Freedom of Information documents show the Bureau of Statistics spent a good deal of effort toning down news of rising inequality. The Productivity Commission seems to have been at it too.
Income is a useful measure for tracking economic progress over time. But a broader lens is needed to understand the relational and often political ways in which poverty emerges and is reproduced.
A new Grattan Institute study finds that for the first time in a long time, young Australians are no better off than those who came before, and are likely to do worse.
Saudi women may now travel without a man’s permission, easing one of the most repressive aspects of the country’s ‘guardianship’ system. Women in Saudi Arabia gained the right to drive last year.
The world of the fourth industrial revolution looks set to be one dominated by forms of knowledge and industries – like science and technology – that have long been dominated by men.
Unions should move their focus away from traditional collective bargaining and instead embrace new ways to attract new members, such as by offering discounted benefits and engaging in more advocacy.
Peter Martin, Crawford School of Public Policy, Australian National University
The official figures show things are fine, but Australia’s most comprehensive tracking survey finds the typical household is worse off than ten years ago.
A clandestine system of transfer payment, with roots in apartheid-era boycotts, has developed into routine behaviour on which many family budgets now depend.
Combining big data sources about bike-share trips with anonymized data from traditional survey research can best capture who is using bike-share programs.