he's saying that small business is "not important", just that it's not as important as the small business owners think it is. Everyone talks up their own book.

Including Ross Gittens, I have never found his articles, very enlightening. I suppose that happens, when you have to write a column on a regular basis, they tend to write the same thing 1,000 different ways. IMO

 

[SirRumpole]

Including Ross Gittens, I have never found his articles, very enlightening. I suppose that happens, when you have to write a column on a regular basis, they tend to write the same thing 1,000 different ways. IMO

I think that applies to most journalists in the 24 hour news cycle these days. If they don't write something they don't get paid. So they just concentrate on churning out words. Gittens seems to be one of the more balanced imo though.

 

[basilio]

I have a lot of time for Ross Gittens. He seems to be very clear eyed about how the economy works or doesn't work. He is quick to call out the special interest groups that attempt to talk up their role in the economy to gain further governmet support when the facts would indicate otherwise. The small business story is one of these.

I suggest one of the killers of small business these days is the role of the large franchise groups which herd potential small business people into their franchise where they (often) end up plucked and cooked.

The other killer is the rents in shopping centers which extract the last dollar from small retail businesses.

Makes one wonder what the effect on small businesses would be if say a super fund bought a shopping centre direct and then reset rents to make a 7% return and encouraged small businesses to survive and thrive.

 

[Junior]

I feel as though the argument around tax cuts for businesses is not black and white.....surely if businesses get to retain a bigger proportion of their profits, that will lead to more employees. Of course it depends on the industry and particular business, but on average, overall, more profit = increased ability to expand = more jobs.