Ulysees

Alas, I didn’t finish Ulysees by Bloomsday.

Why there should be wards in the City of Sydney Council

Last year I argued in favour of having wards in the City of Sydney during a referendum to introduce them held in conjunction with the September 2008 City elections.* (I have to declare that I was a Labor candidate for Council – number six on the ticket of ten candidates, and that our team supported a Yes vote in the referendum.) I argued that not having wards meant that Councillors were responsible to voters through their teams, and that having “team” votes meant that it was much more difficult for voters to vote for or against particular Councillors.

I now support having wards more strongly than I did at the election. I used to be against having wards but my view changed since being involved in community groups.

While I used to think that having wards promoted parochialism, this relatively minor point is much weaker than the negatives associated with not having wards. The fact that all nine Councillors represent the entire City of Sydney means that that no particular Councillor (or group of Councillors) is directly responsible to the voters in any particular area of the City. There is no obligation for the issues in any area to be taken up by any Councillor.

NSW Government introduces state preference – NSW protectionism!

The Daily Telegraph today published a story stating that:

…all NSW Government departments and agencies will be forced to protect Australian jobs by giving preference to locally made products.

This would include stationery, uniforms, cars and even trains and building contracts. And to make local bids more competitive, a 20 per cent discount will be applied to Australian products when comparing the cost with overseas bidders.

What can one say? This will lead to NSW residents being subject to higher taxes and charges than necessary, and likely to lead to increased prices due to decreased competition to supply the NSW Government. One wonders how managers in the NSW Government will attempt to run their organisations efficiently given this protectionist policy.

The NSW Treasurer agreed that this could lead to increased costs, but that this was ok given that it would “help local jobs”. The NSW Treasurer should answer the question about why Australia ever reduced tariff barriers, given that the tariffs helped support local jobs at higher costs to taxpayers and consumers.

“All NSW Government and state-owned corporations (SOCs) are to give preferential treatment to Australian-made goods under the new Local Jobs First plan,” Mr Roozendaal said.

“The NSW Government is putting NSW jobs first. Every year, NSW Government agencies spend billions of dollars buying the things they need to deliver services to the people of NSW.

“This plan tips the balance in favour of local businesses, providing them with greater opportunities to expand and sell to government.”

The Local Jobs First program has been endorsed by Unions NSW.

While protectionist sentiments are understandable in the present environment, they should be resisted. It would be better for tenders should be won by businesses offering the best product, regardless of where the business is located.

McKinsey Quarterly article – ‘Power curves’: What natural and economic disasters have in common

McKinsey Quarterly has a nice article discussing the oft-quoted power law distribution of events in the natural and financial worlds, together with readers’ comments:

Executives, strategists, and economic forecasters, somewhat sheepish after missing the “big one”—last year’s global credit crisis—turned to the lexicon of natural disasters, describing the shock as a tsunami hitting markets and as an earthquake shaking the world economy’s foundations. Shopworn as these metaphors may be, they aptly capture the extreme and unexpected nature of the circumstances. In fact, the parallels between the dynamics and failures of man-made systems, such as the economy or the electricity grid, and similarly complex natural ones are bringing new ideas to economic forecasting, strategic planning, and risk management. This trend may have profound implications for policy makers, economists, and corporate strategists alike.

NSW electors selecting political party candidates

Via pollbludger comes news of the NSW Nationals using a US-style primary to select its candidate for one NSW state electorate for the 2011 state election. Quoting the story:

Under the trial, polling booths will operate to allow everyone enrolled in the chosen electorate to vote on who they would like to see as the Nationals candidate.

Currently, only card-carrying members of the party have a say in that process.

Individual electorate councils within the Nationals will now be asked if they would like to have their candidate chosen via community pre-selection.

Mr Stoner previously has said that if the trial works, it would be expanded to other seats for the 2015 election.

It would be great to see the Liberals and ALP adopt a similar process for selecting a candidate for at least one seat in the next state and federal elections, perhaps in independent-held seats. This seems unlikely though given the conservatism of both party organisations.

Maths problem – which \beta satisfy \beta(i+j, k)\beta(j+k, i)\beta(k+i, j) = 1?

A problem has recently arisen when attempting to define colour traces on square traces using minimal assumptions. The problem is as follows.

Let i, j, k = 0, 1, 2, …, m-1, and let + be additive addition modulo m, i.e. we identify m and 0.

Let \beta(i, k) -> C be a complex-valued function of i and k, where \beta satisfies:

• \beta(i, k) \beta(k, i) = 1, for all i, k, and
• \beta(i+j, k) \beta(j+k, i) \beta(k+i, j) = 1.

The problem is: what are the allowed values of \beta(i, k) ?

Note we have: \beta(n, 0) = \beta(0, n) = 1 for all n which can be seen from fixing i=n-1, j=1, k=0, which gives \beta(n, 0) \beta(1, n-1) \beta(n-1, 1) = 1. We also have \beta(1, 1)^{2}=1.

The ACTU’s “fair go for Australian industry” that isn’t “a call for a new wave of protectionism”

The ACTU is doing Australian workers no favours in pretending that its call for protectionism under another name is not, actually, a call for protectionism.

This call appears in an ACTU press release dated 4 June 2009 entitled A fair go for Australian industry by government purchasing will support local jobs, which states (in part):

Unions are proposing a set of National Interest Expenditure Principles to guide government spending and investment so that it maximises jobs and benefits Australian industries.

“Federal and state governments should do more to protect Australian jobs through procurement policies that give a fair go to domestic industries,” said ACTU President Sharan Burrow.

“This is not a call for a new wave of protectionism,” Ms Burrow said. “This is about a fair go for Australian jobs and industries.