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Within the developed world, recent Australian political history is uniquely turbulent. This situation invokes indecision regarding investment decisions in both the real economy and the financial markets. This paper explores the relationship between uncertainty in Australian federal election polling and resulting financial market uncertainty. Empirical evidence suggests that increasing (decreasing) levels of uncertainty around the election result induce higher (lower) levels of uncertainty in financial markets. The effect is more pronounced as polling day approaches. Industry-level analysis suggests that the base materials sector is most significantly affected by election uncertainty in Australia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In mid-2014, Australian consumer affairs ministers announced that they would together set 'a national, legally enforceable definition of free-range eggs'. A response to significant conflict, claims and counterclaims about what free-range should mean, the proposed code could take the form of a mandatory information standard under the Australian Consumer Law. This paper asks whether this approach would adequately respond to the underlying conflict between various actors as to what free-range means. Conflict over the meaning of free-range on the label is the latest expression in an ongoing series of challenges, defences and counter-challenges to the legitimacy of intense, industrial-scale animal food production and particularly conventional cage egg production. This paper briefly explains how it is that the regulation of welfare of layer hens is now largely a matter of voluntary labelling for consumer choice rather than mandatory government regulation of animal welfare in production conditions. It goes on to critically evaluate whether the current network of voluntary regulation of free-range labelling adequately informs consumers about animal welfare conditions using data collected about the claims on egg carton labels between 2012 and 2014 to do so. It goes on to assess the potential of a mandatory information code or other consumer regulation to improve animal welfare labelling on eggs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Increasingly short-term, opportunistic, adversarial politics has consistently constrained and compromised significant and genuine tax reform in Australia. This article reviews the various attempts at tax reform since Asprey in the mid-1970s, assesses the existing tax system and attempts to set out the major essential ingredients of genuine tax reform in this country. Tax reform is seen as particularly urgent. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Is the rise in inequality in Australia due to global changes in the distribution of marginal productivity or changes in the allocation of political favours? This article lays out the arguments for both views. Looking at the tax and subsidy changes that favour the rich, and considering that almost all the 200 richest Australians look like the beneficiaries of political favours rather than innovators or superstars, the article concludes that inequality is probably increasing due to changes in the political realm. The discussion outlines a research agenda and possible counter-moves, such as more direct democracy and having open markets for political favours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Standard treatments of the politics of taxation and the determinants of the size of government draw on the median voter theorem, which assumes that the voting population is effectively a single electorate (see, for example, Meltzer and Richard, 1981). However, in a multi-electorate political system such as Australia's, the policy preferred by the median voter of the entire population will not be stable -- the bliss point of the overall median voter will not emerge as a Condorcet winner in a series of pairwise multi-electorate contests. Instead, the Condorcet winner is found by identifying the median voter in each separate electorate, arranging these medians in increasing order, then identifying the median of these medians. The policy distance between this 'median of medians' and the overall median can be very large. In other words, it is possible for 'extreme' policies to emerge as political equilibria. The article discusses the implications of these results for political competition, taxation policy and the size of government. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]