This paper analyses various aspects of the economics of logging high conservation value native forests. After outlining the multiple uses of these forests, evidence is reviewed that suggests that subsidisation of logging is extensive. Next the paper reviews work that indicates that when account is taken of the environmental values lost due to logging (including the value of water with alternative uses) there are net social costs from logging high conservation native forests. Finally, changes to the structure of the wood products industry are analysed and it is argued that the growth of plantation timber, although rapid, has been constrained by subsidisation of native forests logging. Despite this, the data show that plantation-sourced wood will capture most of the market for sawn timber and pulp within a decade. There is thus the opportunity for Australia to have its timber needs met without the environmental costs associated with logging of native forests.

This paper examines a number of the deficiencies of the use of the budget balance, or changes in it, as an intermediate target for macroeconomic policy. It draws attention to a number of defensible alternative definitions of ‘the budget deficit’ - which may give conflicting indications of the direction in which the budget balance is moving. It then outlines some of the ways in which alternative measures for effecting a given change in the budget balance may have different effects on the principal objectives of macroeconomic policy. It is pointed out that even if a reduction in the rate of increase in government debt is in itself desirable, it is only after consideration of the costs and benefits of alternative ways of achieving that aim that one can logically decide what policy measures - and what consequent change in the deficit - are appropriate. An appendix draws on some simulations for the UK economy and for the OECD to illustrate how different measures having the same effect on the PSBR may have different relative effects on the various macroeconomic objectives.

The last decade has seen major changes made to the taxation system in Australia. However, these changes have been primarily concerned with income tax reform. Three areas of the tax reform remain outstanding - wealth taxation, State tax reform and commodity tax reform. Wealth taxation has proven a politically sensitive issue subject to little public discussion, a situation not helped by a lack of data on wealth distribution in Australia. State taxation has been the focus of more public debate through a number of Government funded reviews but despite this, few of these report’s recommendations have been implemented. Although the issue of commodity tax reform has been the subject of considerable public debate, it too has resuted in no substantive reforms. This paper argues that until the political dimension of tax reform is taken more fully into account when designing tax reform proposals, the debate on these three tax issues will not move from words to legislation.

This paper examines the predicament of timber workers in the woodchipping industry, with particular reference to Western Australia, but existent throughout Australia. Of distinctive interest is the conflictual situation, and on occasion violent confrontation, which has arisen between timber workers and conservationists. It is concluded that continuing conflict between timber workers and conservationists will, at best, simply displace the environmental problem of logging old-growth forests by the creation of another problem of inequitably distributed resources. Resolution of the conflict requires these two main players to achieve empathetic communication and a negotiated settlement - if, given their very different world views, it is feasible.

This paper examines empirical relationships between government expenditure and private spending in Australia, to see whether government expenditure reduces, or crowds out, private expenditure or encourages it. Particular attention is paid to the effect on private investment expenditure and the possibility of a change occuring in the relationship between public and private is examined. Regression analysis found no significant evidence of crowding out. Public investment was found to compliment private investment in the period before 1974, but not in the period since then.

The question of how often to log is examined applying two different methods – one optimizes over time the value of its timber harvested and the other considers the forest as a multi-use resource. The former, applied to data for the Eden area given an optimal rotation period of 25 years, the latter suggests that it is optimal never to harvest pristine native old growth forests.

To what extent have wages recently increased in Australia? Have these increases been excessive? There are a myriad of wage data series produced by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. These series reflect different questions and different perspectives about wages. In the context of the previously centralised wage determination process the dissection and analysis of aggregate wage series was an important exercise for industry and academic economists. However, the analysis and interpretation of aggregate wage data has become more difficult in the light of a number of developments: (a) falling award coverage, (b) the development and uneven spread of enterprise bargaining, (c) the industrial and demographic restructuring of the workforce, (d) the growth in non-wage benefits, (e) the growth in non-standard employment What are the available options for measuring aggregate wages growth in the light of these above developments? To what extent has recent wage growth been excessive?

This paper contains a survey of recent empirical research on the relationship between public capital and private sector production. The implications of these empirical studies for policy debates over the appropriate level of public capital are also examined.

Women continue to lag some distance behind men in the Australian labour market - in relation to pay differentials, recognition of their skills, award coverage and their concentration in part-time and casual work. This article examines the implications of Labor and Coalition industrial relations policies in relation to women with a focus on three issues; the level of decentralisaton of the system; the strength of the safety net underpinning enterprise industrial relations; and the role of unions. The article concludes that while women are further disadvantaged by some aspects of Labor’s current enterprise bargaining processes, they would be much more damaged by the coalition’s proposals.

While the 1990s have seen sustained attempts in Australia, on the part of the federal government and others, to encourage firms to adopt International Best Practice, the results so far are somewhat disappointing. Firms find themselves tugged in several different directions, by competitive pressures, by industrial relations shifts, and by the demands for higher levels of quality, timeliness and responsiveness. While they are exhorted to adopt teamwork and other initiatives that go under the rubric ‘Best Practice’, there is as yet little sense of the underlying principles that inform these organisational innovations, nor of the history of their introduction into Australian organisations over previous decades.

In May 1995, under the auspices of the Australian Best Practice Demonstration Program, and the Australian Quality Council, an international colloquium was convened, by myself and Professor Malcolm Rimmer, to help shed light on these issues.

The Minimum Wage, in various variants, has been an important part of Australian wage determination for over a century. This paper documents the development of the minimum wage and in so doing highlights the pivotal role of the Sunshine Harvester case. That case left a number of legacies which are examined in other parts of the paper. These include the bifurcated nature of wage determination, consideration of family size, the sexual division of labour and wages, the conflict between needs and capacity to pay, wage adjustment indexes and the role of minimum wages in a decentralised wages system.

This paper sets out to highlight some of the major sociotechnical and team interventions in Australia from the seventies through to the nineties. The review notes that teamwork interventions have changed over the last two decades and argues that this may be attributed partly to the popularity and influence of Japanese management approaches during the eighties along with changes to the industrial relations institutions. Team interventions associated with earlier sociotechnical and participant design approaches, undertaken in the seventies, concentrated on changing work and jobs as a way to address quality of work life concerns. In contrast, many Australian organisations which are presently implementing teams are linking them to broader organisational design issues, taking into account product flows, customer and supplier focus, product innovation and support systems. It is noted that later-style team interventions are linked closer to an organisation’s strategic goals.

Collective bargaining can be of benefit to both employees and employers. Nevertheless, there is growing interest in individual contracts, as part of a broader agenda for labour market flexibility. In particular, individual contracts are being pursued by some companies as part of a human resource management strategy to increase productivity by reducing the role of third parties and promoting ‘common purpose’ between the firm and its employees. There is some evidence that individual contracts can indeed contribute to higher productivity. The challenge for policy makers is to provide sufficient flexibility in the area of individual contracts while preventing employers from using them to reduce wages and conditions.

In 1980 Dr F. Emery published a paper discussing the design of socio-technical systems for ‘greenfield sites’. In his paper Emery argued that a new and different paradigm of work, which is based on ‘co-operative, symmetrically dependent relations’, is more easily introduced into ‘greenfield sites’ and that ‘most matters can be negotiated beforehand with trade union officials’ (1980:19&21).

In this paper the author explores the use of socio-technical design in a greenfield plant, and its application in an old, or brownfield plant of the same company. The socio-technical approach is embodied in the new production model being introduced, which is called a high commitment work system Of specific interest is the role of unions in the sites. Two questions are addressed in this respect. Are unions involved in the design and implementation of the socio-technical system? What are the implications for the future of the unions in these two sites?

This paper examines the application of the techniques of economic analysis to occupational health and safety regulations using occupational noise as an example.

The paper explores the extent to which economic impact studies are practically feasible and useful in relation to occupational health and safety legislation. Six studies of the same regulatory change, from four countries were analysed. The results of these studies ranged from a strongly negative to a significantly positive net present value, depending on the assumptions made. The factor which had the greatest influence on these differences was the way in which benefits are costed.

It is shown that in the field of Occupational Health and Safety, economic analysis does not produce a single valid net present value or benefit to cost ratio on which a decision to legislate can sensibly be based. However the analysis can, if properly directed provide useful information on factors which will enable organisations to optimise their response to the regulation and authorities to introduce regulations in a way which does not bear with unreasonable weight on specific sectors of the community.