Graham Lovell, Author at Democratic Capitalism

Same-sex marriage – Australian plebiscite

Fiercely contested social questions, like same-sex marriage, are rarely the basis of voters’ decision-making during an election, but they can be.

Why a Plebiscite?

A plebiscite was chosen by the Liberal and National party room as a way of giving the NO vote a chance of winning.

However, from a theoretical point of view, a plebiscite is not without merit. Parliaments are mostly elected on economics, foreign affairs, and very importantly, on competence. Same-sex marriage does not fit in this set of criteria.

In addition, the advantage of a “people’s vote” on this matter is that such things are uncomfortable for many politicians to discuss. This is because most politicians want to be preselected and elected on economics and competence. Mostly, they do not want to stand or fall on social questions.

The cost of plebiscite is trivial – about $10 per working person. The significance is great – changing norms that have existed for over 2000 years in the western world.

Who will win the same-sex marriage plebiscite?

The advocates for same-sex marriage believe that, with the ALP virtually purged of those who oppose that change, and the minor parties in favour of that change, they reckon they will win if it comes down to a conscience vote of Liberals. So the ALP, Greens and Nick Xenophon Team are against a plebiscite and for a parliamentary vote.

The opponents of same-sex marriage hope that a plebiscite will see the measure defeated.

Neither the proposers, or the opponents of same-sex marriage have made their case clear. Both parties discuss the matter in the ether. For proposers it is all about love, but in a non-sexual context; for opponents it is all about preserving the ideal of a heterosexual couple bringing up a family.

Dysfunctional Arguments

One suspects that the underpinning proposition for male proponents of same-sex marriage is to achieve community acceptance of sodomy / anal sex. I believe that they do not talk about this in public or private because they do not think that the community will look favourably upon that proposition. So it could be argued that many male proponents hide their real agenda behind the mantra, “Our love should be acknowledged!” For most female proponents of same-sex marriage it would appear to a genuine case of arguing for acceptance of their relationship, combined with a certain defiant militancy.

For male and female opponents of same-sex marriage it is definitely about sex. Having lost the argument that sodomy should be a criminal offense, they are not prepared to use this as an argument, on the grounds that they will be labelled as “out of touch bigots.” However, an objection to sodomy lies at the root of the case against same-sex marriage, combined with a real attachment to the heterosexual relationship as the basis for nurturing families.

Possible outcome

For Christians, this is a particularly difficult question, since same-sex relationships, without sex, have been an important part of the Christian experience since earliest times. This idea even goes back into the Old Testament, with the relationship between David and Jonathan being a particularly important example (even though some have, without any evidence, claimed this to have been homosexual). So there should not be any question for Christians of acknowledging love between people of the same sex.

For Christians, sex outside of marriage is not allowed. It is considered to be a moral failure. In addition, each person is expected to only have one sexual partner during their whole life (except in the case of the partner dying), just as Jesus taught. Taking this a step further, there is no place in the Christian life for heterosexual promiscuity or for sodomy. However, there is a place for loving and committed relationships between people of the same sex. However, the debate over same-sex marriage has left no place for this Christian standpoint: it is consigned to dust bin of “elite thinking.”

Therefore, if the same-sex plebiscite goes ahead, it is likely that it will be lost.

However, a parliament vote formalizing same-sex relationships, yet without appearing to endorse sodomy as a normal part of life, is likely to receive bi-partisan support.

In a democracy, it is a question of the achievable, and of achieving a reasonable consensus. On this question, we are far from that point.

Australian Exceptionalism is alive and well

In an entertaining article in The Australian, 17 Sept 2016, Paul Kelly discusses the idea of Australian Exceptionalism.

According to Kelly, the idea of Australian Exceptionalism goes back to Alfred Deakin, PM 1903-4, 1905-8 and 1909-10. It included control of immigration, protection of industry and wage arbitration, leading to (or arising out) a sense of egalitarianism.

Apparently, Paul Kelly, Peter Costello, Henry Ergas and William Coleman (an economist at ANU) all want to smash Australia’s egalitarianism in the search for a now elusive platform of “reform.” However, those who support Democratic Capitalism love the Australian sense of egalitarianism, and would dearly love to bring these blind economic reformers to their senses.

Immigration

There is only a minority of people in Australia who want to throw open our borders, like the US did at the beginning of the 20th century, and say, “Whoever wants to come, come now!” Australian know that their precious and hard-fought-for “exceptionalism” could not stand in the face of millions of uninvited arrivals. Europe now knows the same thing: it learnt that lesson the hard way.

Protection of Industry – $A

Australia now knows that its hard-won industrial base cannot survive (and has not survived) an over-valued currency. Led by the Reserve Bank of Australia, the nation has made every reasonable effort to bring the currency down to a more manageable level.

The relative value of the $A is not divinely or even particularly rationally set. It is a balance between those who want to buy $As and those who want to sell $As. As the Central Bankers of the world continue their ridiculous plan to revive their national economies by cutting interest rates, their national economies dive into a hole. This is because they are obsessed with a zero-tariff regime (but they haven’t worked yet that this is the source of their problems).

Tiny Australia is at the end of the line. We have to cut our interest rates in order to slow down the flow of funds into the country in order to stop our currency becoming overvalued. Yet there is little we can do to make investing in Australia less attractive. It is a safe haven for hot money from Asia; and the Australian economy is better run than any other G20 nation. Who wouldn’t want to invest in Australia, or live here for that matter? (A few, like Germane Greer!)

So, industry protection can be established indirectly by managing the exchange rate. This can be done with measures designed to make it harder to invest in Australia. (We have enough of our own money to fund all existing Australian businesses – we didn’t need to sell the Melbourne ports to China and other overseas buyers.) The RBA can also keep interest rates low, in order to discourage hot money chasing higher interest rates in this nation.

Protectionism – Tariffs

Industry protection can also be established by re-introducing tariffs. Yet with the current exchange rate regime, a uniform tariff of 20% on all goods is likely to over-cook the economy. However, an increase in all tariffs up to 10% is certainly worth examining. If that is too difficult to accept or implement, then an implicit 20% tariff on all goods and services being purchased by an Australian government authority could be introduced.

In regard to services, establishing a 20% “International Outsourcing Tax” would offset the massive cost differential hurdles of current international outsourcing. These include: Payroll Tax, Superannuation, generous leave arrangements, health and safety regulations.

Wages Policy

Some reform is certainly needed in the industrial relations area. Here a new government could take advantage of the “reforms” implemented by Julia Gillard under the Fair Work regime. The result or her reforms is that there is no longer any real need for unions in the wages area, since the government sets minimum wages for every class of work.

Now there is only a place for unions in negotiating enterprise agreements, conditions and in health and safety. These can also go if Fair Work takes over these roles and gets rid of the rorts currently supported by unions. These include employment-destroying double time penalty rates for Sunday work.

Fair Work Australia could also be prohibited from promoting union membership.

Egalitarianim

It would be a great loss if Peter Costello’s vision for Australia, invoking the perceived need for hyper-competition for the nation’s businesses, became the order of the day. If only the best-in-the-world can thrive in his Australia of the future, we can say goodbye to social cohesion, and hello to the dysfunctional situation currently found in so many American towns and in north of the United Kingdom.

May heaven preserve us from this kind of future.

Tariffs are not a curse-word

If international trade is to be of benefit to every nation upon the earth, then tariffs must come back into our economic vocabulary.

Tariffs are not evil

Tariffs are a supplement to the automatic stabilizer of an exchange rate. They help iron-out the development disparities within a nation and are necessary if a national government is determined to do whatever it can to ensure that there are jobs for people of every skill and education level.

If handled correctly, tariffs will have two results. While all imported goods will be more expensive, some sectors of the economy that would otherwise die without tariffs will survive. The question to be considered is, “What is the trade off for more expensive imported goods?” The answer should be, “Jobs for those who would not otherwise have jobs!”

The corollary of imposing tariffs is, “What is the trade off for cheaper imported goods?” The answer has been, “Jobs will be lost, with no sign of them ever been regained!” For those who are skeptical about the “never” aspect of this answer, just consider the Enclosure Laws in England in the 17th-18th century. They resulted in 100 years of chronic unemployment and poverty in England. This is not just a historical aberration. Modern attempts to fix the structural imbalances of Western economies via monetary policies, have not worked. Here is a prediction that is beginning to be recognized as true in the world of Central Bankers: they will never work! BoJ’s “decision” to aim for 10 year interest rates at 0% must soon be recognized as nuts!

Rather than Tariffs being “evil,” it is the zero tariff objective of the WTO that is evil, and has brought on the unremitting distress of the current economic situation.

Tariffs will not end World Trade

Re-instating tariffs will not end globalization, or world trade. It will just regulate that process and restore economic control to national legislators.

Even if every nation imposed a 20% tariff on all imported goods and services most items of global trade would continue. This is because the Real Advantage held by some nations in the production of those goods and services will mean that trade in those goods and services will continue.

Take an example of simple manufactures. Australia buys most of its clothing from China and Bangladesh. Even at retail, a T-Shirt often costs only $A6. With a 20% tariff it will cost $A7.20 (if the margins stay constant). No-one will notice!

Take an example of complex manufactures. The NSW government is planning to buy trains from South Korea, because they are less expensive than Australian-made trains. Also the history of train-manufacture in Australia has been fraught in recent times. It is quite unlikely that a 20% tariff would change that decision, although it would impact the dynamics of the decision-making process a little. Once again, since the decision is likely to be unchanged, and the cost will only be 20% more (rather than, say 40% more if made in Australia) then no-one will notice.

Tariffs will Save Jobs

Although, under the scenario I have painted, the introduction of tariffs, even at the relatively high level of 20% on all goods and services, would not end world trade, in other areas it will mean that domestic production can continue.

In cases where the imported cost is currently less than 20% below the locally manufactured cost, a 20% tariff would mean that local manufacture will be preferred over imported supply. For an Australian example we can look at steel manufacture. Here the existing South Australian plant is balancing on the brink of being uneconomic. A 20% tariff would change that situation overnight.

Tariffs will Restore Prosperity

Most Western nations are now consumer societies, where most jobs are created by providing goods and services for other consumers. However, for consumer societies to work, there must be jobs for everyone, for everyone is a potential consumer. Here potentiality is converted into action by having money, and for most of us money comes from having a job.

The USA is the most telling example of the failure of this principle because of defective economic orthodoxy. Here we see the impoverishment of US “Middle Class” since the 1980s. This has followed the zero-tariff ideology pushed by the economic elite. This ideology was even supported by the Democratic President, Bill Clinton, and also by the Republicans. The consequences of the Democratic Party’s acceptance of this bogus theory is now being felt on the streets of their impoverished cities. Since Hillary Clinton also believes that America should continue down the same path upon which her husband set the country, there will be no saving American cities if she is elected. Just more ringing of hands and ineffective “black lives matter” protests.

The elite pushing zero tariff policies now has its own world body, namely, the World Trade Organization. That body, and those who support it, can take the majority of the credit for the current economic malaise impacting on the West. Its malign influence is now spreading to emerging nations, since they are finding limited scope to sell their goods. This has happened because the consumer/worker in the West has been crushed by the trade policies of the US.

The same elite who pushed for zero tariffs are now “subtly urging” the WTO to making it more difficult for UK to leave the EU. The best outcome of that talk could be for the UK not to join the WTO and for the UK to prosper without its dead weight of WTO rules around that nation’s neck.

Tariffs are better than Quotas

While quotas can have a place in food production, since it is natural objective of every nation to maintain a large measure of self-sufficiency in food for cultural and defence reasons, tariffs are more economically efficient than quotas. This is because they allow the market to establish a close-to-optimal division of labour between economic sectors.

Quotas are not economically efficient. They can result in much higher prices of now-scarce goods, even leading to a doubling of prices. They can also result in super-profits for importers who have a licence to import up to the quota level, since they are now dealing in scarce goods. Of course, that can be partially compensated by using an auction system for selling the licences to import.

Sectional Impacts

There will be downsides in using trade controls via tariffs for those sectors of the economy that are very heavily dependent upon exports. This, too, will require a balancing act by the national government in order to ensure that no sector of the economy is unreasonable impacted by the introduction of tariffs. This can be done via rebates for the tariffs embedded in their exports, and by targeted measures designed to offset the extra costs that they have to bear compared with producers in other nations. It is worthwhile to address all such matters, since everyone in the nation benefits from a cohesive society in which everyone has the realistic chance to obtain a job.

Democratic Capitalism & 21st century economics

Democratic Capitalism is the way forward. Capitalism + empowered democracy is the key to restoring economic fairness throughout the world.

George Cooper

Recently, George Cooper, in his Money, Blood and Revolution (2014), and in his new Fixing Economics (2016), explained that the economic leveling tendency of the twentieth century was a result of the processes inherent in democracy itself. While capitalism is intent on increasing shareholder returns, other forces tend to reduce these returns. Obviously, competition between firms is a contributing factor in this process, but Cooper was able to show that democracy plays a major part.

Whereas capitalism can be expected to improve the wealth of those at the top of the economic pyramid, Cooper argued we should not ignore the fact that, in a democracy, the majority of the people actually have the power to elect those who favor their own cause. For Cooper, this has resulted in taxation being used to redistribute income, most notably seen in the impact of inheritance taxes in England. Other welfare measures meant that those at the bottom part of the pyramid shared in part of the economic prosperity of the nation. Even wage policy can help to share the wealth.

Therefore, on Cooper’s model, capitalism helps to improve the economic value of each person’s labour and effort, and democratic forces ensure that this increased value is spread more fairly between capital and labour.

Trade policies

The relatively fair income distribution of the 20th century has come under direct threat with the beginning of the new millennium. The gap between the rich and the poor has increased in all developed and undeveloped nations, whether they are democratic or not. The old mechanisms are no longer working, and there is little chance that this will change unless there is a change in our economic thinking.

The first thing to accept is that nations are in competition with each other. We do not live in a world which can be realistically governed as if national borders do not exist. They do, and most ordinary people (if not the elites running the show at the moment) want them to continue. Most people value many of the unique aspects of their own national culture and situation. Most people would like the economic situation of their own nation to improve. They are prepared to co-operate in order to achieve that result, and look to their own national government to advance the economic welfare of their own nation. Democratic governments that ignore that imperative do not get re-elected.

The economies of western nations are out of balance, with currently unresolved structural imbalances, and difficult to resolve unemployment issues. These can be fixed, but the first thing is to win the argument against the dominant economic theory, Ricardo’s Comparative Advantage theory. This theory has meant that “tariffs” has become a curse-word. Yet tariffs should be in first line of defences for any national government seeking to advance the economic interests of its own people, particularly when faced with chronic unemployment.

Tariffs are a necessary part of any nation’s economic weaponry, and are certainly essential if the forces that are pushing nations to more and more inequality are to be countered. I say, put democracy ahead of a failed economic theory.

Democratic Capitalism

The economic model of Democratic Capitalism recognizes that capitalism is the engine for economic development. It will deliver economic benefits that neither socialism (of the Sanders and Corbyn type) nor communism (of the Venezuelan and Cuban type) is able to deliver. Yet the 21st century has shown that capitalism needs controls, excised via democratic processes, to ensure that it serves everyone, not just those in control of capital.

It is time that we clearly recognized the two most important economic drivers in a modern economy, Democracy and Capitalism, and stopped toying with dysfunctional alternative models.