In 1972 a group of scientists, known collectively as the Club of Rome, constructed a detailed mathematical model to test whether population growth and economic development could continue indefinitely and…
China’s rapid economic growth, and the development of Shanghai, Chongqing, and Shenzen into modern metropolises, might easily give observers the sense of a successful country, full of confidence. Clearly…
Green shoots don’t become tall trees without long-term nurture.
Skotkin
Mark Taylor, Warwick Business School, University of Warwick
The Office for National Statistics has issued the welcome news that UK GDP rose 0.8% from July to September this year. This is the fastest rate of increase in the past three years and is the third consecutive…
Where will jobs and growth come from after the mining boom? This is the fundamental question facing the next Australian government, whose success will depend to a great extent on how it addresses this…
EU politicians get to grips with the latest science.
European Union, 2013
When we think of cutting-edge innovation, we tend to think of big corporations and their latest wheezes: Google Glass, Sony flat screens or Airbus’s newest plane. But small businesses play key roles in…
Osborne: coming after an extra £11.5bn from departmental expenditure.
PA
John Van Reenen, London School of Economics and Political Science
The spending review is a strange beast. Invented by Gordon Brown, it would normally cover 3 to 4 years instead of a single year – but this one is aimed at 2015-16. Chancellor George Osborne’s 2010 Review…
Buying power doesn’t always stack up as the best measurement for who we are and how far we’ve come.
Shutterstock/ MaleWitch
In the verbal volley between Gillard and Abbott, Swan and Hockey, there is a conversation that we are not hearing. It bubbles below the consciousness of mainstream Australia, a conversation that is old…
John Van Reenen, London School of Economics and Political Science
The International Monetary Fund’s annual investigation into the health of the UK economy makes ugly reading. The IMF points out that “per capita income remains 6% below its pre-crisis peak, making this…
Speed is not enough, we need growth.
Gareth Fuller/PA
The International Monetary Fund’s annual report on the UK economy calls for the Chancellor to boost economic growth through investing in infrastructure. While the IMF is right to make this point, we must…
The world is definitely a mess, but women aren’t the ones to blame.
AAP Image
Without really knowing what he was saying, Alan Jones was right – we are “destroying the joint”. Any dispassionate assessment of the state of “the joint”, both the corner we occupy and the planet as a…
Low-density living in the outer suburbs is not the root of all evil.
www.shutterstock.com
In a recent article on The Conversation Robert Nelson argues we are all morally culpable for unsustainable urban sprawl. He goes on to suggest we fix this by taking advantage of opportunities for higher…
Federal treasurer Wayne Swan said the National Accounts figures released today showed the Australian economy was doing better than every other major advanced economy.
AAP/Alan Porritt
The Australian economy grew 0.6% last quarter but Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania and the ACT are now technically in recession, according to new Australian Bureau of Statistics data. The new figures…
Four-year-old Ar Zin stared at my bag. He knew there was something special inside. The classroom full of 30 Burmese refugee children was so hushed that I could each child’s breath, and Ar Zin’s eyes followed…
Warnings of a drop in Australia’s real GDP per capita - a measure of living standards - still provide a stark contrast to Greece, where the real GDP per capita is likely to be 25% lower in 2013 than in 2008.
AAP
Last week, the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in a preliminary version of its 2012 Economic Outlook lowered its growth forecasts for Australia from 3.7% to 3.0% in 2013. This…
Japan might be the third largest economy in the world, but the past 20 years have seen its GDP growth rate fall behind that of its economic rivals, the US and UK. The outlook appears bleak. Recently, Japan…
We’re banking on business as usual to solve our environmental problems, but we’re likely to be disappointed.
Tony.../Flickr
Australia will introduce a carbon tax on Sunday at A$23 per tonne of carbon. In 2015, an emissions trading scheme (ETS) will replace the tax. The aim is to cut Australian greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions…
Highly processed and fattening but very tasty and easy to get food is partly responsible for the obesogenic environment.
Toban Black
OBESE NATION: It’s time to admit it - Australia is becoming an obese nation. This series looks at how this has happened and more importantly, what we can do to stop the obesity epidemic. Today we look…
Principal Research Fellow, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, and Professor of Economics, Department of Economics, The University of Melbourne