John Connor, CEO of the Climate Institute, made a speech today talking about bushfires. I’ve been pondering one of his key points for the last two weeks, ever since the bushfires. Climate change is not just about warmer weather, it is about wilder weather. One of the lessons I learnedContinue Reading
Watching the Obama Inauguration, from a country deeply affected by American politics, but still outside it, has been wonderful (although I have to admit that 3 am was just too early for me to watch it live). But reading Elizabeth at Half Changed World’s description of actually being there hasContinue Reading
In today’s book review, I’m doing a combined review of two Australian feminist books that were published in 2008. The Great Feminist Denial, by Monica Dux and Zora Simic, and The F Word: How We Learned to Swear by Feminism, by Jane Caro and Catherine Fox. First a disclosure ofContinue Reading
The thought that the market can do anything better than the public sector has become pretty unpopular in the last six months. Nevertheless, I still believe it. And I’m going to illustrate it today with one public service that is pretty close to being a basket case; Sydney Ferries. SydneyContinue Reading
Today’s book review is The Unthinkable – Who survies when disaster strikes – and why by Amanda Ripley. When I was in year 5 at school, I shocked my teacher by writing in a book review that I liked a book which involved an earthquake (Ballet shoes for Anna) because “IContinue Reading
In most big Sydney CBD companies, a car space is a sign that you’ve made it. In my company, and the last company I worked for, the most senior executives are entitled to a car space. They are allocated strictly by rank, and neither the cost, nor the Fringe BenefitsContinue Reading
Today the EOWA released the results of their annual women in leadership census. Sadly, the apposite headline is “Women’s glacial progress melted away”. The census is pretty simple – someone reads the annual reports of the top 200 listed Australian companies, and counts the proportion of women on the seniorContinue Reading
I’m just back from a week’s holiday up in far north Queensland, so I’ve got a few books to review. First cab off the rank is HIH: the Inside Story of Australia’s Biggest Corporate Collapse. by Mark Westfield, who is the journalist who kept the pressure on HIH for mostContinue Reading
With politicians everywhere blaming hedge funds and short sellers for the financial crisis, I guess it was only a matter of time before short selling was completely banned. Over the past week, gradual steps have been taken to make it harder. First naked short selling (selling a stock without evenContinue Reading
AIG, the world’s biggest insurer, has been rescued by the Federal Reserve. They’ve lent them $85bn, and in return they get to own 80% of the company. Given that the market capitalisation of AIG was $10bn (on Tuesday’s close, according to the NY Times), I’m guessing that the $8bn or soContinue Reading