The Australian welfare trap means that some low income individuals keep only $100, after accounting for tax and lower welfare payments, for every $500 increase in their income:
The welfare state is encouraging men to stay out of work, which is one of the reasons the male work-to-population ratio is at historic lows, as the IPA’s Gideon Rozner explained in his report, The Disappearing Australian Working Man. For more, listen to The Young IPA Podcastinterview with AEI’s Nicholas Eberstadt last Friday about the same crisis unfolding in America (listen on iTunes and SoundCloud).
The climate models were wrong and global warming is going to take longer than the IPCC predicted, warmist scientists admit in a landmark paper published in the Nature Geosciencejournal. Of course, this is old news for climate model sceptics – as Dr Roy Spencer argued in our book, Climate Change: The Facts 2017, satellites have long been recording temperature increases half those predicted.
But that will not stop the alarmists from shutting down dissent. As James Delingpole explained on Saturday, the only reason that outrageous criminal charges against sceptical organisationsin Canada were dropped was because the responsible government agency ran out of money.
How much does free speech cost? Nothing, of course. But as UC Berkeley discovered last week, the cost of violent thugs amounts to about $US600,000 – that was how much the college spent on security for an event featuring conservative commentator Ben Shapiro. As The Daily Signal explained on Friday, when freedoms are attacked with violence, they must be defended at all costs.
People will attack President Trump for literally anything – and no I’m not talking about his speech to the UN on Tuesday. (But this piece by Fox News’ executive vice president on the “bewildered diplomats” facing Trump at the UN is excellent). After granting the wish of an industrious 11-year-old to mow the White House lawns, a New York Times journalist had this to say:
Together with our friends at the Menzies Research Centre, IPA members are invited to attend a forum with the great Frank Furedi in Brisbane next Thursday (details here) and joining Frank will be the IPA’s Dr Bella d’Abrera in Melbourne next Wednesday (details here).
Article of the week:
The counter-revolution against identity politics is continuing – Tom Slater congratulated Reed College, Oregon for resisting divisive identity politics in Spiked last week saying that “feasting on the inheritance of Western Civilisation has for centuries been a means through which truly oppressed people fought back.”
IPA Staff Pick:
Each week an IPA staff member shares what they have enjoyed recently. Today: Peter Gregory
FIFA is still wracked by corruption and the soft power of soccer is being exploited by questionable regimes globally, writes Simon Kuper in this 3,900-word piece from the September edition of The New York Review of Books. It’s an excellent review of celebrated Guardianfootball journalist David Conn’s latest book, The Fall of the House of FIFA, and contains some eye-watering yarns about suitcases of cash being flown around the world to corrupt soccer officials.
Here’s what else the IPA said this week:
- John Roskam, Malcolm Turnbull’s thoroughly Liberal blasphemies – The Australian Financial Review
- Evan Mulholland, Media reforms a significant achievement – The Daily Telegraph
- Andrew Bushnell, Non-jail rehab programs key to cut incarceration – The Australian
- Evan Mulholland, Media reform, energy subsidies and more – Sky News Weekend Agenda
