Andrei.Hicks wrote on Jan 29^th, 2011 at 10:01am:


You do realise, don't you, that she was incubating for about 9 months at approximately 37.5C - which remains her normal body temperature - and therefore that an environment of 19C is unnatural for her body!?

Yes freediver you are quite right.  Get rid of the Baby Bonus, and the first home buyers grant.  However the timing is wrong, they should have gone years ago.   

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Get rid of the baby bonus, less will breed, to make way for more immigration.

Get rid of the first home buyers grant, well, they might as well, there are no 'affordable' houses left to purchase anyway.

Perhaps there could be healthy in-between,  the first home buyers grant could apply to the 'first' baby havers grant also?

When I had my two, there was no baby bonus, should I be entitled to back-pay?



I'm thinking of having another baby within a few years, (once my course is finished, and I'm fully self-employed)...  however wont be unless I'm in a position to do so financially...I have promised the two I have a pool first...so this has to go in first...should be in by next summer.

Anyway when all is said and done, we spent the money wisely and correctly.

If people do that and it helps gives the baby a good start in life then I am all for it.

If it is spent wisely, I am fine with it.

mellie wrote on Jan 29^th, 2011 at 10:23am:


Wait a minute... weren't you saying not so long ago that Australia already had too many people and we need to start reducing the population?

I guess leading by example isn't one of your strong points then?

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Taxes go up and down all the time, but mostly up, because for some reason there are so many people like you whop support government waste so long as they get back a fraction of their own money after the government wasted most of it.

Obviously there are multiple causes for each move and it is hard to blame one tax hike or drop on one policy change. However, right now it is more clear than ever - we will get yet another tax hike unless the government drops more of these absurd middle class welfare handouts.

Tell me Andrei, if dropping the baby bonus meant we avoided a tax hike, is that just as useful as if it caused taxes to go down?

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Air conditioning is a significant contributor to the obesity epidemic. This is well documented. It is also well documented that the habits that parents set up in their children can impact their whole lives. If you turn them into obese, lazy, feeble minded children, they will end up as obese, lazy, feeble minded adults, who support middle class welfare because they don't understand how silly it is for the government to take with one hand and give with the other.

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What about all the rebuilding?

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Maybe the baby bonus can help with the pool.
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Except for all the money you gave to the government to waste on bureacracy so they could give a bit of it back to you.

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Great, lets throw rationality out the window because there are babies involved.

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I agree it is a bad idea to leave a baby out in the sun on a hot day. Or overnight during a storm. This is not the same as a climate controlled room.

There seems to be a number of underlying issues being raised here (and elsewhere) - and a few others that I believe to be important in the overall scheme of things - including: -

* That, for the majority, one average adult wage no longer covers the basic costs of living and raising a family in 21st Century Australia - hence some form of ongoing Govt subsidy has become necessary for many families. I point out that this is largely because the wages share of GDP has been falling for several decades - whilst the CEOs' and shareholders' shares of GDP has been rising - and that these changes have been accelerating.

* That welfare should be means-tested, so as to exclude WEALTHfare and to moderate the impact upon the Govt coffers (i.e. taxpayers).

* There has been an increasing-trend towards targeted hand-outs for socio-economic engineering and vote-buying purposes - many of which have been ill-conceived and some of which have been introduced under false pretenses and with divisive intent.

* That targeted lump-sum Govt subsidies often lead to rorting, consumer exploitation, OH&S issues, disproportionate price rises and other unintended socio-economic impacts (which only serve to undermine the original intent behind the subsidy).

* That corporate WEALTHfare should go to progressive ground-breaking, socially responsible and environmentally friendly industries - not to established polluters and/or resource-plunderers.

* That highly profitable parasitic industries need to be reigned in for broader and long-tern socio-economic and environmental benefit.

* That funding for long-term education, training and employment of Australian citizens should be given priority over short-term stop-gap measures such as exporting education and importing workers.

* That we need to adopt the best aspects of globalisation and ditch or limit the impact of adverse ones.

* That the insurance industry needs to be better regulated and supervised - such that real-world risks cannot be uninsured en masse!

* That there is scientific evidence that suggests we are in for more frequent and/or extreme weather events and climatic changes - and therefore that we need to push our civic planning and insurance industry to take steps to minimise the risks to individuals, families, the community and Govts.

This is just a brainstorm - it is by no means an exhaustive list. As others have suggested, I think that the flood crises have highlighted the need for the nation to have a serious debate about what types of Govt interventions, subsidies and programs are legitimate - and which ones aren't.

I, for one, hope that the nation will take advantage of the window of opportunity created by the floods, to take a pragmatic and altrustic look at: where we're at, what we want our Govts to do and where we want our Govts to go from here...