There is much wailing and gnashing of teeth over the news that Toyota will follow its fellow foreign-owned carmakers GM Holden, Ford and Mitsubishi in ending car assembly in Australia. But at least from an economic point of view, there shouldn't be. The basic problem for the Australian car industry has nothing to do with … Continue reading Only sentimentalism could have saved the Australian car industry
Category: Transport
The death of Great Train Robber (which, rather like the Holy Roman Empire, is a descriptive phrase that falls down on all possible counts) Ronnie Biggs has led to some predictable, polarised reactions: the geezer-ish "he was a fackin' legend!", and the handwringing "but he was a violent cwiminal!". Both are fairly stupid. Ronnie Biggs … Continue reading Ronnie Biggs wasn’t a hero or a villain, just an idiot
The average woman weighs less than the average man, as does the average child. This is undeniably true. By far the most important cost for the average aeroplane flight is fuel, which is directly dependent on total take-off weight. This is undeniably true. The average woman joining a passenger aeroplane flight carries more luggage than … Continue reading Consistency, aviation and discrimination
I've not abandoned this blog - just, whilst struggling with painful paid work on the kind of social media and consumer goods marketing work I tend to post here (it's rewarding and worthwhile paid work, but whilst working on it for pay I'm not so keen to blog on it for no money), most of … Continue reading Why credit ratings weren’t important in the Thameslink deal
Since I've been blethering on about aviation, that's the quiz topic: 1) Which single airport (domestic or international) is the most popular passenger destination for people flying out of Boston Logan Airport? 2) Where was Air Berlin headquartered for the first 12 years of its existence? 3) Out of the top 40 international destination airports … Continue reading Dull Friday quiz
From an occasional correspondent who knows about this sort of thing: RR engines do not like oil in the wrong places because it may stop the air-cooled turbine blades being cooled All RR "B" checks are supposed to include a look for oil in the wrong places Qantas seem less good at finding it than … Continue reading Not from me, on Qantas and Rolls-Royce
Here's Felix Salmon Justin Fox standing in for Felix Salmon, on the economic impact of the socialist Truman government's evil confiscatory tax policies: During the Korean War, Congress enacted an excess profits tax meant to keep military contractors from, well, profiteering. In its infinite wisdom, Congress defined excess profits as anything above what a company … Continue reading More fun with marginal tax rates
The suggestion that the NSW government had done nothing wrong would normally seem unlikely, irrespective of context. Even more so when the context is a $2.6bn capital investment project that’s at risk of collapsing, requiring a massive government bailout, or both. However, the funding shortfall threatening the public-private partnership (PPP) to build 78 new Waratah … Continue reading Waratah trains: why the NSW government isn’t at fault
There are mild signs of upset at the Coalition opting to cut the number of new speed cameras. There shouldn't be. For one: speed cameras are, entirely, a voluntary tax on idiots. Most non-urban speed limits are far lower than the safe speed for the average vehicle on the road in question driven by the … Continue reading Tories, speed cameras, and Voluntary Idiot Tax
Within a few years, there will only be about five real long-haul airlines, all based around the current alliance systems. The non-alliance airlines will stop flying long-haul, or where national egos won't allow that to happen they'll cut down to a couple of planes on flagship routes that nobody in their right mind would use … Continue reading We have just OneWorld, but we live in different ones