Club Troppo

Yes folks, the Crikey subscription is back at the top of Troppo for ONE WEEK ONLY as we've just been issued with the link - which will enable you to sign up. It's here! . As aficionados will be aware, Troppo funds its entire garage of imaginary vehicles (including the latest a...

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Some readers will be aware of my distaste for costume drama - films about the past without any serious effort to engage with the difference of the past. It's a crime against Oscar Wilde's great admonition to Bosie. Shallowness is the supreme vice. Anyway, we have two more crim...

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David Brin offers a usefully concise means for distinguishing liberalism from what liberalism became within just a few years from Adam Smith's death - the worship of private property or as Brin puts it "today’s idolatry of personal and family wealth as the fundamental sacramen...

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https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oyfUu_fNQfM Well folks after a gruelling (if largely imaginary) 24 hour period haggling with other Troppmeisters, I'm pleased to announce Troppo's unanimous support for The Donald for President of the Greatest Country on Earth. We were locked in...

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Double for Nothing? Experimental Evidence on the Impact of an Unconditional Teacher Salary Increase on Student Performance in Indonesia by Joppe de Ree, Karthik Muralidharan, Menno Pradhan, Halsey Rogers - #21806 (CH DEV ED LS PE) Abstract: How does a large unconditional incre...

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The office of intelligence in every problem that either a person or a community meets is to effect a working connection between old habits, customs, institutions, beliefs, and new conditions. John Dewey, Liberalism and Social Action , 1935 As I've argued before , our engagemen...

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Are these cartoons racist? I have little doubt they are. They're also cartoons that take a stand against violence against women. I guess they're racist (in a bad way - or in the way that we generally take to be a bad way) because they present people in a very unattractive ligh...

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The SMH points to a recent OECD report, claiming that over one-third of Australian pensioners live in poverty - with this being the second-highest rate in the OECD. Are we really that exceptional? No, we are not. Unfortunately, this is an example of analysis that undermines th...

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This post and its first part are condensed in this blog post at NESTA. “What is elementary, worldly wisdom? Well, the first rule is that you can’t really know anything if you just remember isolated facts and try and bang ‘em back. If the facts don’t hang together on a latticew...

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There's a world of difference between (let's call it) youthful social change seeking in the sixties and immediate post-sixties social and political movements and much social change seeking today. Then the focus was largely on political activism. And 'theory' played a central r...

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Surely the most spectacular and inspiring building of our lifetimes - and some others' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RcDmloG3tXU

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Does Science Advance One Funeral at a Time? by Pierre Azoulay, Christian Fons-Rosen, Joshua S. Graff Zivin Abstract: We study the extent to which eminent scientists shape the vitality of their fields by examining entry rates into the fields of 452 academic life scientists who...

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As I've argued elsewhere, most public debates on policy - and I suspect on pretty much everything else - tend to take place as culture wars. In a culture war the 'sides' are well defined - usually mapping pretty well onto 'left' and 'right' terrain. The identities of the vario...

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Among Australian economists, the reform years of Bob Hawke and Paul Keating (1983-1996) have achieved near mythical status. Their governments have been credited with opening up the country to foreign competition via reductions of the tariffs, freeing industry from the shackles...

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[caption id="attachment_28231" align="aligncenter" width="676"] From National Geographic[/caption] Julie Bishop is in strife with the left-leaning Twittersphere for making light of the plight of Pacific Islanders, who are seemingly in peril of sinking beneath the waves due to...

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Here for my sins is the text of another letter I have just submitted to the local Northern Territory News: Dear Editor The statement in your editorial of 2 December 2015 that "neither of the major political parties is in a position we would consider as ready to govern beyond 2...

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Here are a few gripes about really stupid things. I'm back to Android (the new LG built Nexus 5X) and much happier than with my iPhone. But why (oh why) when you press and hold the 'on/off' switch and the 'power off' option appears, does it appear as the only option? Why don't...

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When Adam Smith said that "people of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public" I read that statement broadly. He clearly intended to refer to business people seeking to monopolise the ma...

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I can only assume that op-ed pundit/pop historian Peter FitzSimons must have been wrapping his trademark red vanity hijab too tightly around his head and cutting off the blood supply to the brain. It is the only plausible explanation for this idiotic piece: At the very same ti...

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With the Internet being a regular feature of our lives for about 20 years now, what have been the related developments that were hard to pick at the outset? What are the lessons? Five thoughts: Communication and personal expression is the main business of the Internet. That wa...

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