Battlers And Billionaires

Is Australia fair enough? And why does inequality matter anyway? In Battlers and Billionaires, Andrew Leigh weaves together vivid anecdotes, interesting history and powerful statistics to tell the story of inequality in this country. This is economics writing at its best. From egalitarian beginnings, Australian inequality rose through the nineteenth century. Then we became more equal again, with inequality falling markedly from the 1920s to the 1970s. Now, inequality is returning to the heights of the 1920s. Leigh shows that while inequality can fuel growth, it also poses dangers to society. Too much inequality risks cleaving us into two Australias, occupying fundamentally separate worlds, with little contact between the haves and the have-nots. And the further apart the rungs on the ladder of opportunity, the harder it is for a kid born into poverty to enter the middle class. Battlers and Billionaires sheds fresh light on what makes Australia distinctive, and what it means to have – and keep – a fair go.

Is Australia fair enough? And why does inequality matter anyway? From egalitarian beginnings, Australian inequality rose through the nineteenth century. Then we became more equal again, with inequality falling markedly from the 1920s to the 1970s. Now, inequality is returning to the heights of the 1820s. The housing and cost-of-living crises we face are some of the defining issues of our time. In Battlers and Billionaires, Andrew Leigh shows that while inequality can fuel growth, it also poses dangers to society. Too much inequality risks cleaving us into two Australias, with little contact between the haves and the have-nots. And the further apart the rungs on the ladder of opportunity, the harder it is for a kid born into poverty to enter the middle class. Battlers and Billionaires sheds fresh light on what makes Australia distinctive, and what it means to have - and keep - a fair go. 'Fun, fascinating and fundamentally important. A must-read for anyone who cares about bridging our divides.' -Julia Gillard 'Be warned- this book will open your eyes and prick your conscience.' -Ross Gittins 'A thought-provoking book which emphasises how far we have strayed from confidently discussing public policies that seek to give meaning to our egalitarian spirit.' -Laura Tingle 'This is required reading for every Australian who seriously cares about the fair go enduring.' -Peter FitzSimons

War is traditionally considered a male experience. By extension, the genre of war literature is a male-dominated field, and the tale of the battlefield remains the privileged (and only canonised) war story. In Australia, although women have written extensively about their wartime experiences, their voices have been distinctively silenced. Shooting Blanks at the Anzac Legend calls for a re-definition of war literature to include the numerous voices of women writers, and further recommends a re-reading of Australian national literatures, with women’s war writing foregrounded, to break the hold of a male-dominated literary tradition and pass on a vital, but unexplored, women’s tradition. Shooting Blanks at the Anzac Legend examines the rich body of World Wars I and II and Vietnam War literature by Australian women, providing the critical attention and treatment that they deserve. Donna Coates records the reaction of Australian women writers to these conflicts, illuminating the complex role of gender in the interpretation of war and in the cultural history of twentieth-century Australia. By visiting an astonishing number of unfamiliar, non-canonical texts, Shooting Blanks at the Anzac Legend profoundly alters our understanding of how Australian women writers have interpreted war, especially in a nation where the experience of colonising a frontier has spawned enduring myths of identity and statehood.

A fascinating account of how radical researchers have used experiments to overturn conventional wisdom and shaped life as we know it Experiments have consistently been used in the hard sciences, but in recent decades social scientists have adopted the practice. Randomized trials have been used to design policies to increase educational attainment, lower crime rates, elevate employment rates, and improve living standards among the poor. This book tells the stories of radical researchers who have used experiments to overturn conventional wisdom. From finding the cure for scurvy to discovering what policies really improve literacy rates, Leigh shows how randomistas have shaped life as we know it. Written in a “Gladwell-esque” style, this book provides a fascinating account of key randomized control trial studies from across the globe and the challenges that randomistas have faced in getting their studies accepted and their findings implemented. In telling these stories, Leigh draws out key lessons learned and shows the most effective way to conduct these trials.

The Routledge International Handbook of Working-Class Studies is a timely volume that provides an overview of this interdisciplinary field that emerged in the 1990s in the context of deindustrialization, the rise of the service economy, and economic and cultural globalization. The Handbook brings together scholars, teachers, activists, and organizers from across three continents to focus on the study of working-class peoples, cultures, and politics in all their complexity and diversity. The Handbook maps the current state of the field and presents a visionary agenda for future research by mingling the voices and perspectives of founding and emerging scholars. In addition to a framing Introduction and Conclusion written by the co-editors, the volume is divided into six sections: Methods and principles of research in working-class studies; Class and education; Work and community; Working-class cultures; Representations; and Activism and collective action. Each of the six sections opens with an overview that synthesizes research in the area and briefly summarizes each of the chapters in the section. Throughout the volume, contributors from various disciplines explore the ways in which experiences and understandings of class have shifted rapidly as a result of economic and cultural globalization, social and political changes, and global financial crises of the past two decades. Written in a clear and accessible style, the Handbook is a comprehensive interdisciplinary anthology for this young but maturing field, foregrounding transnational and intersectional perspectives on working-class people and issues and focusing on teaching and activism in addition to scholarly research. It is a valuable resource for activists, as well as working-class studies researchers and teachers across the social sciences, arts, and humanities, and it can also be used as a textbook for advanced undergraduate or graduate courses.

This book analyses the processes through which the modern forms of large fortunes are amassed. Despite the recent spate of governmental and non-governmental interest in inequality (be it wealth or income), the most privileged and fortunate have not generated much interest in mainstream economics. As the issue of wealth accumulation is multifaceted, the proposed book will not merely be an exercise in business history but deals with the issue from multiple perspectives, accordingly employing alternative research methods. Broadly, the trends and dynamics in high-tier wealth accumulation are coupled to the economic, political and social mechanisms that have been in play for at least half a century or more in some parts of the world. This approach leads to potential policy implications since much of the debate on wealth distribution centres on the extent to which wealth has been ‘justly’ attained. Further, how wealth is distributed in the capitalist system can have an impact upon economic growth.This book offers an alternative perspective on why we have witnessed the growth of a new social class of ultra rich. This book will be of interest to academics and researchers in international economic bodies.

Australia’s development, from the most unpromising of beginnings as a British prison in 1788 to the prosperous liberal democracy of the present is as remarkable as is its success as a country of large-scale immigration. Since 1942 it has been a loyal ally of the United States and has demonstrated this loyalty by contributing troops to the war in Vietnam and by being part of the “coalition of the willing” in the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003 and in operations in Afghanistan. In recent years, it has also been more willing to promote peace and democracy in its Pacific and Asian neighbors. This fourth edition of Historical Dictionary of Australia covers its history through a chronology, an introductory essay, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 500 cross-referenced entries on important personalities, politics, economy, foreign relations, religion, and culture. This book is an excellent access point for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know more about Australia.

'Life Chances, Education and Social Movements' explains the sociology of life chances; the opportunities and experiences of different generations in Australia, the United States and the UK; and how the differential distribution of life-enhancing opportunities affects our well-being. Ralf Dahrendorf’s life-chances theory is used to support the theoretical and empirical arguments in Lyle Munro’s book. For Dahrendorf, education is arguably the most important option individuals can utilise for improving their well-being and for overcoming social and economic disadvantages. While there are countless sociological accounts of inequality, Munro’s study takes a different and novel approach based on Dahrendorf’s model, according to which education and social movements and their networks function to enhance the life chances of individuals and social groups respectively.