headline

A collection of 56 posts

australia

Black Wednesday: How one man broke the Bank of England

When I talk about foreign exchange (FX) markets, what do you think of? I’m sure you have some memory of being at the airport in a foreign country, standing at a little stall as screens flash a constant stream of numbers telling you how much your AUD is worth

australia

Building the blocks of blockchain: Part 1

‘Commerce on the Internet has come to rely almost exclusively on financial institutions…While the system works…it still suffers from the inherent weaknesses of the trust based model’. The year was 2008, Satoshi Nakamoto, the creator of Bitcoin announced to the world that they have solved this weakness in

headline

Annual Publication Out Now!

Welcome to Short Supply, an annual publication of the Economics Students Society of Australia. You can enjoy our past issues here, including our 2017 issue, ‘The Global Financial Crisis’: http://economicstudents.com/short_supply/ Make sure you also check out Equilibrium, our annual hardcopy publication featuring articles from our writers,

economics

Mo Money Mo Problems: The Universal Basic Income

A topic almost as contentious as salt and vinegar chips, the debate over universal basic income has come and gone in line with the business cycle. Whilst the concept of free money may appear to be an economic and political panacea, it has struggled to move past a socialist stigma

AEC tally room

Australia Doesn't Quite Decide: The House of Reps

First, to the makeup of the parliament. Here’s the headline: a hung Parliament looks increasingly likely. Different websites have different tallies, but, based on their methodologies, some are more useful than others.[1] The ABC only lists seats for either party when one candidate has a 2PP above 51%

Andrew O'Shea

Election 2016: Unimelb Presidents' Pitches

So, after 8 weeks of gaffes, selfies and high-vis vests, the moment of truth has finally arrived. Tomorrow, Australians cast their vote to decide our political future (at least for the next few months, before our traditional mid-term ministerial mutiny). Over the last 24 hours, ESSA has brought you comprehensive

economics

Whose place in space? A tragedy of the commons

Just as we are oblivious to the invisible electromagnetic signals around us, many are unaware of the infrastructure and capital required to operate and maintain common signal-based services, such as T.V., internet and mobile. This May, 8 major satellites are scheduled to be rocket launched into orbit. On May

budget2016

Budget Breakdown 2015-16

Treasurer Scott Morrison today handed down his highly-anticipated first budget. The budget, covering the financial year 2016-17, has been widely billed as the government’s pre-election pitch, coming as it does two months out from the expected poll on July 2nd.   Here’s a summary of what we learned.   The

daenerys

Westerosinomics

By the time you read this, there’s a fair chance you’ll have seen the long-awaited first episode of Game of Thrones’ sixth season, either because you watched straight away or because you severed all contact with the outside world until you had time to see it. But if

auspol

Negative gearing: Glue in the “House of Cards”?

While it has faded amongst the haze of the US primaries, the Panama papers and more recent tax debates, something remarkable happened on February 13th. Labor Opposition Leader Bill Shorten unveiled sweeping proposed changes to negative gearing and capital gains taxation as part of the party’s 2016 election platform.

donald

Trump: can game theory explain the inexplicable?

We like to think of ourselves as pleasant people rationally thinking through our actions ­- so it’s a shock to our psyche when confronted with a system failing as alarmingly as the 2016 Republican Nomination contest. Betting markets -­ believed by many economists to be the best predictors of

advice

Unsolicited advice from an Honours student

I don’t remember the first time I walked on campus. I can’t really remember what I saw, what I said or what I did. But I will never forget that feeling. The feeling of promise; a new start with freedom attached. With each breath I exhaled anticipation, with

auspol

Nominal Interest Episode 1

Introducing Nominal Interest, ESSA’s exciting new podcast! On Tuesday, the ESSA publications crew donned the headphones and microphones and went live on the airways courtesy of Radio Fodder for the first ever episode of new podcast, Nominal Interest. Each week, on Tuesdays at 7:00, we plan to dissect

disease

A healthy obsession: Why the United Nations must act on healthcare ... now

When Larry Summers and 266 other economists lobbied the UN for change, it wasn’t filled with the stereotypical phrases you would hear from a hard-headed economist. Summers and his colleagues talked about one topic: health. Health is an oft-neglected subject in discussions of economic growth in developing countries; access

commball

Commballnomics

Cancel your Friday morning tutes, people: it’s Commball time. With the big night fast approaching, it’s time to answer the important questions. How long will I need to get ready? What should I do for pres? Will anyone notice that my bowtie is a clip-on? What valuable lessons

australia

Of stunted growth and tax reform

Comments by the RBA are usually ignored by all but the most dedicated policy enthusiasts. But when Governor Glenn Stevens recently suggested that it may be time to revise down Australia’s long run growth rate, headlines sprung up everywhere, and a broader audience sat up and took notice. Treasury

federal budget

The story of the real Australian economy: Part 4 – The federal budget & the victims of political folly

“What are the most pressing economic issues the government should be tackling right now?” “Well the current and previous governments are avoiding the obvious problem, they’re not focusing on reducing the deficit!” That is a small excerpt from a conversation I had with someone a few days after the

australian economy

The story of the real Australian economy: Part 3 – The RBA’s toolkit

In the first two parts of this series, I outlined the circumstances of Australia’s current position and the issues which are underpinning our sub trend growth at the end of the resources boom. This is essentially summarised as high levels of borrowing by our banks and institutions with credit

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Do you have what it takes to be a YouTube star?

I’ll admit it. I’ve always wanted to be a YouTube star. I’m almost ashamed to say it, but it’s true. And why not? It seems like a glamorous life. Most of the successful women on YouTube live every little girl’s dream: they try on clothes

ESSA

Pirates from Down Under

Australia: our home is girt by sea, our land abounds in pirates. Lots of them. According to TorrentFreak, when the first episode of the fourth season of the hugely popular series Game of Thrones launched, it was pirated in Australia more than anywhere else in the world. In fact, more

australia

Desperate, deceitful and deliberately dull: Budget 2015

Last month, Tony Abbott proudly declared that this year’s budget would be “dull”. It’s clear now why he wanted us to look away. The government has performed one of the swiftest policy reversals in recent memory. A question of politics For years, the Coalition could speak of nothing

budget 2015

Nuanced debate must supplant budget bluster

It is unambiguously clear that Australia faces serious economic challenges. The iron ore price has fallen from above $100USD a tonne to below $50USD, resulting in serious impacts to the miners, the industries that act as scaffolding around them, and the revenue that the government draws from all of them

australia

The story of the real Australian economy: Part 2 – Australia’s house of cards

In my previous article, I outlined the economic conditions Australia faces as the mining investment boom reaches its end, and how strong headline indicators mask deeper structural issues with the economy. I will now take a thorough look into what these issues are and what factors are contributing to Australia’

employment. leadership

Free market, free women?

One of the many sound economic arguments for labour market deregulation in the 1990s was the greater flexibility it was supposed to bring to women juggling careers and family commitments[i]. This flexibility was promised to arrive in the form of individually negotiated contracts between employee and employer. By all

benefit of education

Your economics education: how to travel the path to enlightenment, rather than the road to hell

Economics students around the globe have clamoured in recent years that Something Be Done about the way economics is taught (see, for example, http://www.rethinkeconomics.org/).  The basic message is that economics, as usually taught to undergraduates, does not accurately depict the real world – an assertion that is self-evidently