Tag: Privatisation
Arms industries across Europe and North America are trying to get credentialed as “ESG”-friendly options for environmentally and socially conscious investors. That’s absurd. As long as their products are used to perpetuate war, they will remain sin stocks.
Source: No, Arms Dealers Don’t Count as “Environmentally and Socially Responsible” Investments
When Governments do less and less?
In an asset-manager society, firms like Blackstone, Brookfield, and Macquarie act as the shadowy overseers of wealth funds that find a home in the assets that sustain human life, such as housing, energy, and transportation. The questions of how this came about, what the implications are, and who the ultimate winners and losers might be are all explored in brilliant clarity by Brett Christophers in Our Lives in Their Portfolios: How Asset Managers Own the World.
Source: Asset-Manager Firms Are Taking Over the Social Infrastructure on Which We All Depend
On average, excluding publicly owned Essential Energy, network providers are earning a 13-14% super-profit across the east coast and South Australia.
By contrast, Essential Energy, an NSW Government-owned corporation that services rural NSW and parts of southern Queensland, charges no super-profits whatsoever actually taking a 1% haircut on return on investment according to Orme’s analysis.
Another offender is Ausgrid, again formed in 2011 when the NSW sold off its network assets.
SAPN, or South Australian Power Networks, sold by the South Australian government to controlling shareholder Hong Kong-based Cheung Kong Infrastructure Holdings, and Australian investment fund Spark Infrastructure charges a 15.5% super-profit to its customers.
Since our report was published last October, no action has been taken to stem supernormal monopoly network profits.
Source: Poles and wires super-profits causing energy price spikes, and foreign takeovers
The Big Four banks are hurtling to a record $33bn profit this year fired by $13bn in risk free Pandemic aid. Callum Foote checks out the latest profits for Westpac, NAB, CBA and ANZ – and the TFF effect.
Source: Banks hurtle to record profits turbocharged by Reserve Bank pandemic help – Michael West
They want to Privatize the Planet but then so did the East India Company which started the ball rolling. It resulted in America’s war of independence. Now the Republicans want to turn back the clock on Independence,
Former Vice President Mike Pence, a possible 2024 presidential candidate, has voiced support for a Social Security privatization scheme that the George W. Bush administration unsuccessfully pushed nearly two decades ago.
Source: ‘Republicans Keep Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud’: Pence Calls for Privatizing Social Security
Green-Colored Glasses
Private Prisons Are a Socially Responsible Investment, According to Bizarre Wall Street Measures
“We didn’t change any business practices. It’s a charade, yet no one questions this stuff,” he added. “It sounds good, but it doesn’t do anything.
How Corporate America Uses ESG to Polish Its Image
Sometimes I wonder why something that I see as a simple idea isn’t being suggested by people in public office. You know, simple things like – given the shortage of workers in some industries – why don’t we double the amount that the unemployed could earn before they lose any of their benefits? It would…
It’s starting to sound all socialist and full of red tape and we all know that privatisation is the way to go because, hey, hasn’t privatisation worked a treat with all the areas where governments have privatised.
I’m trying to think of a specific example here, but I guess my trouble must be that there are so many of them,
Ah, Qantas. Once it used to be government-owned but now that it’s in private hands, they find your lost luggage much more efficiently because they’ve had so much experience at it…
All right, the Commonwealth Bank… Um, public transport?
Anyway, we know that it much be better because why else would governments keep selling off public assets to their mates?
Source: Lacking Energy? It’s Labor’s Fault Apparently… – » The Australian Independent Media Network
The COVID-19 pandemic has been a nightmare for the tertiary education sector — and the government couldn’t be happier about it.
Source: How COVID-19 almost killed universities, just as the Coalition wanted
We once had a time when Politics was “hot” and we were eager informed and engaged. Then along came the Howard LNP who have sold work, the ” public service”, and gave them to the free market. Morrison has done everything to turned politics into a state of ” media cool” or “don’t worry be happy”. Hi Viz photo shoots, “on the water matters” the “cone of silence” better known as the Canberra bubble all real attempts to dampen our engagement in politics. But he’s done the opposite and once again politics has become “hot” When Morrison says he “keeps us safe” we experience and feel the opposite. The problem with all of this is his media illusion is in tatters and we can all see the machinery behind it and it’s not working. Scott Morrison has done that alone in one term of being PM and that’s his miracle.
To be precise, what we have today is a government that is at war with its citizens by other means. It’s a very real struggle. We cannot rely on traditional allies like the Fourth Estate. So, prepare yourself and the best preparation is knowledge. Ask questions and demand answers. It’s a life and death struggle for a form of democracy that truly represents us.
Source: Australia: a failing state in a hurry to fail – » The Australian Independent Media Network
LNP supports privatized Prisons for Profit and Prisons for Profit support the LNP. Isn’t that a perfect Quid pro Quo policy? The LNP’s urgency in privatizing all government services is not just a Quid pro Quo movement described by Mussolini as the ideal state. He called it Fascism. However quite the opposite of the ideal Australians strive for called Democracy. Save Our Public Service
The immigration detention industry in Australia profits from imprisoning refugees. The Australian Government outsources the day-to-day management of its cruel immigration detention system to private corporations who, in turn, make political donations to them. One of the largest beneficiaries of Australian Government contracts is Serco Group, which has an octopus-like grip on many former government and community services in the UK and across the globe that are now privatised for profit. This human rights-abusing “profit before people” approach must be stopped and the rights of asylum seekers upheld everywhere.
Source: Djokovic unhappy but Australia’s refugees face lifelong persecution
Morrison’s we do nothing Mantra sure fits the addictive failure of the LNP to achieve the best economic and cleanest energy outcome possible..
The takeover bid for Sydney Airport all but done, a takeover frenzy grips the sharemarket. Investors, foreign and local, know Australian governments are an easy touch, that they allow their citizens to be pillaged, that some of them actually believe the bankers’ myth that privatisation means efficiency. Michael West reports.
Source: Addicted to privatisation, addicted to failure – Michael West Media
The problem with the system is that it premised on competition, not collaboration. This model of employment services, delivered by outsourced providers, seems to have mostly benefited the providers.
Source: The problem with employment services: providers profit more than job seekers
A takeovers binge is in swing in the jobless sector as the biggest private provider of employment services, the foreign multinational Max Solutions, mops up smaller players and posts strong revenues from government. Stephanie Tran investigates the Jobactive scheme and the failure of privatisation.
Source: Foreign multinational Max Solutions the biggest winner in pandemic jobs crisis – Michael West
Privatisation of child care laid bare: women pay high price – Michael West
Why isn’t this a not for profit industry after all it’s a service for our most valuable assets (ODT)
Despite huge government subsidies of more than $8 billion a year, parents still pay an arm and a leg for this essential service. And the women who mostly do the caring and educating receive pittance wages while the landlords, developers and investors make a mint. Lisa Bryant reports.
Privatisation of child care laid bare: women pay high price – Michael West
Meet the Tripodinas, the Sydney fruit and veg moguls and Liberal Party donors behind the bid to privatise Australia’s visa system. Michael Sainsbury reports.
Flemington market’s fruit and vegetable mogul Santo Peter Tripodina and his 38-year old son, property developer Adrian Tripodina, have emerged as mystery power-brokers behind the one of the two bids for the Federal Government’s $1 billion visa privatisation.
Both bidding vehicles for Australia’s visa system, chiefly via Consolidated Press and Accenture, have significant tax haven connections.
Scomo’s mate’s mate and the billion-dollar privatisation of Australia’s visa system – Michael West
Notorious billionaire and war profiteer Erik Prince, who founded the disgraced mercenary firm Blackwater, is once again appealing to President Donald Trump to privatize the 17-year-old war in Afghanistan. Notorious War Profiteer Erik Prince Refuses To Give Up Dream of Mercenary Takeover of Afghan War
Frankfurt, Germany — Anti-austerity, anti-bank ‘Blockupy’ protests have rocked Germany as the ECB’s (European Central Bank) new headquarters was scheduled to begin operations.
Images of burned police cars and bloody protesters have begun flooding social media. On the surface,protesters are obviously upset over the ECB building’s $1.4 billion price tag — at a time when the Eurozone suffers through a recession which has hit the working class exceptionally hard.
Other grievances include austerity measures, which are promoted by the banking class, but in reality are just a privatization of assets and resources which were initially funded with public money. Essentially what this has become is a theft from the general public to collateralize finances that were thrown into uncertainty by politics and bad monetary policy in the EU. Rather than the bureaucrats and bankers paying the price for their mismanagement, the European public is footing the bill for the bailouts, and that has rightfully upset many across the Continent.
It’s estimated that roughly 10,000 protesters flooded Frankfurt streets, many coming from across Europe including from the banker victimized country of Greece.
At least 90 police officers have been injured trying to protect the banks, meanwhile over 100 protesters were injured and at least 350 have been arrested. Charges include arson, destruction of property, and disturbing the peace.
Central banks have long been criticized for policies which make the working class poorer while enriching the ruling class. The US has it’s own central bank called the Federal Reserve, which has been the subject of many protests in America as well. Since the creation of the Federal Reserve, which is much older than the ECB, the US has seen an unprecedented shift of wealth from the middle-class to the Wall Street class. The same can be expected of the ECB.
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