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Argues that the principle of equity in the institutionalized determination of inter-industry wage differentials and the economic pressures in an efficient labor market do not necessarily reinforce one another. Incompatibility of attempts by wage-fixing authorities in Australia to maintain wage justice with the operation of market forces; Criticism of Turner and Jackson's theory of wage and price determination.

1971 will go on record as the year in which the general public in Australia began to worry about cost inflation or income inflation as I prefer to describe it. This concern was expressed clearly in the Commonwealth Treasurer's budget speech; unfortunately the action taken in the budget did not correspond, for it was aimed at further restraint of demand which was already sagging below the level of full employment. In public discussion it is now understood that the 1971 variety of inflation is significantly different from previous bouts, in that this time the general level ot5 demand, profits, and activity are not very high as they have been on previous occasions pulling prices up. Indeed the use of the term "stagflation" to describe the 1971 situation is becoming common to indicate the combination of a stagnant level of activity combined with a rapid rise of prices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Discusses the employment status of aborigines in Australia. General employment profile; Early position of Aborigines in relation to the pastoral industry; Importance of missions and settlements.

Discusses how economist W.E. Hearn expressed his theoretical notions in terms of the political and economic controversies of his day in Australia. Opposition to government interference; Taxation and political policies; Education reform; Disposal of waste lands.

In Australia, as in many other countries which have limited markets, decreasing cost industries pose awkward policy problems. The optimal number of producers does not automatically occur, at least in the short run, which may, indeed, be very long, and producers do not always share the market in an optimal fashion. This essay elaborates on this problem and deals with the related matter of possible governmental intervention. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Investigates the association between prosperity and strike activity in Australia from 1952-68. Nature of a cyclical influence of strike activity; Factors expected to be positively related to strike frequency; Fluctuations in economic activity.

Australian studies of industrial, labour and economic history in the second half of the 19th century have long relied on manufacturing statistics published annually in the colonial Statistical Registers. This reliance could become even more pronounced through the influence of Professor N. G. Butlin, who drew heavily upon these sources. This article suggests, however, that these Statistic Registers are unreliable and indeed—for certain purposes—misleading. If this is so, some popular historical interpretations will have to be reviewed. We shall have to reconsider why Victoria adopted a protective tariff in the 1860s and also reconsider the subsequent effects of the tariff. We shall have to re-examine the effects of the gold-rushes on the growth of manufacturing. We shall have to reject much of Butlin's pioneering work on the rise of manufacturing in Victoria and Australia between 1861 and 1901, and we shall have to reconsider the role of manufacturing in the boom of the 1880s and the recovery from the depression of the 1890s. The statistics and the estimates based on them are also relevant to such questions as how manufacturing influenced the growth of cities, how urban living standards moved, and how the economic and social climate affected the growth of unionism and welfare legislation. Moreover, unless the manufacturing statistics are handled with a new discretion, the infection of error may spread to problems in local history, industrial history, colonial and national history; for these statistics are as basic to industrial history as detailed voting returns are to political history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Presents indexes of average prices of Australian imports from Great Britain from 1919-20 to 1927-28. Food, drink and tobacco; Living animals; Raw materials and articles mainly unmanufactured.

Explores the extent to which domestic income adjustment can help balance external payments in Australia. Relevance to economic policy; Alignment of expectations; System of incentives in market economy.

Focuses on the variations in loans to and rates paid by authorized short-term money market dealers in Australia. Size of the authorized market; Dealer capital; Sources of funds to dealers; Daily averages and variation in loans to dealers.

The connections between international trade and domestic economic growth and welfare have for long been of central interest to both economists and economic historians. This theme has special relevance for the analysis of Australia's growth performance because of the relatively high ratio of trade to national income and the concomitant pursuit of policies favouring rapid industrialisation and population expansion. Clearly, improved balance-ofpayments estimates will establish more precisely the magnitude and character of Australia's international economic relationships during the process of economic development. Ideally, a complete quantitative picture of these international transactions would be obtained by compiling a set of accounts covering not onlyu merchandise exports and imports but also invisible trade and capital movements. The aim of the present note is to provide estimates of the current account only (merchandise trade and invisible items) over the period since Federation. While private and official attempts have been made to estimate either portions of the current account or the full account for a limited period of time, there has not previously existed a continuousu series for the entire period set out in the relatively comprehensive form which the present estimates take. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Early in 1967 the University of Cambridge Department of Applied Economics published an interim report on an investigation into some of the effects of Britain's direct overseas investment. This publication has been widely referred to as the "Reddaway Report". This term is used in the present article, but it should be remembered that a final report, bearing a similar appellation, will probably be available about March 1968. This article does not summarize the Report. Bather it considers certain aspects of it, mainly from an Australian viewpoint, and supplements the Report by presenting certain data for Australia from the Cambridge survey, analysed by industry groups, which were not published in the Beddaway Report. Interpretations to be placed on the data are subject to all the qualifications that are emphasized in the Report. These will not be repeated here. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Here my purposes are as follows. First, I shall present briefly some of the main facts about recent tariff policy bearing on the two criticisms above. This is not an easy task since our tariffs, and the machinery for changing them, are very complicated and are in fact in a continuous state of change. It is therefore not surprising that most people find it very difficult to get a clear perspective on what has been happening. Secondly, I shall discuss a central issue of long-term tariff policy, namely the question of the "benchmark". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comments on the article 'Wages Policy in Australia,' by E.A. Russell. Argument on productivity-geared wages policy; Movement of the rate of growth of average money earnings in line with average domestic productivity.

Reports on the use of a transportation model, based on the classical warehouse-retailer formulation, to determine optimal wool flows minimizing total growers' transport costs in Australia. Effects of state legislation and Section 92 of the Australian Constitution on existing wool transport movements from grower to wool store; Determination of the minimum cost routing from warehouses to retail stores.

Forecasts the economic potential of Australia's natural gas industry. Consumption of primary energy; Markets, reserves and minimum pipeline investments in natural gas; Determination of fuels prices.

The main purpose of this article is to derive the general algebraic conditions which show what factors determine the extent of foreign ownership in the private sector of an economy, and the circumstances under which direct investment by non-residents will continue indefinitely as a net source of foreign exchange. The foreign ownership and balance-of-payments conditions are then combined to demonstrate that under certain circumstances a borrowing country can accept a particular rate of direct investment from abroad indefinitely, without either increasing the proportion of the private enterprise sector foreign-owned or reaching a situation where the outflow of funds in the balance of payments is greater than the inflow. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Reports on Australia's foreign investments in manufacturing industries in Singapore and Malaysia. Gross expenditure from 1948 to 1949 and 1964 to 1965; Management of labor in factories; Australia's contribution to manufacturing development in Singapore and Malaysia.

Focuses on the problem of fiber substitution in the Australia wool industry. Estimations on the economic effect of the substition of fiber; State of the fiber market; Markov process analysis of the fiber market.

Historically the Indonesian oil industry was an important segment of the world oil scene, and with about 24,000,000 metric tons per annum, or 1.6 per cent of total world production, remains a considerable producer of crude oil. For Australia Indonesia is a large and strategic element in the oil situation, since it supplies one-quarter of this country's crude imports; and certain radical alterations in the structure and performance of the oil industry which are at present taking place could have a special impact on oil policies in Australia. For the student of economics these same changes are of a more general interest. Recent Indonesian developments bring out the prime importance for newly-independent countries of preserving the effectiveness of their inherited investments in export industries such as oil. There is a warning, for private enterprise, and governments, in the ambivalent attitude of new nations to foreign investment no matter how essential or productive. The effect of socialisme à l'indonésienne (to use President Sukarno's label for the particular brand of state control) on the operations of western-type enterprise is worth noting. Finally, there is the reaction, surely unique, of international oil companies large enough and resourceful enough to hold off encroaching nationalism while making dispositions of their affairs which will leave their total situation unchanged and possibly improved. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Industries characterized by differentiated oligopoly and dominated by multi-product firms are intractable to economic analysis. Yet they are the most common type of industry. The present article analyses the structure and conduct of one such industry. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Examines the usefulness of gross national product statistics in the measurement of economic growth in Australia. Concept of price relativity; Impact of changes in terms of trade on purchasing power of earnings from exports; Absence of productivity allowance in measurement of output of public services.

Forecasts the prices of Australia's wool. Original weights and standard deviations of forecasting errors; Coefficients of variation and average fractional error for optimal set of weights; Coefficients of variation and average fractional error for comparative model.

Two previous studies of the operations of a floor price scheme for wool have shown that such a scheme cannot be expected to exert much effect upon the mean level of growers' incomes or upon the mean level of export receipts from the sale of wool. Both studies, however, demonstrated that substantial changes in receipts may occur in particular periods. In the case of growers' incomes, these involve increases when wool is purchased (at a time when incomes would normally be low), and decreases when wool is sold (when incomes would normally be high). In the case of export receipts, when demand is elastic, the changes are likely to be of opposite sign. Whilst the changes tend to even out over a cycle of buying and selling operations, the magnitude of changes in particular periods suggests that the effects upon variances may be substantial, to reduce the variance of growers' incomes and to increase the variance of export receipts. The anticipation of a variance reduction in growers' incomes was evidently a compelling reason for the Wool Board's recommendation for a floor price scheme. However, the variance effects cannot properly be evaluated with a twoperiod analysis, as were the previous studies cited. The investigation reported here seeks to analyse the impact of a scheme upon the relevant variances. As a by-product, it also furnishes data on a number of other issues-the mean levels of incomes and overseas receipts, the likely profitability of a floor price scheme, and the relationship between the reserve price and the capital backing required to sustain it. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Analyzes the behavior of the statistical discrepancy in national accounts in Australia. Absence of cyclical fluctuation; Negligible correlation between changes in the statistical discrepancy and changes in the gross national product; Use of Wallis-Moore and Durbin-Watson coefficients.