Where's the next obfuscated meltdown coming from?

So [this](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-10-01/david-taylor-global-financial-crisis-2/101492384) is interesting. Albeit over-stated and under-evidenced. But it makes sense that with everything ec...

Yay! You Lose

Yeah all great news.. not.. The thrust [here](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-09-29/australia-s-policy-downshift-hindered-by-global-tightening-wave?sref=QlpF64WK) is the RBA knows that...

Stable Diffusion AI image generation

So more on AI image generation. Not surprisingly since ['stable diffusion'](https://stability.ai/blog/stable-diffusion-announcement) released its models to the world, various folks have been packagin...

And on it goes..

It's all getting pretty weird if you're following along on a daily basis. Everything politicians, economists, and talking heads thought they 'knew' is pretty much being tipped on its head.. The Bank...

You're just a labour widget

It's true - [the memes are crap](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-09-27/quiet-quitting-lying-flat-great-resignation-what-these-fake-work-trends-mean?srnd=premium&sref=QlpF64WK). But i...

Super Statistics Updates 2022

This [update article](https://thenewdaily.com.au/finance/superannuation/2022/09/21/super-slips-in-august/) from The New Daily is helpful to bring super earnings figures up to date. But I've been loo...

And?

I usually like Peter's articles but I'm not sure what the point of [this one](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-09-21/the-mint-printing-money-why-cash-won-t-last-forever/101458918) is.. it doesn't see...

Just don't do what 'they' did

With Labor seemingly still in a 'honeymoon' period, even though they have past the '100 day marker', it's not a bad idea to reflect and see if there's a coherent strategy showing up via their actions...

OMG Mullet!

September is #mulletsformentalhealth so please do...

Robbing Peter to pay Paul?

It's a very strange world we live in.. Think about it, the 'economy' needs workers, 'mothers' seem to be an available demographic, so let's *pay them* (in childcare subsidies) to get them into the wo...

Where's the surprise?

Upside stock market gains Jun-Aug were profit take opportunities, no more. Anybody who thought the downward trend had finished wasn't looking at the data - inflation has *not* eased, PE ratios are ...

New shit has come to light

So having left behind the age of the toorak tractor[^1], learjets over kulgera[^2], and "I'm just helping my lady friend conceive man!"[^3], your newly educated urban greenie has moved on to a very t...

Nobody's quitting, and they're certainly not being quiet about it.

[It's an argument about what the argument is about..](https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-backlash-against-quiet-quitting-is-getting-loud-11661391232?mod=djem10point). As the [Wall Street Journal](http...

Life Programatically

``` initialise(birth); while (life = shit) do { - something different; - toughen up princess; - repeat; } exit(death); ``` computerised philosophy? 😛...

Dead Cat Bounce?

So that (July-August) was a '[dead cat bounce](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/d/deadcatbounce.asp)'? Probably not, a bit of exuberance whilst the markets work out what direction we're *actually*...

Leopard changing its spots?

I like Gordon Brown, I think he's probably smart, genuine, and honest. But I can't help thinking when I see him 'don his socialist suit' like he is in [this article](https://www.theguardian.com/com...

Is racial/religious 'tagging' really necessary?

WTF? The reason that [in this article](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-23/greed-construction-loss-making-boom-sees-builders-collapse/101334170) two individuals are referred to as: * "Persian-A...

Attrition

Oh yeah, this from a period when I was 'under attack' in my own workplace during 2010-2015.. My luck was that the 'adversaries' seriously over-rated their own intelligence, and in the end I simply ...

National Trust of S.A.

We do have limited built structure conservation in Australia (compared to say, Europe), so if you can, you really should support the [National Trust of S.A](https://www.nationaltrust.org.au/sa/) (or ...

Spent power

It'd probably be a good idea if UK politicians and departments dialled down the rhetoric, and 'trimmed their cloth' the match the reality of where the country finds itself. Bordering on being a fin...

Correlations pivot around Oil

[John](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/authors/AT2bBytfUHQ/john-authers?sref=QlpF64WK) has another novel outlook in [this article](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/) where he ruminates th...

Economics:  off to the race course

In the modern western world we have a paradox in how we talk about economics. In one version it's 'hand-wringing' on the importance of growth in economies to the nation. Whilst at the other end of th...

Grrrr

Miss M says "Grrrrr...

Markets Game

A lot of 'jaw-boning' that we're at a 'pivot point' again. Why? argument goes either: 1) it's the start of a 'new bull run' (after June22 lows, strong employment, FED won't hike as strongly as anti...

All that is gold glitters?

As a purely academic exercise I was trying to get my head around any correlation between gold prices, us$ strength, and us$-au$ crosses.. Why? well I, for some unfathomable reason (given in general ...

get your TL;DR here

let me a do the TL;DR (too long; didn't read) summary on [this article](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-18/economists-say-rba-should-have-raised-cash-rate-target-sooner/101343618) for you.. "Eco...

What we don't (want to) know..

> "In other words, these scholars do not argue that women are incapable of doing what men do,
> but rather that they are biologically programmed to want other things." That's pretty amazing rea...

Miss M

Miss M, extreme wide shot
[ Read more.. ]

Yeah just worry about the LNP

yes, and that pretty much encapsulates the problem the LNP has had for at least the past 30 years - they are only interested in *themselves*.. Elections, by-elections and parliament are for *the peo...

What can you do?

Oh yawn.. this is getting very boring already.. but OK then let's continue wringing the last few drops of satire out of it.. First Dog on the Moon's [pretty much got the nub of it](https://www.thegu...

Murdering English

We seem to get sillier as a race as time goes on.. but at least it provides for endless laughter opportunities.. Metamodernism? WTF is that? a knowledge restricted to a select group maybe? who? one ...

What a dip stick

Yeah, that was bound to happen, somebody was going to start calling for heads to roll.. He's got quite the legacy now. Scotty from marketing was never the sharpest knife in the drawer, and he damage...

Please let us import slave labour

Business council says: "Please let us import already trained slave-labour, because it messes with our profits if we have to spend money training existing staff" ...

Why the markets are bouncing

"of the investing profession (a hundred years ago everyone in stocks was a degenerate gambler with a margin loan, now just half of us are) and the advent of massive retirement systems (a hundred and ...

No solution, no ideas, lots of coin

Good analysis and interesting opinion piece by Simon Tisdall [here](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/aug/14/putin-war-europe-ukraine-west) Before we start let's just do the numbers - aid to Uk...

US Dollar Everywhere

Yep, what's nuts is it's a zero sum game. Ultimately as Adam Tooze [points out](https://www.inkl.com/newsletters/morning-edition/news/the-world-is-seeing-how-the-dollar-really-works?utm_campaign=2022...

Happy Sea Dog

Happy Sea Dog (2021...

Another Queensland Dinosaur?

Astute analysis by Katharine [here](https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2022/aug/12/why-is-peter-dutton-ignoring-all-the-lessons-that-got-anthony-albanese-into-the-lodge). Whilst I very much...

The politicisation of super?

Wow.. there's a lot to unpack in [this one](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-11/older-australians-delay-retirement-superannuation-cost-of-living/101296658). Let's just deal with the one interesti...

Uncommon sense

[John Authers](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/authors/AT2bBytfUHQ/john-authers?sref=QlpF64WK) once again brings a voice of analysis, and common sense, to the table. In [this article](https://www....

Greens leader indicates idealism is the new religion..

I think I know now what bothers me so much about Bandt (aside from the fact that he's just annoying 😛) - he pretty much always talks in absolutes. Maybe he should look up the word 'transition', ...

One statistic a policy does not make..

Here we are again, a one dimensional statistic argument which purports to support "It means motorists are forced to buy cars that are worse for the environment and household budgets".. Umm might it ...

Who cares!:-)

Didn't read it (it's probably paywalled anyway). This is nearly as silly as asking whether the ALP has solved all our problems in their first 100 days. Dutton's not in my pantheon of good guys, b...

Business don't need evidence

So, [here's more](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-08-08/new-zealand-wages-soar-will-australia-workers-get-a-bump/101306138) 'hand-wringing' on wages. All sorts of sensible, believable, assertions ma...

Australian Debt Numbers (at June 2022)

To try and get a handle on whether there's a 'credit problem' I thought a look at the straight aggregates over time might shed some light. RBA aggregates are available on [knoema](https://public.kno...

Interesting exercise..

That's an interesting exercise to do: * disposable income (i.e. your gross - super - tax) * value of housing assets (and as a ratio to disposable income i.e. house price / disposable income) * val...

He's got a point..

I've never been a Corbyn fan. I respect his conviction, but as a political player he is either naive, or has a 'tin ear'. He was certainly never electable. I don't know all the ins and outs of his ...

Seal

This one was having...

Feudalism is alive and well

There's nothing astonishingly [new here](https://aeon.co/essays/the-great-replacement-is-real-but-its-not-what-the-right-says) I'd argue, it's a well known story mired in a little more 'academica spe...

"Oh oops, sorry, we've destroyed the world economy again.."

[Mea Culpa by everyone](https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-07-31/central-banks-believed-too-much-in-their-inflation-fighting-powers-we-let-them?sref=QlpF64WK)? The asinine regurgitation...

Nostalgia in contradictions

This [documentary](https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057233/) is worth sourcing and watching for a variety of reasons. It's an hours worth of contradictions and lessons in history, and that's before you ...

There's nuffin'

you're nothing, because there is nothing, we are all "in the oneness", which is nothing.. "Seems to be an awful lot of idiots in all this nothingness" says fictional buddha cat.. 😃 😛
[ Read more.. ]

Qantas and new feudalism

People it's been privatised, any 'patriotic devotion' is seriously misplaced - it's a greasy corporate just like any other: with over paid executives, dodgy finance, backroom government deals, its ha...

There is no future economy

[This article](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2022-07-28/profit-seems-to-be-the-hardest-word-the-readout-with-allegra-stratton?srnd=economics-vp&sref=QlpF64WK) by [Allegra Stratton](https...

Lobster Man

Plaque reads: "This bespoke bronze statue depicts a 1950's fisherman following a Southern Rock Lobster catch with typical fishing gear of that era." "Steeped in history through generations of local...

Insurrection!

All these nonsense articles about how to save money in times of inflation (only use one squeeze of detergent instead of two, drive to work like grandma not like Peter Brock etc. etc.).. Bloody moder...

Squeeze 'em till their "pips squeak"

So, as usual, the IMF's advice to 'policy makers' now is to up, and up, interest rates until the "people's pips squeak" and inflation comes down.. You see it's not rocket science how this works - wh...

War is war and now it's always global

Once again we see that war, despite notions to contrary, makes no allowances for morals, rules, or conventions. To even suggest otherwise is to deny history, including the current history in the maki...

Stagflation as strategy

ooh yeah, it's now becoming clear (well to me at least, and I know.. like, who cares? 😛) that interest rate hikes have another agenda.. Inflation's high sure, and interest rates need to be 'norma...

It's true, web development has turned into nonsense

It's a tax rort, always has been

Yeah well, duh.. who would of thought?.. We all know tax on investment property gains, and even more, the tax breaks (negative gearing) are a rort, always have been. Middle class subsidies is all t...

It's 'CentreFuck'ed

It's idiotic but explicable.. A few years back I had a few months 'inside the system' when ill.. (and I tell you it is like being in another dimension.. where all logic and common sense seems to hav...

Bill knows what he's talking about

[Bill](http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/) has far more expertise than I, and has been [talking about these problems](http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=50155), which I've only in my latter...

Non-speeches

I love these 'non-speeches' by RBA functionaries. "We'll take everything into consideration before we make a decision" Yeah, well, duh.. who would have thought? What's more interesting is what th...

Some thoughts on late stage super saving

Some random thoughts around late stage super investing.. Later life 'super saving' makes sense because you can treat it a bit like a term deposit - i.e. if you're 55+ there's only 5 years until you ...

What do we want? When do we want it?

Today's long read.. These Gareth Hutchen's [articles](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-11-01/why-wouldnt-governments-want-full-employment/12836424) are very informative because they shed light on hi...

The math on batteries still doesn't work..

So, assessing the 'damage' for 2022/23 electricity price uplifts. Inconveniently (or is it for their corporate convenience?) I haven't been able to access my [simply energy](https://www.simplyenergy...

Some photographs and stuff

So onward we go, solving all the problems that I've wanted to have available for web delivery for, like.. well a long time.. For photographers there's often as much fascination with the camera and t...

Your Monkeys, Your Circus

Oh yeah.. which delusion is your greatest illusion, kind of thing.. 🙂

Taking stock..

Well.. a bit of taking stock and 'cleaning up'.. ## CSS, Responsiveness, & Design I'd forgotten how frustrating CSS can be. It takes a couple of hours to get 'into CSS think' (grids, blocks, floats...

Click bait from TND

So, [TND](https://thenewdaily.com.au/), once somewhat reliable, has, as well as aligning itself with 10News (I can't think of a better way to discredit yourself journalistically than by partnering wi...

Diplomacy anyone?

The US could always try this, you know, actual *overt* foreign diplomacy.. If they spent a fraction of what they spend on their intelligence agencies, covert operations, and covert interference, on...

UK real wage decline worst than post-GFC

The following graph shows what I anecdotally experienced post-GFC (2008) in the UK. My best guess was a fall in real wages of between 10-15% over 2008-2013. That fall is significantly faster now by ...

Rebuilding on..

Well.. a lot of 'tidy up work' for ['Rebuild 22'](/rebuild2022.md).. ## CSS CSS4 is a much more capable beast that I am used to, having probably had 'deep exposure' to CSS the last time about 10 ye...

A 'messy' world requires rhetorical care

Indeed. There's a certain idiocy in simply repeating old narratives and tropes. Sure they might have served politicians and nationalists well for a couple of hundred years, but what about the rest ...

Leg of Mutton Lake

Leg of Mutton Lake, Mount Gambier, circa 1880 ([v...

SA Land Valuation Increases..

So, as suspected, we can expect land valuation increases across SA of between 10-30% according to [their report](https://www.valuergeneral.sa.gov.au/publications/VGYIR2021.PDF) by the [valuer genera...

Looking for the villian..

>"Aussie consumers are now being hammered by the fastest interest rate increases in a quarter of a century that are crushing disposable incomes; a massive reduction in real wage growth as a result o...

Are we done with the 'looney right' now?

We can only hope that this completes the era of bombast and narcissism.. Maybe Boris and Trump can go and have a drink together to console themselves down at the "delusions cafe".. I think the pair ...

It is just naive

There are so many things wrong with this article I hardly know where to begin.. I'll keep it short. The article, overall, is naive. The people depicted in its story are naive. It's naive to suggest ...

How's it going?

Well.. a lot of 'grunt work' getting 'behind the scenes' things working for ['Rebuild 22'](/rebuild2022.md) ## Images There are two types of images: 1) never changing and generally fixed size (e.g....

Are they meeting treaty conditions?

The problem with treaty/membership/diplomacy by 'hope' is that it comes back to bite you.. Arguably Turkey's membership of NATO was always 'a bit of an eyebrow raiser'.. Equally, Hungary's EU member...

"Elite safe-seaters choir of moaning"'

Albanese needs to quickly learn to *not to respond* to 'click bait' from the opposition. Alan Tudge's whine on Monday, followed by Littleproud's, and then Taylor's, completed the trio of the LNP's "...

'Stop spending so much if you want lower rates'

Of course that's what needs to happen, and will happen - it's just unsaid. Inflation presently is generally accepted (not universally though) to be a supply side, or external factor, problem. The a...

A post from last July (2021)..

It's official! Having joined the ranks of 'the retired' all future posts will be about: my upcoming medical appointments, the status of my gout this week, the outrageous cost of everything compared ...

C class and an artificial sky

Basic markdown test photos post, with and without lightbox.. ### Plain markdown image link:  ### Shortcod...

Another failed 'blue blood' minister

[Hunt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Hunt) is another of the 'ivy league' educated 'blue bloods' (University of Melbourne, Yale), who have 'hung around' the system (in Hunt's case on Alexander D...

Salary Statistics Comparisons Table

So now we have another set of salary metrics (Census 2021 data) which put more nuance into the numbers: starting from the 'all Australia census personal' at $41K, through 'median per employee' at $62...

So whose crusade is this anyway?

So [this](/blog/2022/20220627a.md) has turned into a fully fledged 'media shit storm', and like all such things is becoming pretty devoid of useful facts. So this'll be my last words on the matter...

So how big is the crypto crash?

Ian's doing his bit to redeem ABC standards; in this analysis piece he outlines quite well (best one can, given the lack of real information in this sphere) the nonsense that 'cheap credit' has crea...

Boris the clown

What he should have said: "In my fantasies (and wet dreams) I imagine I'm Churchill, but sadly, I'm just another oxbridge cad who's been promoted to his own level of incompetence..""...

Four Corners the 'new A Current Affair'

oh FFS.. You can walk into any supermarket and buy cigarettes *legally* and they're pretty much *guaranteed to kill you*.. The ABC is making out like nicotine is crack cocaine, or heroin.. and choo...

Credit on the never never

After a small hiatus, back to the numbers.. This 'ere chart gives some explanation to the big movements in credit over the past couple of years. [![graph](../../images/web500/screenshot20220627.jpg...

Rebuild - how's it going?

So I'm rebuilding my website for like the umpteeth time. I'm not at all sure why I'm bothering, maybe I've got something to prove to myself now that I'm not working? Who knows? So much for the philos...

Aunty - the 'journalistic biafran'

Oh c'mon Aunty.. recycling press releases isn't news.. Origin (Energy) uses grant money it's receiving from ARENA ("Origin Energy has teamed up with ARENA", to the tune of $840,000 of tax-payer fund...

Gravy train..

Wowsers, every now and again a little crack appears in the opaque pane of obfuscation which shrouds the money spent within our institutions. This is pretty astonishing - every independent MP and Se...

They're making it up!..

As an amateur student of 'the markets' for a decade or so, it's constantly surprising how little 'empirical anything' exists in this sphere of modern life. Take todays (24Jun22) northern hemisphere ...

EU Posturing..

Well I suppose that's OK on the face of it.. But realistically IMO it's little more than posturing, as the deeply corrupt Ukraine could stay in 'candidate status' for decades if the EU so chooses. ...

Ukraine - strategy, conflate, propagandise

A [winter squeeze on gas supplies](https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/jun/22/europe-told-to-get-ready-now-for-russia-to-turn-off-all-gas-exports-iea-winter) seems a logical strategy for Russia...

That's a bit grim..

That's looking pretty grim. My real returns to date for financial year 2022 (FY in Aust. for European folks is 1Jul->30Jun..). If we're lucky we'll finish at circa 'even'.. having swung from gains o...

Really? Eyes Wide Shut?

[Well apparently Dr Lowe says](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-21/rba-says-inflation-is-increasingly-coming-from-within-australia/101169436) 'I don't see a recession on the horizon'. Whilst havi...

Yes, and..? (nothing to see here..)

Of course [this is behind a paywall](https://www.crikey.com.au/2022/06/21/albanese-cabinet-full-of-landlords-renters-need-representation/).. But I'm a little surprised by the headline and the fact th...

Handy Powerboards

Don't usually get very 'excitable' about 'stuff' but.. [these powerboards](https://www.amazon.com.au/gp/product/B09P64Y6MP/) are extraordinarily convenient.. you get 8 sockets and 4 x USB instantly ð...

Not the sharpest knife in the drawer..

full disclose: I'm not a Bandt fan, not sure why, he's always rubbed my intuition 'up the wrong way'.. He doesn't strike me as the sharpest knife in the drawer either.. More objectively the greens, ...

Pissing Putin Off

Well.. [that 'ratchets things up'..](https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2022/06/17/brussels-set-to-endorse-ukraine-as-a-candidate-for-eu-membership) 'appeasement' of Putin isn't palatable, but I'm n...

Efficient

Cool! 97% sleep efficiency.. that's something I spend a lot of time thinking about while I'm asleep.. Just how efficiently am I sleeping? 😃 😛 ``` ```

Oh really? Who would have guessed?

Oh please.. governments, corporates, economists, and the financial sector cannot accurately forecast what's going to happen *next year*, let alone 40 years hence.. (as suggested in [this article](htt...

Blood Bath

In the melodramatic "parlance of our times": it's a blood bath.. Graph tells quite a story.. [![Graph][image]](../../images/web1500/ScreenShot2022-06-17.jpg) [image]:../../images/web750/ScreenShot...

There's the yield curve upside down

So whilst we're playing this game called ['the markets'](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-06-14/wall-street-s-favorite-recession-signal-is-back-as-curves-invert?sref=QlpF64WK).. It's pr...