Author Archives: Nicholas Gruen

Market – what market? The catch 22 that stops ‘scaling’ innovation in government in its tracks

Posted on July 24, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

Cross posted from the Mandarin There is a huge catch 22 driving impact measurement in human services. A lot of the evaluation is done because governments seek it, but then it goes nowhere – and for good reason. NGOs and … Continue reading →

Posted in Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Innovation | 7 Comments

Comparing the Census to alternative data or information: What is the right counterfactual?

Posted on June 21, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

By Matt Balmford; Gene Tunny; and Nicholas Gruen Our inaugural blog post for the Valuing the Census project provided an overview of our strategy for estimating the benefits of the Census to the Australian community. From here, we’ll be blogging about various issues … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy | 6 Comments

If your problem is darkness, it’s better to light one quarter of a candle than to light any more of a candle (apparently)

Posted on June 20, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

Here’s Phil Lowe reporting on the RBA’s failure to meet its performance targets and refusal to do anything about it: This decision [to cut rates by 0.25%] was not in response to a deterioration in the economic outlook since the … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy | 3 Comments

Blogging another inquiry: Valuing the Australian Census

Posted on June 12, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

Lateral Economics has been commissioned by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to estimate the value of the Australian Census to the Australian community. As part of that exercise we’ve got the go-ahead from ABS to do something that, it seems to … Continue reading →

Posted in Economics and public policy, IT and Internet, Metablogging, Public and Private Goods, Web and Government 2.0 | 25 Comments

Guest Post by Simon Molloy: Reducing political bias at the national broadcaster

Posted on June 5, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

Claims of a left-wing bias at the ABC are seldom absent from public discussion. These claims quickly lead to suggestions that the ABC should privatised. Of course, bias and impartiality are notoriously elastic and subjective concepts. The only arbiter that … Continue reading →

Posted in Democracy, Media | 7 Comments

Forecasting and competition policy

Posted on May 26, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

Values are observed in actions and choices, and rather less so in words. Competition policy has been applied with great relish to the labour market – at least at the bottom end. (Subject to our relatively generous basic and award wage … Continue reading →

Posted in Competitions, Cultural Critique, Economics and public policy, Innovation, Politics - national | 3 Comments

Brian Schmidt: The Mathematics Does Not Lie: Why Polling Got The Australian Election Wrong

Posted on May 20, 2019 by Nicholas Gruen

This is a guest post by Brian Schmidt. Actually it isn’t, I’ve cut and pasted. I hope he doesn’t mind. Important stuff. HT: John Walker Everyone in my office grew sick last week of my continual complaints about the state … Continue reading →

Posted in Democracy, Economics and public policy, Politics - national | 51 Comments