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Episode 426 - Experts say ...
29th April 2024 • The Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove • The Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove
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Analyzing Contemporary Issues: A Deep Dive into Crime Statistics, Domestic Violence, and Societal Trends

In episode 426 of the 'Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove' podcast, the hosts engage in a comprehensive discussion covering an array of timely topics including crime rates in Queensland, the marches against violence towards women, and statistical analyses revealing significant insights into domestic violence in Australia. Further expanding their conversation, they delve into international relations, focusing on the U.S.'s stance on Chinese manufacturing and tariffs, along with the dynamics of foreign aid to Ukraine amidst the conflict. The episode also touches upon workplace fatalities, the advantages of a four-day workweek, and the role of AI in content creation. Throughout, the hosts offer critical insights, question prevailing narratives, and analyze data to shed light on complex issues ranging from gendered violence to geopolitical strategies and societal progress.

00:00 Introduction

00:36 Meet the Hosts

01:06 Diving into Current Events: Crime Rates and Public Perception

01:21 Exploring the Complexities of Violence Against Women

02:05 The Misleading Nature of Crime Statistics

04:02 China's Economic Policies and Global Impact

05:17 A Closer Look at Domestic Violence and Gendered Violence

11:26 Workplace Fatalities: A Gendered Perspective

13:40 Debating the Effectiveness of Harsher Penalties for Crime

17:02 Unpacking Domestic Violence Statistics and Misconceptions

24:54 Crime Statistics and the Impact of COVID-19

29:52 Australian Government's Aid to Ukraine: A Critical View

32:17 Decommissioning Costs and Second-Hand Goods

33:58 Gratitude for Children's Literature

35:09 Controversial Figures in Literature

35:47 Geopolitical Discussions: Israel and Gaza

36:46 The Role of Egypt in the Israel-Gaza Conflict

38:23 UNRWA and International Relations

43:20 The Debate on Manufacturing and Subsidies

51:12 The Case for a Four-Day Workweek

55:05 Exploring AI's Role in Content Creation

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We have a website. www.ironfistvelvetglove.com.au

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Transcripts started in episode 324. You can use this link to search our transcripts. Type "iron fist velvet glove" into the search directory, click on our podcast and then do a word search. It even has a player which will play the relevant section. It is incredibly quick.

Transcripts

Sir David:

Suburban Eastern Australia, an environment that has, over

Sir David:

time, evolved some extraordinarily unique groups of homosapiens.

Sir David:

But today, we observe a small tribe, akin to a group of meerkats,

Sir David:

that gather together atop a small mound to watch over them.

Sir David:

Question and discuss the current events of their city, their

Sir David:

country, and their world at large.

Sir David:

Let's listen keenly and observe this group fondly known as the

Sir David:

Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove.

Trev:

Hello and welcome back dear listener.

Trev:

Yes, episode 426, Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove podcast, news

Trev:

and politics, sex and religion.

Trev:

I'm Trevor, Coming in loud and clear from regional Queensland,

Trev:

Scott the Velvet Glove.

Trev:

How are you, Scott?

Scott:

Good, thanks, Trevor.

Scott:

G'day, Trevor.

Scott:

G'day, Joe.

Scott:

G'day, listeners.

Scott:

I hope everyone's doing well.

Trev:

And coming in loud and clear from Peter Dutton's

Trev:

electorate, Joe the Tech Guy.

Joe:

Good evening.

Joe:

Hopefully I fixed the audio.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

So, right, dear listener, what's on the agenda?

Trev:

Well, you know, I, I start the, well, every week.

Trev:

Basically starting immediately upon the conclusion of the previous episode,

Trev:

with my little word document, adding things as they, as they pop up.

Trev:

And I hadn't really added the, sort of the marches about violence against

Trev:

women until the end, until today actually, maybe even this afternoon.

Trev:

So we're gonna talk about that, bear with me if my notes are a little

Trev:

bit sketchy, and just looking at the number of deaths and just Posing some

Trev:

interesting statistical questions, and then also looking at, you'll

Trev:

recall, dear listener, that I was very pleased to see from the Australian

Trev:

Bureau of Statistics that crime rates generally across the country were down.

Trev:

And so it's been one of my favourite things of late, is to say to people,

Trev:

you realise crime rates are down.

Trev:

And, Last week, between last week and now, maybe it's somewhere in there, a

Trev:

report came out from the Courier Mail which was reporting statistics from

Trev:

the Queensland Bureau of Statistics, or whatever it's called, detailing crime

Trev:

rates in Queensland, which seemed to show quite a spike, quite an increase in crime

Trev:

rates of around 15 percent on average.

Trev:

And this, of course, the Courier Mail delighted in, because they

Trev:

could then blame Stephen Miles and the Labor government for it.

Trev:

And they've been running a campaign in the Courier Mail for the last

Trev:

two years on violence and blaming the Labor government for it.

Trev:

So, I was a bit perplexed.

Trev:

How could the Australian Bureau of Statistics on the one hand be saying crime

Trev:

rates are down, and then on the other hand, the Queensland crime statistics

Trev:

seeming to indicate massive increases.

Trev:

Scott, did you see any of that at all in your report?

Trev:

About the Queensland crime rate and the Courier Mail reports and any of

Trev:

that come across you or not really?

Scott:

Not a hell of a lot because I don't read the Courier Mail, so I

Scott:

did see a front page when I was in the shop the other day and it said

Scott:

something about there was a spike, so

Joe:

Yeah,

Trev:

so I've had a chance to do a little bit of digging and I'll try and

Trev:

figure out what's going on But well there's an old saying isn't there, there

Trev:

are lies, damned lies and statistics.

Joe:

Hmm, I thought you were going to say there are lies,

Joe:

damned lies and murder newspapers.

Joe:

Yes.

Scott:

One of those things I did see this car sticker years ago, it says is it true

Scott:

or did you read it in the courier mail?

Trev:

I'd love a car sticker like that, yeah.

Trev:

So, I'll try and explain that, and maybe we'll do a bit more

Trev:

on Israel and Gaza, and maybe a little bit about, um, China and U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

complaints about China being, sort of having overcapacity,

Trev:

and the desire of the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

A.

Trev:

to start imposing tariffs and other protections.

Trev:

And, and look at the history of the United States of America in relation to tariffs.

Trev:

So That's where we're heading.

Trev:

See how far we go.

Trev:

If you're in the chat room, say hello.

Trev:

Looks like Joel's there.

Trev:

Joel, you had a really good one at the end of last week's.

Trev:

We didn't make it.

Trev:

It was something about a pyramid scheme or something.

Trev:

It was a good comment.

Trev:

We just missed it.

Trev:

But if you're in the chat room, say hello.

Trev:

We will try and incorporate your comments.

Trev:

And, yeah.

Trev:

So, look, I turned on the, do you guys watch like the six o'clock news?

Scott:

No, I watch the ABC streamed.

Trev:

Okay, so you watch the ABC News Bulletin that Yeah, I do.

Trev:

Right.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Joe, do you watch any news I don't watch TV.

Trev:

Right.

Trev:

Okay.

Trev:

I just thought you might, somewhere along the track.

Joe:

I, I, I get, I use Apple News, which has all sorts of news

Joe:

feeds coming into it, but not

Trev:

TV.

Trev:

Right.

Trev:

Okay.

Trev:

There you go.

Trev:

Well, I do.

Trev:

Not always, but you know.

Trev:

So, so Sunday night, turned it on, Channel 7, and of course the first item

Trev:

was showing, you know, demonstrations, before sort of the explanation came

Trev:

through, and it just showed thousands of people marching in the streets.

Trev:

And I thought to myself, Fantastic.

Trev:

Australians are finally complaining about Israel and Gaza.

Trev:

It's so good to see.

Trev:

This'll be great.

Trev:

And then, I was quite shocked.

Trev:

Well, I wasn't shocked.

Trev:

But it was like, then it turned out it was actually a, a series of marches

Trev:

organised, to protest, violence, gendered violence against women.

Trev:

And, so so then I thought, well, I better pay some attention to this, seeing

Trev:

thousands of people are on the street.

Trev:

what were you laughing at then, Scott?

Scott:

Oh, just something that St John the Lord Don said.

Scott:

He says, Oh, watch the Cartoon Network on Fox tell their

Scott:

stories are more believable.

Scott:

Yeah.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

So, so what were the marches about?

Trev:

And according to the Guardian, 26 women have been violently killed

Trev:

in the first 114 days of the year.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

According to data compiled by advocacy group Destroy the Joint, they have a

Trev:

project called Counting Dead Women.

Trev:

So that's what it's about, and in a statement posted to X, formerly Twitter,

Trev:

Albanese said, Counting Dead Women.

Trev:

Counting Dead Women.

Trev:

A woman had been killed every four days so far this year, so he

Trev:

was accepting that statistic of 26 women in the first 114 days.

Trev:

And More from the Guardian report was, protesters said they were horrified

Trev:

and outraged by the growing violence with figures from the, Destroy the

Trev:

Joints, Counting Dead Women and Femicide Watchers Red Heart campaign

Trev:

showing that an average of one woman is murdered in domestic violence incidents.

Trev:

Every four days across the country.

Trev:

Last year that figure was one woman a week.

Trev:

Now, that's the report by the Guardian, and where it says one woman is murdered

Trev:

in domestic violence incidents every four days, If they're actually relying

Trev:

on the figures provided by Destroy the Joints, they admit that their figure

Trev:

includes the five women killed in Bondi.

Trev:

So of the 26 killed this year, they've said five of them relate to that incident,

Trev:

which they call gendered violence.

Trev:

But you could hardly call that domestic violence.

Trev:

I wouldn't think.

Trev:

You might call it gendered violence because he seemed to specifically target

Trev:

women, but it's not domestic violence.

Trev:

So, as I'm reading all this stuff, I'm seeing a confusion between,

Trev:

violence, Homicide and domestic violence or domestic homicide.

Joe:

And also there's a difference, there's domestic violence and

Joe:

there's intimate partner violence.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Because domestic violence is also apparent against children

Joe:

and also other way around.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Generally with elderly relatives.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

We'll get on to some statistics about, family violence being by siblings, by

Trev:

children, and by intimate partners.

Trev:

So, so sloppy reporting by the Guardian and just as I'm reading stuff, it's sort

Trev:

of clear that the nature of the protest seemed to be about family domestic

Trev:

violence situation of men committing violence against women that they know.

Trev:

But then using the statistic of the Bondi, for example, to beef up the figures.

Trev:

So, look, where am I getting to with all this?

Trev:

Is just, let's try and understand what's happening.

Trev:

By all means, gather in your thousands in the street and protest about, People

Trev:

being killed unnecessarily, like, but let's just I'm gonna be giving you some

Trev:

statistics that I came across and facts and figures and other things to think

Trev:

about, so From the age a woman is being violently killed in Australia every four

Trev:

days, It used to be one woman a week, but this year an Australian woman is being

Trev:

violently killed every four days, so, quoting some people here, we're looking

Trev:

at a shocking rate of violent deaths of women this year that exceeds anything

Trev:

Australia has experienced in recent years, and um, and quoting the organisers.

Trev:

Remember, these are just the women that we are hearing about.

Trev:

How many women are murdered or missing that we do not hear about?

Trev:

We don't even have a proper funded counting mechanism to tally and record

Trev:

details of women lost to violence.

Trev:

We don't know the true numbers.

Trev:

And the Facebook page, Counting Dead Women Australia, which is maintained

Trev:

by volunteers using verified police reports of women's homicides is

Trev:

recognised as the most accurate tally of women killed by violence.

Trev:

I don't think any of that is correct, and I'm going to refer you to a government

Trev:

site and an article from Crikey.

Trev:

I mean, there are some government statistics about, about homicides,

Trev:

So we'll get on to that.

Joe:

Also, which none of the left wing media will want to

Joe:

acknowledge, unfortunately, seems to be very much community based.

Joe:

As in, Aboriginals are considerably over represented in these numbers.

Joe:

And it's going to be a horrible, horrible balancing act between going in and

Joe:

being authoritarian, and ignoring the, the weakest of the underprivileged.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

What to do about it?

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

yeah.

Trev:

Before I get onto that, because Bernard Keane talks about what do we do about it?

Trev:

As I was watching this report, dear listener, on Channel 7, Sunday

Trev:

night, So the lead article was the demonstrations and this reporting

Trev:

of 26 women killed so far this year.

Trev:

After about 10 or 15 minutes there was another, article in the same news report.

Trev:

Workers deaths.

Trev:

People killed at work.

Trev:

34 so far this year.

Trev:

Last year it was 175 for the whole year.

Trev:

And of course the listener.

Trev:

Most of them are men.

Trev:

according to SafeWork Australia, 93 percent of work related fatalities

Trev:

in 2022 were men, 7 percent female.

Trev:

So, so while this news report talks about 26 women killed in violent sort

Trev:

of homicides, domestic or non domestic.

Trev:

The same report's got 34 men killed at work with not nearly

Trev:

the same amount of outrage.

Trev:

I just watched The Red Pill the other day and that was a documentary where,

Trev:

this lady was very much a feminist and she'd had decided to report on those

Trev:

crazy guys at the men's rights agencies.

Trev:

And sort of at the conclusion of it, decided maybe she

Trev:

wasn't a feminist anymore.

Trev:

And the sort of theme of the documentary was that there were a lot of, bad

Trev:

things happening to men as well.

Trev:

So the particular angle in the documentary wasn't that we should ignore what's

Trev:

happening to women, but at the same time there's a lot of Gender, sort

Trev:

of unequal things happening to men.

Trev:

And I think, sort of workplace deaths were one of the statistics that they

Trev:

were talking about there as well.

Trev:

So, anyway, not saying don't go out and protest, just saying, well,

Trev:

bear in mind these other things.

Trev:

What do we do about it if we say that there is a, a large amount of,

Trev:

Either domestic homicide against women, or or just general homicide.

Trev:

Bernard Keane, writing in Crikey, gave a really strange article.

Trev:

It was a really odd one, because he's saying that the problem can be addressed

Trev:

and he refers to data from the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data, so

Trev:

this is a government organisation, showing domestic and intimate partner homicide

Trev:

rates have more than halved since the 1980s, and, So that's one, in the article

Trev:

he's kind of calling for higher penalties, but he does quote the statistic that since

Trev:

the 1980s, domestic homicide and intimate partner homicide has nearly halved.

Trev:

And he says that there should be harsher penalties.

Trev:

according to Bernard Keane, nothing changes behaviour more than potential

Trev:

offenders knowing they're much more likely to be punished and much more

Trev:

likely to be jailed for longer.

Trev:

I don't know if that's true.

Joe:

No, I think murder is one of those ones where it provably isn't.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

I don't think the murder rates are any less in places that have capital

Joe:

punishment as compared to places that, you know, Scandinavia for instance.

Trev:

Yeah, so I don't think that just people go, Maybe I won't kill this person

Trev:

now because They've mumped up the penalty rates by an extra 10 years last year.

Scott:

Yeah, it's one of those things, I just think, I think

Scott:

Joe's hit the nail on the head.

Scott:

If you're going to commit murder, you're not really in your sound

Scott:

mind, you're just going to do it.

Scott:

I just don't think you're going to be considering the penalties.

Trev:

Yeah, John in the chat room says, those men weren't killed by women

Trev:

though, the ones in the workplace.

Trev:

true, they were killed and, there wasn't much of a fuss made about it.

Trev:

anyway, what else did he say there?

Trev:

oh, he said, yeah, jail them longer and that'll fix the problem.

Trev:

But then he says, true, this runs against arguments about the need to keep

Trev:

Indigenous men and boys out of jail.

Trev:

Oh.

Trev:

and he says, as it's noted by the AIHW, which is this government report,

Trev:

Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people were disproportionately

Trev:

represented in intimate partner violence homicide offenders.

Trev:

So, 27 percent of the offenders and 27 percent of the victims,

Trev:

even though they're only 3.

Trev:

2 percent of the population.

Trev:

So, it's a really strange article to be saying.

Trev:

Yeah, we need to crack down on harsher penalties, but it's probably not going to

Trev:

be real good for the Indigenous community because they are a significant part of

Trev:

the problem here and we really don't want to be throwing Indigenous people into

Joe:

jail if we can avoid it.

Joe:

I have read a couple of articles recently that were saying, really, we need

Joe:

better mental health support and better community support out in regional areas.

Joe:

To stop people getting to a point where they get drunk and abusive, because

Joe:

generally it's alcohol involved.

Trev:

Yeah, yeah.

Trev:

So, anyway, in the Bernard Keene report, article, he refers to this Australian

Trev:

Institute of Health and Welfare.

Trev:

Data, A I H W, and I thought, well, I'd better go and have

Trev:

a look and see what it says.

Trev:

And there's a link in the show notes for the Patrons.

Trev:

now, the report was Current as of 2021.

Trev:

Some information has been updated in 2024, but not, I believe, to the stuff

Trev:

that I'm going to be talking about here.

Trev:

So, these are 2021 figures, which seem to be the latest figures.

Trev:

on family, domestic and sexual violence, according to this government report.

Trev:

So, 2021, one woman was killed every 15 days, by an intimate partner.

Trev:

But, one man was killed every 28 days by an intimate partner, same period.

Trev:

So women, every 15 days, a man every 28.

Trev:

And, what else did they say?

Trev:

There were, in 2021, 78, actually, domestic homicide victims were made

Trev:

up a third of all homicide victims.

Trev:

So, I'm going to use that in these figures as a rough rule of thumb, that,

Trev:

that of all homicide victims, let's just assume that about a third are domestic.

Trev:

Because that's what it was in 2021.

Trev:

So, in 2020, 2021, 78 domestic homicide victims, 38 were killed by an intimate

Trev:

partner and 40 were killed by a family member who was not an intimate partner.

Trev:

So 14 killed by a parent, 11 by a child, four killed by a sibling, and

Trev:

11 killed by a family member other than a child, parent, or sibling.

Trev:

Maybe an uncle or aunt or something like that.

Trev:

So, so yeah.

Trev:

and so females 25 were killed by their intimate partner.

Trev:

13 men were killed by their intimate partner.

Trev:

Scott, it's possible, I guess, their intimate partner was a gay partner.

Scott:

Yeah, potentially, but, I

Trev:

It's also possible that the females were killed by a

Trev:

female intimate partner as well.

Scott:

Exactly.

Scott:

I haven't actually I couldn't tell you about the whole domestic violence

Scott:

within same sex relationships.

Scott:

All I can go is by You know, an anecdote is not data, but I haven't seen any

Scott:

domestic violence or anything like that amongst my group of friends.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

So, so yeah, a significant number of men, are also killed.

Trev:

and so do I actually give that figure then and all that?

Trev:

let me just find here.

Trev:

let me just give you the figure.

Trev:

So in all domestic relationships, so 45 females, 33 males for a total

Trev:

of 78 in the 2020 2021 period.

Trev:

So I bet that is a surprising statistic to a lot of people as to the number of

Trev:

men who were killed in domestic homicide.

Trev:

33.

Trev:

And females was 45.

Trev:

So, and you know, of the 33, 13 were, intimate partners.

Trev:

Who knows if that's a male friend or not.

Trev:

but again, with the females, who knows if it was a female friend or not,

Trev:

but you know, all these assumptions.

Trev:

So,

Joe:

interests.

Joe:

The US CDC actually have, one year, so they do a yearly report on, violence.

Joe:

And one year they had my, sexuality of the victim.

Joe:

and yeah, the figures bear out that actually gay relationships have the

Joe:

lowest forms of intimate partnership.

Joe:

Sorry, male, gay male relationships.

Trev:

Okay, so we probably wouldn't see a significant number of men in the Killing

Trev:

of men, men killing men column there.

Trev:

It would probably most likely be females.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trev:

Based on that.

Trev:

Okay.

Trev:

Right.

Trev:

What other statistics are in this government website?

Trev:

the intimate partner homicide victimization rate decreased from 0.

Trev:

7 to 0.

Trev:

2 per 100, 000.

Trev:

basically in the 30 year period from 1990 to 2020.

Trev:

And, proportion of women who experienced physical or sexual violence by cohabit,

Trev:

a cohabiting partner, decreased from 1.7% to 0.9% between 2016 and 2021.

Trev:

So, so there's just some interesting statistics to keep in

Trev:

mind about what is happening with domestic, homicide that in fact.

Trev:

It's a strong rate of, of male victims in this, and um, other family members

Trev:

are involved in committing it, and

Scott:

yeah.

Scott:

Is that male victims of other males, or male victims of women?

Trev:

We don't know, it just, when it says intimate partner, it doesn't say

Trev:

whether the intimate partner is same sex or, same gender or opposite gender, so.

Joe:

But telling you you're safer than you used to be doesn't sell newspapers.

Trev:

Yeah, and, anyway,

Trev:

there's, there we are.

Trev:

What more can I say without getting

Joe:

into trouble?

Joe:

I mean, talking, talking of that, I saw a news headline on Friday,

Joe:

Saturday, I can't remember.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Courier fail again.

Joe:

you know, boy abducted at knifepoint, 11 year old boy

Joe:

abducted at knifepoint in Logan.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

And you go, Oh my God, that's horrible.

Joe:

And then I saw a follow up article probably on the ABC that said, Yeah,

Joe:

he was pulled into a car by people who alleged that he'd thrown rock at the car.

Joe:

So it wasn't another Daniel Morecambe where he was being abducted.

Trev:

Yeah.

Joe:

It was these people had seen him vandalizing the car and decided to

Joe:

take matters into their own hands.

Joe:

Now that's not a good thing.

Joe:

I'm not, I'm not advocating it, but that wasn't what the headline was.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

Yep.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Headline made you feel that you could be innocently, a kid could be

Trev:

innocently minding his own business, abducted, where in fact there was

Trev:

a little bit of a backstory to it, which didn't justify abduction.

Trev:

No, not at all.

Trev:

Yes.

Joe:

But, but did kind of explain what had happened.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

So anyway, that's the, fun facts, if you can call them that, about,

Trev:

Domestic violence and just trying to understand the situation a bit better.

Trev:

Now,

Joe:

John's pointing out 49 truck drivers killed in Australia.

Trev:

Yeah.

Joe:

and, yeah, I mean, that is Shocking because that's

Joe:

almost certainly overworked.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Truck drivers, presumably not doing it for fun.

Trev:

Yeah.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

But, it's, it's going to be overtired, falling asleep at the wheel and

Joe:

that's a danger to everybody.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

They die, but also they kill people.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

So, So anyway, that's that story.

Trev:

Um, now I mentioned in the, in the intro how chuffed I was to find Australian

Trev:

Bureau of Statistics saying that crime had been dropping, which was contrary

Trev:

to the propaganda of the courier fail.

Trev:

And then to my surprise, Amazement, The Courier Fail comes out with Queensland

Trev:

statistics showing that seemingly crime has been on the rise for two years.

Trev:

And things like, in this report that came out, assaults up 15%, other

Trev:

offences up 51%, sexual offences up 5%.

Trev:

Robberies up 16, only one down being Homicide down 14, actually Other Homicide.

Trev:

I don't understand Other Homicide down 14, but Homicide up 31.

Trev:

a whole bunch of, sort of, bad news for the Labor Miles government.

Trev:

And, I'm all ready for my friends who I were talking to before, so you

Trev:

realise that Courier Fowl has been running a campaign and the crime's

Trev:

down, next time they see me they're going to go, Well, Trevor, what

Trev:

about the Queensland crime statistics showing that, in fact, crime is up?

Trev:

And, I've had a look, and I'm, I'm, looked at the figures, and what it seems to be

Trev:

indicating is that there was a way, a change in the way the statistics looked.

Trev:

were created or the motivation for entering the statistics.

Trev:

So according to the, now let me just get this straight, where are we talking about?

Trev:

Um, it's a report, I haven't got the actual name of it, but it's, it's from

Trev:

the government, looking at the government, Queensland government statistician.

Trev:

So what it shows is that according to this report, I'll quote them,

Trev:

that, there were three times as many assault victims recorded in

Trev:

2022 23 than nine years earlier.

Trev:

And most of the increase, 68%, Recorded in the last two years.

Trev:

And it says here, since the police recording change was implemented

Trev:

in July 21, driving the upward trend in assault victims were

Trev:

common assault and serious assault.

Trev:

Scott, we can hear you loud and clear when you're typing, sorry.

Trev:

Thank you.

Trev:

so, driving the upward trend in assault victims were common

Trev:

assault and serious assault.

Trev:

but, but what it seems to be is that, a recording change in 2021 and what it

Trev:

did was from 1st of July, 2021, police officers are required to record all

Trev:

criminal offences associated with domestic and family violence investigations.

Trev:

So it seems to be that there was a change that took place, forcing

Trev:

police officers to record stuff.

Trev:

That they weren't recording before in relation to domestic and

Trev:

family violence investigations.

Trev:

And maybe that is what has caused this spike in figures, because then

Trev:

interestingly, the State Labor Government pulled out figures for the last nine

Trev:

months showing that total crime had gone down 1 percent in the last nine months.

Trev:

That of course was buried in the Courier Mail article about three

Trev:

quarters of the way in very small type.

Trev:

So, the headline being Crime up, you know, 16%, and then buried in

Trev:

a paragraph was, of course, in the last nine months, it was down by 1%.

Trev:

Don't you worry about that.

Trev:

So, anyway, it all goes to show that you can muck around with statistics.

Trev:

If you torture the data long enough, it will confess to anything.

Joe:

That's the one.

Joe:

Didn't we

Trev:

learn that in the COVID epidemic?

Trev:

Oh yes.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

So, anyway, I will, try and get that.

Trev:

Straighten my head and maybe look a bit more at that over time.

Trev:

But that seems to be the explanation.

Trev:

And the other thing that really complicates it is that COVID 19, of

Trev:

course, in In that period, there was a lot less movement of people, a lot more

Trev:

restrictions, crime was down because of the movement restrictions on people.

Trev:

So

Joe:

Well, certain crimes were down.

Trev:

Yeah, but it certainly had an effect.

Trev:

And again, they say that in these statistics.

Trev:

So with statistics, it's always good to compare apples with apples, and

Trev:

that's sometimes really hard to do.

Trev:

Yeah, there we go.

Trev:

The third item from this Channel 7 news report on Sunday night that, that

Trev:

got me was, was, they, they reported that our Australian government, thanks

Trev:

to Deputy Prime Minister and Defence Minister Richard Myles, has decided to

Trev:

give a hundred million dollars in aid.

Trev:

for Ukraine.

Trev:

And as the report, as the newsreader said, experts say it's the least that we

Trev:

could do having reneged on our agreement to provide helicopters, blah, blah, blah.

Trev:

And I'm listening to this and when they said experts say, I'm going, in my

Trev:

mind, Which fucking experts are these?

Trev:

Like, who, who is saying this?

Trev:

Who are these experts say?

Trev:

And a little bit later on, out gets trotted Peter Jennings, Executive

Trev:

Director of ASPE, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, and He basically, of

Trev:

course, was the expert who was saying this, and of course, the average person

Trev:

is not given any context at all about who Peter Jennings is, who API is,

Trev:

how the organization is funded by the Defense Force and defense suppliers.

Trev:

And of course, they want military equipment used so

Trev:

that more can be provided.

Trev:

It's got the lack of context.

Trev:

Just gave me the shits, basically.

Trev:

I was railing at the TV.

Trev:

Can you blame me?

Scott:

No, I can't blame you.

Scott:

I just think you've got to stop watching The Seven Years.

Scott:

It's one of those things, I used to watch the Nine News until it

Scott:

just got so ridiculous, I thought to myself, I've got to find some

Scott:

real news, so I went to the ABC.

Scott:

Now it's getting a little ridiculous, so I'm going to SBS.

Trev:

Yeah,

Joe:

yeah.

Joe:

so I don't know about the Australian funding, but the American funding

Joe:

that's just passed Congress.

Joe:

Yes, is actually not being given to the Ukrainian.

Joe:

What really is happening is they're giving the old equipment that is getting out of

Joe:

date and needs replacing to the Ukrainian.

Joe:

That's what we're doing too.

Joe:

Right, and buying brand new with the money.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

So, so realistically, A, we're not giving them that amount of money, we're

Joe:

saving ourselves decommissioning costs.

Joe:

Because we have to decommission this equipment.

Joe:

Because you can't, you can't just take a gun down to a scrapyard and

Joe:

say, here you go, mate, chuck it in the pile with the rest of it.

Joe:

You actually have to do something to make it safe before you can get rid of it.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

So, so, and there's a cost involved in that.

Joe:

So realistically, what we're doing is we're giving them our second

Joe:

hand goods and buying ourselves brand new stuff off the shelf.

Joe:

Correct.

Trev:

That is true as well.

Trev:

Absolutely spot on.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

So it's not like a crate of cash is sent across to these people and they're said,

Trev:

you know, buy whatever you want with this.

Trev:

It's, well, we've ordered, or we've figured out what you're going to be

Trev:

supplied with and we'll be paying these people and it'll just arrive.

Trev:

Yeah, and it's probably our secondhand shit that we don't want anymore.

Joe:

It's like going through your pantry and going, right, all of these

Joe:

tinned goods are about to expire.

Joe:

I'll take them down to the food bank, but I'm going to claim the cost of

Joe:

my new shopping against the groceries that I've just handed away despite

Joe:

the fact it was gonna go out of date.

Joe:

Correct.

Joe:

Or in a week.

Trev:

And I'm gonna pat myself in the back and go, oh, I've, I've donated.

Trev:

X amount of dollars to charity, where in fact, yes, this is

Trev:

precisely what is going on here, Joe.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

And, experts say, and that's, Channel 7 News drove me crazy, but gave me 37

Trev:

minutes of content for episode 426.

Trev:

So for that, for that, I'm grateful.

Trev:

Oh, grateful.

Trev:

I forgot to do, what are we grateful for?

Trev:

I'm grateful for Dr Seuss books, because you've had to read books to grandchildren.

Trev:

I quite like clever rhyming books, and of course Dr Seuss is often very

Trev:

clever, and it sort of, it entertains me at one level and entertains

Trev:

them at another level, so yeah.

Joe:

It wasn't until my daughter was old enough to have books read

Joe:

to her that I realised how bad most children's poetry is, and how good A.

Joe:

A.

Joe:

Milne was.

Joe:

and Roald Dahl are in comparison.

Trev:

A.

Trev:

A.

Trev:

Milne?

Trev:

Yeah, so Winnie the Pooh.

Trev:

Oh, okay.

Trev:

Is it rhyming?

Trev:

Is Winnie the Pooh rhyming?

Joe:

Winnie the Pooh, well, so, his other books, he's done a whole load of poetry.

Joe:

Okay.

Joe:

And it is very, very good.

Joe:

and then, Roald Dahl did Horrible verse, something verse, which takes

Joe:

the historic children's nursery rhymes and turns them on the head.

Joe:

So, Goldilocks was a horrible girl who broke into this poor

Joe:

bear's house and broke all their furniture and ate all their food.

Trev:

I've got to find that.

Trev:

It's

Joe:

brilliant.

Scott:

Rob Taylor's very amusing.

Scott:

Yes.

Joe:

Yeah, okay.

Joe:

Pity about him being an anti Semite, but anyway.

Scott:

Oh, I was in anti Semite, wasn't I?

Joe:

Oh, God,

Scott:

yes.

Scott:

Okay, gotcha.

Trev:

Well, you know, the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

is full of university professors who apparently are anti Semite as well.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

John in the chat room says, that's the way it's always been done, the Marshall Plan.

Trev:

Correct, John?

Trev:

Yes, indeed, as as Cameron Reilly says.

Trev:

Talks about, when referring to the Marshall Plan, how, yeah, it was

Trev:

essentially money provided to American businesses and, from American taxpayers.

Trev:

So, yes, there we go.

Trev:

That was, that was that one.

Trev:

What am I up to next?

Trev:

Um, Israel, Gaza.

Trev:

Israel is thought to be preparing to send troops into Rafah, which is the

Trev:

area in the southern part of Gaza.

Scott:

Where they're all told to evacuate to?

Scott:

Yes.

Trev:

They're ready to wipe them out.

Trev:

I just Yeah.

Joe:

Well, I mean, if you hear Jared Kirshner, he wants Israel to go in

Joe:

and finish the job off so that they can get that nice waterfront property.

Joe:

Yeah,

Trev:

so these poor people have been just crammed into a corner down the

Trev:

bottom and you know, you just couldn't put anything past Israel at this moment.

Trev:

It looks like they're going to completely demolish them down there and say, well,

Trev:

you didn't leave Rafah and we told you to.

Scott:

Yeah, but you know, if they, if they stay in the North,

Scott:

they get shot at by the Israelis.

Scott:

If they, now they're in the South, so they're getting bombed by the Israelis.

Joe:

Yeah.

Scott:

You know.

Scott:

I know that we've got to be critical of Israel and I am critical of Israel,

Scott:

but I honestly believe it now is the time for us to put some pressure

Scott:

on the Egyptians to open the border and let these poor bastards out.

Trev:

How many should we take?

Scott:

Sorry?

Trev:

How many should we take?

Scott:

I don't know.

Scott:

You know, I just think to myself that we've got to, no, I don't think you

Scott:

actually want them to leave because you want them to be there to actually be the

Scott:

backbone of the new Palestinian state.

Scott:

But, I honestly believe they should open the borders up to allow them

Scott:

to leave into Egypt temporarily.

Scott:

If they can come over there for six months

Trev:

Temporarily?

Trev:

Do you reckon the Israelis, if they're forced out over the border, do you reckon

Trev:

the Israelis will ever let them back in?

Scott:

No, they won't.

Scott:

But

Trev:

So it'll be

Scott:

permanent.

Scott:

Sorry?

Trev:

It will be

Joe:

permanent.

Joe:

That's why Egypt never opened the borders.

Joe:

Yeah.

Scott:

Anyway, I just think to myself that Egypt's got to actually You know,

Scott:

Egypt was the first country that had a, did diplomatically recognize Israel.

Scott:

It was after their failure in the Seven Day War, and I just think to myself

Scott:

that it's time for them to actually use their long standing relationship

Scott:

with Israel to apply pressure to them to say, do not bomb Rafah.

Scott:

And if they do bomb Rafah, then they're going to have to open the borders

Scott:

up, let the people out and that sort of thing, and then they've got to

Scott:

try and shove them back in there.

Trev:

If the Egyptian argument was, don't bomb Rafah, otherwise we'll open

Trev:

the borders and let them into here.

Scott:

Then they will bomb Rafah.

Scott:

Precisely.

Scott:

It's one of those things.

Scott:

What they would

Trev:

want to hear.

Scott:

Yeah.

Scott:

It's one of those things.

Trev:

Anyway, remember UNRWA, which was a UN group that was providing aid relief?

Trev:

And because Israel said, look, there's about a dozen employees

Trev:

who we reckon are members of Hamas, out of thousands of employees, the

Trev:

Australian government and others,

Scott:

I thought the allegations were

Joe:

actually that they'd been involved in planning the, whatever

Joe:

it was, the October whatever.

Scott:

October 7th attack?

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

I just thought it was that they were Hamas.

Trev:

I didn't know.

Trev:

Are all Hamas guilty of being involved in planning the attack?

Trev:

No idea.

Trev:

So, I, I, I only heard that they were accused of, of being Hamas.

Trev:

But in any event, a UN report has come out demolishing Israeli propaganda campaign.

Trev:

In January, Israel claimed, without evidence, that some

Trev:

UNRWA staff were members of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad.

Trev:

And had participated in the Hamas led attack.

Trev:

There you go, Joe.

Trev:

So the allegation from Israel was that they had participated

Trev:

on the 7th of October.

Trev:

Israeli allegations promptly caused the US and other Western nations to cut funding.

Trev:

The Guardian reported on the 22nd of April, what's that, seven days ago?

Joe:

A week ago, yeah.

Trev:

That the Kelowna report, which was commissioned by the UN in the wake of

Trev:

these allegations, found that UNRWA had regularly supplied Israel with lists of

Trev:

its employees for vetting, and that the Israeli government has not informed UNRWA.

Trev:

Of any concerns relating to any UNRWA staff based on

Trev:

these staff lists since 2011.

Trev:

That's pretty amazing that, UNRWA was actually giving the Israeli

Trev:

government its employee list.

Trev:

the review, this Colonna Review, Colonna Review, was drafted with the help

Trev:

of three Nordic Research Institutes.

Trev:

It'll be published later on Monday.

Trev:

Confirms Israel is not as yet to provide any evidence of its claims.

Trev:

And it notes that in March, Israel made public claims that a significant

Trev:

number of unright employees are members of terrorist organizations.

Trev:

Quote, the report says, However, Israel is yet to provide

Trev:

supporting evidence of this.

Trev:

So, UN group, saying thanks for nothing Israel when it

Trev:

comes to that sort of stuff.

Trev:

China.

Trev:

Update for episode 426.

Trev:

we've just had Blinken over there in China.

Trev:

His Secretary of State?

Trev:

Yes, he is.

Trev:

Prior to him was Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen.

Trev:

She was over for four days and, she says Washington will not accept new industries

Trev:

being decimated by Chinese imports.

Trev:

Yellen used her second trip into China in nine months to complain that China's

Trev:

overinvestment has built factory capacity, far exceeding domestic

Trev:

demand, while fast growing exports of these products threaten firms in the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

and other countries.

Trev:

Basically, China is making too much cheap stuff for export.

Trev:

It's a threat to U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

industry.

Trev:

I think I have, I think I will find a video about this.

Trev:

Be with me one second.

Trev:

Um, Oh, hang on.

Trev:

Let me try that again.

Trev:

A source, video.

Trev:

Nearly there.

Trev:

Here's Yellen coming up.

Trev:

Janet Yellen.

Trev:

What's she yelling about?

Trev:

Yeah.

Yellen:

Now we're seeing an increase in business investment.

Yellen:

And a number of new industries targeted by the PRC's industrial policy, and

Yellen:

that includes electric vehicles, lithium ion batteries, and solar.

Yellen:

China is now simply too large for the rest of the world to

Yellen:

absorb this enormous capacity.

Yellen:

Actions taken by the PRC today can shift world prices.

Yellen:

And when the global market is flooded by artificially cheap Chinese products,

Yellen:

the viability of American and other foreign firms is put into question.

Trev:

God damn that Adam Smith and the whole free enterprise

Trev:

and let the market work.

Trev:

Sort of stuff.

Trev:

Well,

Scott:

she did say artificially,

Trev:

Jim.

Trev:

She did say, yes.

Trev:

Well,

Scott:

I just think that, it's like I was listening today on, 7am.

Scott:

They were talking about the, Australia, you know, the future of Australian

Scott:

manufacturing and all that sort of thing.

Scott:

And he said that he reckons it's been designed to be a string of announceables

Scott:

up here in Queensland to try and bolster, Albanese's chance in the next election.

Scott:

And he makes a hell of a lot of sense because he says, you know, if we're

Scott:

actually going to try and subsidize manufacturing of solar panels in this

Scott:

country, we're going to end up, you know, we'll never be able to outsubsidize.

Scott:

We'll never be able to outsubsidize what the Chinese can produce them for.

Scott:

You know, I just think that we've got to take the wins where we get them.

Scott:

And that is that China is able to produce solar panels a hell of a

Scott:

lot cheaper than what we can here.

Scott:

So we just got to buy them from them.

Scott:

You know, it's one of those things, you know, had the,

Trev:

unless we, for the security reasons, decide we need.

Trev:

Some sort of manufacturing capacity so that when there's a pandemic we

Trev:

can make ventilators or something.

Trev:

Like we might decide economically it doesn't make sense, but just in case

Trev:

the world goes to shit and international shipping closes, we, we might need

Trev:

some capacity to make some stuff.

Trev:

So we just, we'll uneconomically subsidize it.

Scott:

I agree with that, but they are such small industries and that type

Scott:

of thing that you could have them.

Scott:

You can have them government owned and that sort of stuff that you just know

Scott:

you're always going to lose money on

Joe:

them.

Scott:

You know, that's no problem at all.

Scott:

But I think that with solar panels, we've just got to accept that that

Scott:

race has already been won by China.

Joe:

Yeah, I mean, we should have been inventing the technology, not

Joe:

trying to manufacture the shit.

Scott:

Well, we did actually invent the technology all those years

Scott:

ago, but then the guy left and went over to China and that sort

Scott:

of stuff and he set up over there.

Joe:

Cause our government had no vision.

Scott:

Interest in it.

Scott:

Yeah.

Joe:

Right.

Scott:

Yeah.

Scott:

It was, it was, at some, at one point in the past, I think it was 20 or 30 years

Scott:

ago, Australia had the largest solar manufacturing industry in the world, but

Scott:

we couldn't produce them at the same, the same rate that China could and the,

Scott:

the same low price that China could.

Scott:

So they ended up moving over to China.

Joe:

And the

Scott:

guy that was actually over here, he was studying at the

Scott:

university of New South Wales.

Scott:

And he was actually Chinese.

Scott:

He came over here, studied, set it up, got her working and all

Scott:

that sort of stuff, said to the government, will you help me out?

Scott:

They said no.

Scott:

So he went over to China and he said to the Chinese

Scott:

government, will you help me out?

Scott:

And they said, oh yes, we will.

Joe:

And

Scott:

now they dominate the planet with, with solar cells, like, you

Scott:

know, the solar cells on my roof are all Chinese manufactured, you

Scott:

know, the battery is Korean, the inverter is Korean, but the cells

Scott:

themselves are manufactured in China.

Joe:

I'd like to see, the UQ, yeah, UQ, we're talking about doing biodiesel.

Joe:

Growing it with algae.

Joe:

And that is the perfect replacement for the mining industry is huge algae

Joe:

farms out in the coal fields because all you need is a source of water,

Joe:

doesn't have to be particularly clean, some sunlight and large area.

Joe:

And they reckon they can manufacture diesel at around the dollar.

Joe:

Wow.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Which considering how much we pay To ship it in from overseas.

Scott:

yeah, that's, that's true.

Scott:

They have been looking at that for a long time.

Scott:

There was, They were using it as a way of, they were trying to

Scott:

supplement the, geos, sequestration.

Scott:

They were saying, well, we can actually suck the carbon diox out of

Scott:

the air growing, de growing, algae.

Scott:

And then after they, they did converted into the diesel.

Trev:

Anyway, Yellen is completely hypocritical and the US government,

Trev:

because now they're talking about it's unfair that China is so cheap

Trev:

and they're wanting to impose.

Trev:

You know, tariffs and other restrictions to protect American industry, whereas

Trev:

since the Second World War, the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

has been demanding that other countries open their, open up to free trade

Trev:

to allow American multinationals to come into the country, and in fact

Trev:

has worked with the IMF and the World Bank to ensure that the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

Developing countries could not get loans unless they opened up their

Trev:

countries to, foreign investment, foreign ownership of, essential infrastructure

Trev:

and, and reduced all tariffs.

Trev:

And now that the US is, you know, looking again at tariffs to protect

Trev:

its industry, It's coming around full swing because, you, the good ol US of

Trev:

A was built on protectionist policies.

Trev:

So, drawing from Wikipedia here, dear listener, Britain was the first.

Trev:

However, its most ardent user was the US.

Trev:

This is for protection mechanisms and Britain initially didn't want to

Trev:

industrialize the American colonies and implemented policies to that effect.

Trev:

So they banned high value added manufacturing activities.

Trev:

in the US colony.

Trev:

So, the American Revolution was to some extent a war against this

Trev:

policy, in which the commercial elite of the colonies rebelled against

Trev:

being forced to pay a lesser role in the emerging Atlantic economy.

Trev:

And this explains why, after independence, the Tariff Act of 1789 was the second

Trev:

bill the Republic signed by President Washington, which imposed a tariff of 5%.

Trev:

And, during that period of the early American, days, most American

Trev:

intellectuals and politicians during the country's catching up period felt

Trev:

that the free trade theory advocated by Classical economists was not

Trev:

suited to their country, and the U.

Trev:

S.

Trev:

went against the advice of economists like Adam Smith, Ricardo, and

Trev:

Jean Baptiste Say, how would you pronounce that in French, Joe, S A Y?

Trev:

Ah, Say.

Trev:

Just so, okay, and tried to protect its industries and, that's what they

Trev:

did all the way up until the Second World War, so, let me see, between 1792

Trev:

and the war with Britain in 1812, the average, the average tariff was 12.

Trev:

5%, then they doubled to 25%, and by 1820, America's average tariff was 40%.

Trev:

And that, dear listener, is how American industry was born, because they were able

Trev:

to protect these industries and get them growing and feeding the local economy,

Trev:

and then once they were competitive, they were then ready to take on the world.

Trev:

And so after the Second World War, with America dominant, they then said to

Trev:

the rest of the global South and other countries, well, you guys have to, What do

Trev:

you, what do you mean you've got tariffs?

Trev:

You gotta get rid of those?

Trev:

Free trade?

Joe:

Yeah, I mean, the Second World War, of course, America was

Joe:

spared the destruction of Europe.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

And, and loaned, yeah, I mean, they, they loaned, they didn't give.

Joe:

the equipment to their, their allies, so the allies were in debt.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trev:

So it's just a turning of, the original roots of, of the American

Trev:

economy back to some protectionism.

Trev:

And, there you go.

Trev:

A bit of the story there.

Trev:

And finally to finish up with, what do you think of a four day week?

Scott:

I'd love a four day week.

Joe:

I knew people who worked a four day week, but it was four ten hour days.

Joe:

Right.

Joe:

As opposed to four eight hour days.

Joe:

See, that

Scott:

honestly wouldn't worry me if it was four ten hour days.

Trev:

Well, why not let's have four eight hour days?

Trev:

So, there was an article in the John Menardew blog, John Wiggan in his post

Trev:

saying four day workweeks are inevitable, saying that pro productivity has risen

Trev:

in the last 50 years, but the hours we put in at work haven't changed.

Trev:

And

Joe:

yeah, but that's all gravy for the, owners, business owners.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

Yeah.

Trev:

well, he says at first sight, that might indicate a 20% fall in productivity.

Trev:

As measured by output per worker.

Trev:

But the fall would be less than that because in most occupations there are

Trev:

diminishing returns to working hours.

Trev:

That would be true.

Trev:

There's a lot of people filling in time, watching the clock go around.

Trev:

You could get their work done in four days.

Scott:

I was guilty of that myself.

Scott:

You know, you'd be watching the clock for the final two hours.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

So, he's got a website you can support, 87 percent of the time.

Trev:

Yeah, but you could make

Joe:

them work for longer hours, back up to you.

Joe:

40 a week and then just sack more people and save yourself more money.

Joe:

You could.

Trev:

so Australia's got a bit of a reputation as being a bunch of slackers

Trev:

when it comes to work, you know.

Scott:

We're not actually.

Trev:

No, we're not.

Trev:

So there is a chart here which shows that hours worked per year

Trev:

on, with high income OECD countries.

Trev:

And let's just start at the top for the, for the countries where

Trev:

the people work the most in terms of number of hours per year.

Trev:

Korea.

Trev:

I'm assuming that's South Korea.

Trev:

Well, we're talking on the OECD countries.

Trev:

So yeah, South Korea, Israel, United States, New Zealand, and then Australia.

Trev:

Now the countries I list from now on, dear listener, work less hours than us.

Trev:

Canada, Japan, Ireland, United Kingdom, Switzerland, Belgium, France,

Trev:

Finland, Luxembourg, Iceland, Austria, Sweden, Netherlands, Norway, Denmark,

Trev:

and right down the bottom, Germany.

Trev:

So we, tend to compare ourselves with Americans and we know that

Trev:

they're overworked, but, we put in more hours than the Japanese.

Trev:

And they're supposed to be the epitome of a workaholic.

Trev:

And look at the Germans, they shut down everything on Sunday, where

Trev:

the Lutherans take all the Catholic public holidays as well as their

Trev:

own, and the Catholics take all the Lutheran holidays as well as their own.

Trev:

And Germany and Australia are closely matched in terms of per capita income

Trev:

and other indicators of material living standards, and the Germans

Trev:

can achieve that with much less toil.

Trev:

And in fact, If you knocked 20 percent off our annual working hours, we would

Trev:

still be working longer than the Germans.

Joe:

Yeah, but you see the Germans CEOs are paid less than Australian CEOs.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

And that's just not fair.

Trev:

Yes.

Trev:

So, so there's a good argument for the, that's the best argument we've got for

Trev:

the four day working week, is that, even with it, the average number of

Trev:

hours worked by Aussies would be still, less than what the Germans are doing.

Trev:

Same.

Trev:

There we go.

Trev:

Try that with your boss next time you have a performance review.

Trev:

Do you listen?

Trev:

If it doesn't work out well, don't blame me.

Joe:

Well, ChatGPT is going to replace us all anyway.

Joe:

Did you try any of that AI stuff, Joe?

Trev:

well, yeah, I summarised

Joe:

some videos with it, but that's about it.

Trev:

Yeah, I've been using it to produce the show notes, so it's

Trev:

been okay, I think, for producing the show notes and for finding the

Trev:

chapter timestamp marks, so, yeah.

Trev:

It's, it's,

Joe:

Okay, as a starting point, it's quite good at doing rote work,

Joe:

but I wouldn't want to use it for anything particularly intellectual.

Joe:

It's perfectly good for the Murdoch press.

Trev:

Yes, that'd do the job there, but there's no way AI could have

Trev:

produced It does do the job there.

Trev:

Yes, there's no way it could have produced a podcast as fine as

Trev:

this one that you've enjoyed, dear listener, for the last 61 minutes.

Trev:

Well,

Joe:

Dan Savage.

Joe:

Who does a podcast, love and sex podcast, relationship advice, wrote

Joe:

his intro to one of his episodes, with one of the chat GPT models or

Joe:

one of the large language models.

Joe:

And it just sounded, it was full of fluff.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

It had no substance to it, it was very saying a lot but not saying

Trev:

anything of any substance.

Trev:

It always strikes me when you ask it, like I hardly use it, but it always

Trev:

sounds like, imagine you've set an assignment, or a test, Tell me about XYZ.

Trev:

And there's a kid who's never read any of the material, just uses bullshitty

Trev:

language to try to give the impression that he does, by drawing out what

Trev:

he can from the actual question.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Not

Trev:

really adding much to it.

Trev:

So, yeah, a lot of fluff and not a lot of insight, but anyway,

Trev:

who knows where it'll finish up.

Trev:

Right, Scott, you've got to go to bed early.

Scott:

Yes, I do.

Trev:

Yep, I've got stuff to do.

Trev:

Joe's got stuff to do.

Trev:

He's got tech guy stuff.

Trev:

Maybe not.

Trev:

Dear listener, hope you enjoyed that episode.

Trev:

We'll, we'll be back next week with something.

Trev:

Talk to you then.

Trev:

Bye for now.

Scott:

And it's a good night from me.

Trev:

And it's a good night

Scott:

from

Trev:

him.

Scott:

Good night.

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