Are most Australians really ‘doing it tough’? In response to the widely-held notion that we are all suffering from cost of living pressures, CPD fellow Ian McAuley undertakes a thorough research of the evidence. Ian finds, in fact, that for the majority of Australians rising incomes have kept well ahead of rising prices. Some people are feeling a squeeze: renters … more
Ian McAuley
Ian McAuley is a contributing author to CPD’s recent publication More Than Luck: Ideas Australia needs now. Ian’s chapter Living off our resources looks at how we use our resources in an era where environmental capital is fast-becoming our scarcest resource of all. Ian lectures in Public Sector Finance at the University of Canberra. His research interests are in public policy, with a specialisation in health policy. His academic qualifications are in engineering and business management from Adelaide University and in public administration from Harvard University. Besides his academic work, he has assisted consumer and welfare organizations in financial and economic policy matters. He has been a strong advocate for integration of the components of health care into a coherent consumer-focussed system. He has been a critic of successive governments’ piece-meal approaches to health policy, particularly the government’s subsidies for private health insurance because they bring neither the benefits of market competition nor the benefits of strong government control. Ian is co-author of a number of papers for the Centre for Policy Development, including ‘Reclaiming our Common Wealth: policies for a fair and sustainable future‘, ‘A Health Policy for Australia: reclaiming universal care‘ and ‘You Can See a Lot By Just Looking: Understanding human judgment in financial decision-making‘.Articles by Ian McAuley:
Private Health Insurance: High in cost and low in equity
Government proposals to apply a means test to private health insurance subsidies have re-ignited the debate about the role of private insurance. Download the new CPD discussion paper ‘Private Health Insurance: High in cost and low in equity‘ In our present system the vast majority of subsidies disproportionately benefit the well-off. Country people with poor access to private hospitals subsidize … more
Ian McCauley | PHI: Costs for Public, Private The Same, So They Should Compete for Funds
Private Health Insurance is a clumsy and expensive way to fund health care. With the 2009 Productivity Commission Report finding only a 3% difference in costings for the Public and Private Health Insurance industries, the allocation of resources to private health is essentially privatising taxation, inequitably and inefficiently replicating what the taxation system already practices. Rather than subsidising private health … more
Ian McAuley | Lets Stop Rolling the Market Dice
The drama on the stock markets is largely the product of gambler’s panic. Better regulation would see less volatile markets – and better returns in the real economy, writes Ian McAuley. Originally published at New Matilda, here. John Maynard Keynes knew what harm could be wrought by financial speculation. In his 1936 magnum opus, The General Theory of Employment, Interest … more
Ian McAuley | A Glimmer of Vision to a Close Horizon
Is the surplus fetish distracting the Government from the real economic challenges? Ian McAuley finds glimpses of Labor values in an otherwise short-sighted budget. In the Budget is a glimmer of traditional Labor principles. Although it is tough on some welfare provisions, it is mildly re-distributive, and it acknowledges the need to make structural changes to the Australian … more
What, then, is regional policy?
The independents, Oakeshott & Windsor, have everyone talking about rural and regional Australia – Ian McAuley dispels a few myths those of us in metropolitan Australia may be hanging on to. Read Ian’s observations on the need to end our trivialisation of regional policy so that we might have a hope of addressing the inequities and complex problems facing these … more
Not so healthy proposals for Medicare & private insurance
Ian McAuley takes a look at the Government’s proposed bill to increase the Medicare Levy Surcharge and means test the private health insurance rebate. Ian considers what this means for funding our health system and making public and private hospitals work for us, as the patients who may need to use them. It has been reported that the Government will … more
Dear Julia & Tony: some ideas on governance
Bob Katter, Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor have a huge task ahead of them over the next few days – a burden made heavier by the poor level of secretarial support successive government have provided. So we thought we could lighten their load by drafting a template letter to send to the two contenders: Dear Julia/Tony Thank you for your … more
Is Coalition Economic Policy A Nauru Solution?
How did a gathering of professional economists rate the policies of the two major parties? And how does the Coalition’s rhetoric about economic management sit against its record? Ian McAuley reports from the Australian Economic Forum more