The Policy Post

  An age of discontent. Change is happening faster than human society can adjust. Discontent, disorder and alienation are the result.

  God is not dead. Yet. Most of the world is turning away from religion. Australia leads the pack.

  How to lose a war. History has many lessons about wars and how to lose them. Trump’s latest dismal escapade shows how completely he has failed to learn.

  The global oil crisis that wasn’t. Closing the Strait of Hormuz was supposed to cripple economies worldwide. It didn’t. Why?

  Out of chaos, hope Everywhere, democratic politics is in turmoil. When the confusion recedes, only the progressives will remain standing.

A lovely day in Dystopia. What sort of world do the far-right populists want to create? And what do their billionaire backers want for their money?

  The sullen revolution. Discontent in western democracies feeds the surge in right-wing populism. But why? And why now?

   One damn theory after another (1) Those big economic theories all seemed like good ideas at the time. Only later did we realise the economists had wrecked the joint.

  One damn theory after another (2) After the shocks of the seventies, Milton Friedman thought he had the answers. He didn’t.

One damn theory after another (3) How banks stopped being banks and took over the world.

  Prosperity versus the planet: can we have both? Humanity needs economic growth – but we also need a habitable planet. We can have both, but not if we go on doing the same things.

  The retreat from globalism. After three crippling shocks – the GFC, the pandemic and Trump’s war – globalisation has gone into reverse.

  Democracy in trouble? Blame the economy. Democracy and prosperity go together. When economies go backwards, authoritarians flourish.

For China, is this as good as it gets? The ‘middle-income trap’ that ended the rise of so many former tiger economies now ensnares China. The prognosis isn’t good.

  How the west mishandles terrorism (and makes it worse) In the rich world, terrorism is one of the least significant of all threats to life and security. But our panicked over-reaction and rushed, repressive laws do what the terrorists could not achieve by themselves.

  Does Trump really matter? He thought the world was simple and that he had the formula for changing everything. But the world is more complicated than he ever imagined. His impact will vanish with him.

  How bed-blocked is your hospital? Almost all of Australia’s 278 public hospitals with emergency departments are afflicted by bed block, but the pain is not spread evenly. This post shows the results for all of them – and why it’s suddenly got much worse.