Hmm. Keywords are: "Department of Environment" and "Volcanic Ash".

Looks to me as though the climate alarmists have had a hand in this muzzling of scientists.

Even trying to get a grant for genuine research without stating an expected alarmist outcome is nearly impossible.

Watch the alarmists mod this down to -infinity.

Some of my best friends have been Brits, but I dont really want them here.

PT = part time. As in that is the only work he/she has. $25k + tips.

As in "average" includes high flyers like Rhinehart and Julia, but does not include part time workers? Median is what FT workers get when the high flyers excluded?

WRONG: "A schoolteacher's (as in, someone in the classroom) salary in NSW will top out at around $85k". I know teachers employed in NSW to teach Physics who get over $100k. Of course they work in the unregulated (non union) private school system.

And yes, quite seriously, I do argue that we should pay Math and Science teachers up to $150k. Whatever it takes to get them. Am I wrong in guessing your PhD is not in Physics, Chemistry or Math?

"how is the fraction of one percent of the workforce you're complaining about responsible for our economic woes, exactly ?" It's a symptom, not a cause. An unintended consequence.

If teaching has been downgraded as a career, it's because students are unable to find competent teachers in the crucial Science and Maths arenas in our public school system. OTOH (Yawn) our children know all about the atrocities committed by a handful of convicts on Aboriginals, (Myall Creek springs to mind) and the horrors of Global Warming. (People dying of heatstroke, but don't mention the people saved from freezing.)

Unless you have a command economy, all jobs are "precarious".

If the employing organization does not deliver value, it goes broke. If the coal costs too much to extract, then coal miners are out of work (50 shades of Thatcher).

"less than one-fifth (and consistently dropping) of the workforce is unionised.". When Pilbara train drivers get $500k? p/a, it becomes economically viable to install automated trains at $1M each. When wharfies got paid too much, then installation of automated machinery became viable. etc. etc. And hence precarious, low paid, part time, non union jobs in the service industries are all that survive.

"you're fundamentally arguing from a logical fallacy: that unionisation is implicitly bad.". No. Unions are implicitly good. It's corrupt union bosses and politicians (most of them seem to be at state level, and in the Labour Party) that subvert the system that are bad. Our system fails the transparency test. We need direct government (like California) and recall elections and deregulation of the labour force.

Your use of the word "rentier" betrays a marxist attitude. Finance of commerce and the sale of goods and property are not "unproductive".

Your criticism of Murdoch is inaccurate and unfounded. It is from the Murdoch papers that we actually learn of these deficiencies in the public school system, and I would point out that State Labour politicians had control of the state education system for past decades in NSW. It is also a fact of life that wage rises, once granted, cannot be rescinded. (all that we can do is sack them, 50 shades of Thatcher). Hence the charge of "trashing the house". I suspect that the only way to fix the State Public school system is by issue of education chits to each child, and let the parents decide which educational institution to patronize. I suspect only about 10% of the public school system would survive for a decade.

Teachers (NSW) get $70k-$100k. Average annual pay for my PT waiter about $25k. Average FT Oz pay about $50k. Don't start me on miners, MUA or union organizers ($100k+), And every time I see about 3 flag wavers (what are they on? $50k?) to every worker repairing footpaths I know how my council rates are being wasted. At least in NY there were 3 blokes repairing the road, and no flag wavers, just a light moveable barrier.

The system is rorted by a process called "regulatory capture" where laws are passed that favour unions and industries that are unionised. (those flag wavers) Know why your kids know zilch about math and physics? Because Simon Crean in his wisdom has declared to teachers "You all do the same job, so you all get the same pay". So a math major in industry earns $150k - $200k, why would he go into teaching? OTOH The average historian/geographer/artist/Litt major would be hard pressed to get $40k-$60k. Gee we have plenty of them in schools, I wonder why?

Murdoch prints truth. That is why he prospers. In every country where he prints newspapers. That is because everybody sees through the lies and omissions of the "liberal" press (except of course the alarmists).

That North Atlantic Banking Crisis (aka GFC) did not justify the incredible wastage by Batts, overpriced & unnecessary school (BER) buildings, and the $94 billion NBN, Thank God JH sold off Telstra and airports. Those places were hotbeds of union "regulatory capture" for wage rises. What we need is a Thatcher to stop all the union rorts.

Oh. I guess it doesn't suit the powers that be that this subject be a topic for discussion. It might reflect badly on the Labour Party (= Democrat).

With the Oz dollar so high, everything looks ridiculously cheap.

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3 http://www.smbc-comics.com/
4. http://xkcd.com/

and these two are the best of the newspaper comics

1. http://www.uclick.com/client/wpc/nq/ nonsequitur
2. http://www.uclick.com/client/wpc/db/ doonesbury

Most issues below have been raised above. Many inaccurately, or incomplete.

Soil v dirt. It is my understanding that to grow anything, all that is needed is something for the roots to grab, and the appropriate chemicals, water and sunlight supplied. True, crop rotation can reduce the chemicals required (Nitrogen a good example, use sub-clover.)

Grain costs. Ethanol can be made from most organic matter. Grains of any type are good producers of ethanol. The production of ethanol for use as a fuel additive certainly appears to have driven up the cost of grains. For instance, look at a graph of "world grain prices" v time. ( http://www.ifpri.org/node/8436 ).

It does seem logical that higher grain costs would correlate very well with the increased starvation of people (especially children, about 6 million per annum) in the poorer parts of the world. (e.g. http://www.wfp.org/hunger/stats) There are reports that agricultural areas in third world countries are being bought up and utilized for ethanol production.

Just incidentally, Ethanol has a lower HCV (Higher Calorific Value) than petrol. (approx 30,000 MJ/Kg -v- 45,000 MJ/Kg.) This means that ethanol is only worth ~2/3 as much as petrol as a fuel, because it only does 2/3 the work. So for a (say) 10% mix (E10) the value per gallon or liter should be (0.9 + 2/3*.1)/1 ~ 0.967% of the straight (ULP) price. Or for each $1.00 paid for regular ULP, the price for E10 should be 3.3c less. For a 20% mix, (E20) the cost should be 6.7c per $1.00 less.

So there we have it. If you want to (1) help the farmers, (2) damage your car's engine, and (3) help the environment by (4) killing off millions of children in third world countries, then just vote to increase the mandated amount of ethanol in petrol.

The solution is already in process.

The answer is greater diversity of tuition options, and a professional qualification examining organization.

Tuition options are already happening, e.g.udacity.com

Of course if you want to attend MIT for your tuition, feel free. But the final requirement to work as an engineer and sign off on those suspended concrete slabs or elevator certificates or for an electrician's license is the certificate from the examining organization.

There will still be graduates who pay for university training. And perhaps they will find preference among some employers for their provenance. But some employers will have employees coming up through the ranks, or spot likely talent in interview.

I suspect that the time to choose a career as staff at a university has probably passed.

Some patents are pivotal, like say antibiotics. Or what if somebody discovered a really cheap, quick and accurate test for cancer and charged say $10, 000 for each use for the next 50 years?

As for copyrights, I think its reasonable that I could record and distribute say a concert that I attended without breaching somebody's copyright. As for books, electronic copies could be provided profitably from an author website for less than a dollar. Even without the copyright system, authors and performers would still live well.

The social utility and justification for the introduction of copyright and patent law was to provide an income for the developers of novel or artistic works. That social utility vanishes when the owners of those concessions abuse their position to profit beyond the reasonable recovery of performance or innovation costs.

1. How is this different to having an agent buy the books second hand overseas and having an agent bring them into the US? Because if it is different, then the point of sale must be proven.
2. If point 1 is found not to be different, then this would be a major rewrite of internet sales laws.
3. What about patented pharmaceuticals? I could imagine that big pharma might want some input into reselling of their patented drugs back into the US.
4. Isn't it time we started a political movement to shorten copyright & patent terms, and to reduce rights?

I worked for a living as an employee in engineering and computing for 50 years. During my working life I saved money in a public superannuation corporation so that I need not work when I was too old. So now you feel entitled to rob me of my savings because I "don't work"? Someday maybe you will retire.

Maybe you live in LaLa land. In Australia bosses are finding it cheaper to pay a worker $20, 000 to leave rather than try to sack him for laziness, lateness or even straightout theft.

From what I hear it was nearly as bad in Detroit. Are you in Detroit?

As a consumer I benefit from lower wages in that I can buy cheaper cars and other consumer goods.

As a retired person living on investments I cheer on the profitability of my investments.

I would rather see those low wages go to someone who needs them than to some lazy unionist who has captured the legislative framework and lives it up at my expense.

I know that there are a countable number of trigger event types/styles, and each will have only a countable number of options.

Programming to predict those trigger type/styles would be an interesting problem. Cycling through those options is then a fairly straightforward brute force problem.

However in the final analysis, even if you missed finding the trigger, I don't see the how the actual event would not be detected by the BB test, or even the timing cycles lost test.

And if that coding is discovered, it immediately becomes our trojan.