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Australia’s fertility rate has reached a record low. What might that mean for the economy?

<div class="theconversation-article-body"><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jonathan-boymal-392960">Jonathan Boymal</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ashton-de-silva-3066">Ashton De Silva</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/sarah-sinclair-385470">Sarah Sinclair</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a></em></p> <p>Australia’s fertility rate has fallen to a new <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population/births-australia/latest-release">record low</a> of 1.5 babies per woman. That’s well below the “<a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/7834459/#:%7E:text=PIP%3A%20Replacement%20level%20fertility%20is,of%202.1%20children%20per%20woman.">replacement rate</a>” of 2.1 needed to sustain a country’s population.</p> <p>On face value, it might not seem like a big deal. But we can’t afford to ignore this issue. The health of an economy is deeply intertwined with the size and structure of its population.</p> <p>Australians simply aren’t having as many babies as they used to, raising some serious questions about how we can maintain our country’s workforce, sustain economic growth and fund important services.</p> <p>So what’s going on with fertility rates here and around the world, and what might it mean for the future of our economy? What can we do about it?</p> <h2>Are lower birth rates always a problem?</h2> <p>Falling fertility rates can actually have some <a href="https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/2007/MR1274.pdf">short-term benefits</a>. Having fewer dependent young people in an economy can increase workforce participation, as well as boost savings and wealth.</p> <p>Smaller populations can also benefit from <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0927537112000620.">increased investment</a> per person in education and health.</p> <p>But the picture gets more complex in the long term, and less rosy. An ageing population can strain pensions, health care and social services. This can hinder economic growth, unless it’s <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21302431/">offset by increased productivity</a>.</p> <p>Other scholars have <a href="https://www.gsb.stanford.edu/faculty-research/publications/end-economic-growth-unintended-consequences-declining-population">warned</a> that a falling population could stifle innovation, with fewer young people meaning fewer breakthrough ideas.</p> <h2>A global phenomenon</h2> <p>The trend towards women having fewer children is not unique to Australia. The global fertility rate has dropped over the past couple of decades, from 2.7 babies per woman in 2000 to <a href="https://www.macrotrends.net/global-metrics/countries/WLD/world/fertility-rate">2.4 in 2023</a>.</p> <p>However, the distribution is not evenly spread. In 2021, 29% of the world’s babies were born in sub-Saharan Africa. This is projected to <a href="https://www.healthdata.org/news-events/newsroom/news-releases/lancet-dramatic-declines-global-fertility-rates-set-transform">rise to 54% by 2100</a>.</p> <p>There’s also a <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/psp.2720">regional-urban divide</a>. Childbearing is often delayed in urban areas and late fertility is more common in cities.</p> <p>In Australia, we see <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population/births-australia/latest-release#data-downloads">higher fertility rates</a> in inner and outer regional areas than in metro areas. This could be because of more affordable housing and a better work-life balance.</p> <p>But it raises questions about whether people are moving out of cities to start families, or if something intrinsic about living in the regions promotes higher birth rates.</p> <p><iframe id="U1wEx" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: 0;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/U1wEx/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0" scrolling="no"></iframe></p> <h2>Fewer workers, more pressure on services</h2> <p>Changes to the makeup of a population can be just as important as changes to its size. With fewer babies being born and increased life expectancy, the proportion of older Australians who have left the workforce will keep rising.</p> <p>One way of tracking this is with a metric called the old-age dependency ratio – the number of people aged 65 and over per 100 working-age individuals.</p> <p>In Australia, this ratio is currently about 27%. But according to the latest <a href="https://treasury.gov.au/publication/2023-intergenerational-report">Intergenerational Report</a>, it’s expected to rise to 38% by 2063.</p> <p>An ageing population means greater demand for medical services and aged care. As the working-age population shrinks, the tax base that funds these services will also decline.</p> <p>Unless this is offset by technological advances or policy innovations, it can mean higher taxes, longer working lives, or the government providing fewer public services in general.</p> <h2>What about housing?</h2> <p>It’s tempting to think a falling birth rate might be good news for Australia’s stubborn housing crisis.</p> <p>The issues are linked – rising real estate prices have made it difficult for many young people to afford homes, with a significant number of people in their 20s <a href="https://pursuit.unimelb.edu.au/articles/more-australian-adult-children-are-living-with-their-parents-longer">still living with their parents</a>.</p> <p>This can mean delaying starting a family and reducing the number of children they have.</p> <p>At the same time, if fertility rates stay low, demand for large family homes may decrease, impacting one of Australia’s most significant economic sectors and sources of household wealth.</p> <h2>Can governments turn the tide?</h2> <p>Governments worldwide, including Australia, have long experimented with policies that encourage families to have more children. Examples include paid parental leave, childcare subsidies and financial incentives, such as Australia’s “<a href="https://theconversation.com/what-the-baby-bonus-boost-looks-like-across-ten-years-81563">baby bonus</a>”.</p> <p>Many of these efforts have had only limited success. One reason is the rising average age at which women have their first child. In many developed countries, including Australia, the average age for first-time mothers has surpassed <a href="https://www.aihw.gov.au/reports/mothers-babies/australias-mothers-babies/contents/overview-and-demographics/maternal-age">30</a>.</p> <p>As women delay childbirth, they become less likely to have multiple children, further contributing to declining birth rates. Encouraging women to start a family earlier could be one policy lever, but it must be balanced with women’s growing workforce participation and career goals.</p> <p>Research has previously highlighted the factors influencing fertility decisions, including levels of paternal involvement and workplace flexibility. Countries that offer part-time work or maternity leave without career penalties have seen a <a href="https://faculty.wcas.northwestern.edu/mdo738/research/Doepke_Hannusch_Kindermann_Tertilt_Handbook_23.pdf">stabilisation or slight increases</a> in fertility rates.</p> <h2>The way forward</h2> <p>Historically, one of the ways Australia has countered its low birth rate is through immigration. Bringing in a lot of people – especially skilled people of working age – can help offset the effects of a low fertility rate.</p> <p>However, relying on immigration alone is not a long-term solution. The global fertility slump means that the pool of young, <a href="https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/fandd/issues/2020/03/can-immigration-solve-the-demographic-dilemma-peri">educated workers from other countries</a> is shrinking, too. This makes it harder for Australia to attract the talent it needs to sustain economic growth.</p> <p>Australia’s record-low fertility rate presents both challenges and opportunities. On one hand, the shrinking number of young people will place a strain on public services, innovation and the labour market.</p> <p>On the other hand, advances in technology, particularly in artificial intelligence and robotics, may help ease the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0164070420302020">challenges of an ageing population</a>.</p> <p>That’s the optimistic scenario. AI and other tech-driven productivity gains could reduce the need for large workforces. And robotics could assist in aged care, lessening the impact of this demographic shift.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/241577/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/jonathan-boymal-392960">Jonathan Boymal</a>, Associate Professor of Economics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ashton-de-silva-3066">Ashton De Silva</a>, Professor of Economics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/sarah-sinclair-385470">Sarah Sinclair</a>, Senior Lecturer in Economics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/rmit-university-1063">RMIT University</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-fertility-rate-has-reached-a-record-low-what-might-that-mean-for-the-economy-241577">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Money & Banking

"Super uncomfortable for everyone": Qantas plays R-rated movie for every passenger

<p>Qantas has issued an apology after an R-rated movie was played for every passenger onboard a flight from Sydney to Tokyo. </p> <p>On Saturday, the flight was delayed by an hour due to problems with the in-flight entertainment system, which resulted in cabin crew only being able to play one film on everyone's individual screens. </p> <p>After requests were taken by passengers, the movie <em>Daddio</em> was chosen. </p> <p>The 2023 drama stars Sean Penn and Dakota Johnson as a taxi driver and his passenger as they discuss their relationships, including an affair Johnson’s character had with a married man.</p> <p>One passenger took to Reddit to share their experience of the flight, saying it was "extremely inappropriate", due to scenes of “graphic nudity and a lot of sexting”.</p> <p>“The kind where you could literally read the texts on screen without needing headphones,” the passenger wrote.</p> <p>“It was super uncomfortable for everyone, especially with families and kids on board.”</p> <p>Another passenger said the airline made the switch to <em>Inside Out 2</em> followed by a New Zealand nature show after playing “40 minutes of penis and boobs”.</p> <p>“These poor kids and the parents because y’all should’ve heard the audible gasps across the plane,” the passenger said.</p> <p>Cabin crew members attempted to fix the screens of those who didn't want to watch the R-rated film, but when this didn't work, resorted to switching the movie entirely. </p> <p>“The movie was clearly not suitable to play for the whole flight and we sincerely apologise to customers for this experience,” a Qantas spokesperson stated.</p> <p>“All screens were changed to a family-friendly movie for the rest of the flight, which is our standard practice for the rare cases where individual movie selection isn’t possible."</p> <p>“We are reviewing how the movie was selected.”</p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock</em></p>

Travel Trouble

I’m feeling run down. Why am I more likely to get sick? And how can I boost my immune system?

<div class="theconversation-article-body"> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/sathana-dushyanthen-1169328">Sathana Dushyanthen</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p>It has been a long winter, filled with many viruses and cost-of-living pressures, on top of the usual mix of work, study, life admin and caring responsibilities.</p> <p>Stress is an inevitable part of life. In short bursts, our stress response has evolved as a survival mechanism to help us be more alert in <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-you-cant-blame-all-your-health-issues-on-high-cortisol-heres-how-the-hormone-works-203162">fight or flight situations</a>.</p> <p>But when stress is chronic, it weakens the immune system and makes us more vulnerable to illnesses such as the <a href="https://www.healthline.com/health/can-stress-make-you-sick#:%7E:text=The%20common%20cold&text=Inflammation%20has%20been%20linked%20to,to%20the%20cold%2Dcausing%20germs.">common cold</a>, <a href="https://journals.lww.com/psychosomaticmedicine/abstract/1999/03000/psychological_stress,_cytokine_production,_and.9.aspx">flu</a> and <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/smi.3017">COVID</a>.</p> <h2>Stress makes it harder to fight off viruses</h2> <p>When the immune system starts to break down, a virus that would normally have been under control starts to flourish.</p> <p>Once you begin to feel sick, the <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4465119/">stress response</a> rises, making it harder for the immune system to fight off the disease. You may be sick more often and for longer periods of time, without enough immune cells primed and ready to <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-3-030-16996-1_6">fight</a>.</p> <p>In the 1990s, American psychology professor Sheldon Cohen and his colleagues conducted a number of <a href="https://www.cmu.edu/common-cold-project/">studies</a> where healthy people were exposed to an upper respiratory infection, through drops of virus placed directly into their <a href="https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199108293250903">nose</a>.</p> <p>These participants were then quarantined in a hotel and monitored closely to determine who became <a href="https://theconversation.com/stress-less-it-might-protect-you-from-covid-153361">ill</a>.</p> <p>One of the most important factors predicting who got sick was prolonged psychological <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691620942516">stress</a>.</p> <h2>Cortisol suppresses immunity</h2> <p>“Short-term stress” is stress that lasts for a period of minutes to hours, while “chronic stress” persists for several hours per day for <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5964013/#:%7E:text=Therefore%2C%20a%20major%20distinguishing%20characteristic,weeks%20or%20months%20%5B9%5D.">weeks or months</a>.</p> <p>When faced with a perceived threat, psychological or physical, the hypothalamus region of the brain sets off an alarm system. This signals the release of a surge of hormones, including adrenaline and <a href="https://www.embopress.org/doi/full/10.15252/msb.20209510">cortisol</a>.</p> <figure class="align-center "><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=472&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=472&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=472&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=593&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=593&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/616892/original/file-20240903-18-blrqoz.png?ixlib=rb-4.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=593&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" alt="Human brain illustration" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The hypothalamus sets off an alarm system in response to a real or perceived threat.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-illustration/hypothalamus-causes-vasoconstriction-illustration-medical-brain-435142264">stefan3andrei/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure> <p>In a typical stress response, <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S147149060300173X">cortisol levels</a> quickly increase when stress occurs, and then rapidly drop back to normal once the stress has subsided. In the short term, cortisol suppresses inflammation, to ensure the body has enough energy available to respond to an <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/immunology/articles/10.3389/fimmu.2019.00245/full">immediate threat</a>.</p> <p>But in the longer term, chronic stress can be harmful. A Harvard University study <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2796097">from 2022</a> showed that people suffering from psychological distress in the lead up to their COVID infection had a greater chance of experiencing long COVID. They <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2796097">classified</a> this distress as depression, probable anxiety, perceived stress, worry about COVID and loneliness.</p> <p>Those suffering distress had close to a <a href="https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamapsychiatry/fullarticle/2796097">50% greater risk</a> of long COVID compared to other <a href="https://theconversation.com/being-stressed-out-before-you-get-covid-increases-your-chances-of-long-covid-heres-why-190649">participants</a>. Cortisol has been shown to be high in the most severe cases of <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7102614/">COVID</a>.</p> <h2>Stress causes inflammation</h2> <p><a href="https://stories.uq.edu.au/imb/the-edge/inflammation/what-is-inflammation/index.html">Inflammation</a> is a short-term reaction to an injury or infection. It is responsible for trafficking immune cells in your body so the right cells are present in the right locations at the right times and at the right <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12026-014-8517-0">levels</a>.</p> <p>The immune cells also store a memory of that threat to respond faster and more effectively the next <a href="https://theconversation.com/being-stressed-out-before-you-get-covid-increases-your-chances-of-long-covid-heres-why-190649">time</a>.</p> <p>Initially, circulating immune cells detect and flock to the site of <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ni1275">infection</a>. Messenger proteins, known as pro-inflammatory cytokines, are released by immune cells, to signal the danger and recruit help, and our immune system responds to neutralise the <a href="https://stories.uq.edu.au/imb/the-edge/inflammation/what-is-inflammation/index.html">threat</a>.</p> <p>During this response to the infection, if the immune system produces too much of these inflammatory chemicals, it can trigger symptoms such as nasal congestion and runny <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691620942516">nose</a>.</p> <h2>What about chronic stress?</h2> <p>Chronic stress causes persistently high cortisol secretion, which remains high even in the absence of an immediate <a href="https://theconversation.com/no-you-cant-blame-all-your-health-issues-on-high-cortisol-heres-how-the-hormone-works-203162">stressor</a>.</p> <p>The immune system becomes desensitised and unresponsive to this <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1043661816307435">cortisol suppression</a>, increasing low-grade “silent” inflammation and the production of pro-inflammatory cytokines (the messenger proteins).</p> <p>Immune cells become exhausted and start to <a href="https://www.fxmedicine.com.au/blog-post/adrenal-immune-connection">malfunction</a>. The body loses the ability to turn down the inflammatory <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691620942516">response</a>.</p> <p>Over time, the immune system changes the way it responds by reprogramming to a “<a href="https://www.unimelb.edu.au/newsroom/news/2021/april/how-stress-can-stop-immune-cells-in-their-tracks">low surveillance mode</a>”. The immune system misses early opportunities to destroy threats, and the process of recovery can take <a href="https://theconversation.com/being-stressed-out-before-you-get-covid-increases-your-chances-of-long-covid-heres-why-190649">longer</a>.</p> <h2>So how can you manage your stress?</h2> <p>We can actively strengthen our immunity and natural defences by managing our <a href="https://theconversation.com/stuck-in-fight-or-flight-mode-5-ways-to-complete-the-stress-cycle-and-avoid-burnout-or-depression-218599">stress levels</a>. Rather than letting stress build up, try to address it early and frequently by:</p> <p><strong>1) Getting enough sleep</strong></p> <p>Getting enough sleep reduces <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3132857/">cortisol levels</a> and inflammation. During sleep, the immune system <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-1-4939-6578-6_12">releases</a> <a href="https://theconversation.com/sleep-wont-cure-the-coronavirus-but-it-can-help-our-bodies-fight-it-134674">cytokines</a>, which help fight infections and inflammation.</p> <p><strong>2) Taking regular exercise</strong></p> <p>Exercising helps the lymphatic system (which balances bodily fluids as part of the immune system) circulate and allows immune cells to monitor for threats, while sweating flushes <a href="https://www.healthline.com/nutrition/does-exercise-boost-immune-system">toxins</a>. Physical activity also lowers stress hormone levels through the release of positive brain <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7387807/">signals</a>.</p> <p><strong>3) Eating a healthy diet</strong></p> <p>Ensuring your diet contains enough nutrients – such as the B vitamins, and the full breadth of minerals like magnesium, iron and zinc – during times of stress has a positive impact on overall stress <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22782571">levels</a>. Staying hydrated helps the body to flush out <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-strong-immune-system-helps-ward-off-colds-and-flus-but-its-not-the-only-factor-99512">toxins</a>.</p> <p><strong>4) Socialising and practising meditation or mindfulness</strong></p> <p>These activities increase endorphins and serotonin, which improve mood and have <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2949834123000351">anti-inflammatory effects</a>. Breathing exercises and meditation stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system, which calms down our stress responses so we can “reset” and reduce <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4940234/">cortisol levels</a>.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/237456/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/sathana-dushyanthen-1169328">Sathana Dushyanthen</a>, Academic Specialist & Lecturer in Cancer Sciences & Digital Health| Superstar of STEM| Science Communicator, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/im-feeling-run-down-why-am-i-more-likely-to-get-sick-and-how-can-i-boost-my-immune-system-237456">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Body

New support system helps older Aussies who have fallen victim to scams

<p>A new support system has been set up to help vulnerable older Australians who have fallen victim to dangerous scams. </p> <p>With millions of Aussies targeted every year, many of these targets are elderly with 30 percent of victims hesitant to come forward because they are too embarrassed to admit what's happened to them.</p> <p>One such victim, 86-year-old Mary, said she was humiliated after falling for a scam saying she is old enough to know better. </p> <p>"It serves me right, I shouldn't have been so trusting," she said.</p> <p>"You blame yourself and you don't really want to tell people how stupid you are, so you think, 'Well, I'll just have to bear it'."</p> <p>Mary was scammed when she received a call from a man pretending to be a technician, saying he needed access to her computer to resolve a problem in her area. </p> <p>Step by step, the "technician" got Mary to log-in and give him complete access to her entire online identification, completely cleaning her out of $20,000 in savings.</p> <p>This is why <a title="ID Support NSW" href="https://www.nsw.gov.au/id-support-nsw" target="_blank" rel="noopener">ID Support NSW</a> is now offering a free service to help older Australians be able to protect themselves online and spot suspicious activity.</p> <p>"The most common scams are romance and impersonation scams, where people pretend to be someone they're not," ID Support NSW's Jacqueline Wilson told <em><a href="https://9now.nine.com.au/today/scam-awareness-week-id-support-nsw-offering-free-help-for-older-australians/20d3f8d6-fe32-4b1d-af32-294e47f4412d" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Today</a></em>.</p> <p>"Most start with a text or call and once someone responds or engages, they usually end up losing money."</p> <p>Jacqueline said the best thing you could do if you even suspect a scammer was to just hang up the phone, saying, "You don't need to indulge them, you don't need to be polite, you don't need to engage in a long conversation."</p> <p><em>Image credits: Today</em> </p>

Legal

From maxing out to slowing down, how much do heart rates vary across sports?

<div class="theconversation-article-body"><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/theresa-larkin-952095">Theresa Larkin</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-wollongong-711">University of Wollongong</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gregory-peoples-1556509">Gregory Peoples</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-wollongong-711">University of Wollongong</a></em></p> <p>A classic image of the Olympics and Paralympics is an athlete at the end of a race struggling for breath, their heart obviously racing.</p> <p>But at the other end of the scale are athletes such as archers and shooters, who need to slow their heart rates down as much as possible.</p> <p>Athletes in speed and endurance events regularly push their heart rate to the maximum. But these athletes usually have low heart rates at rest.</p> <p>What causes our heart rates and respiratory (breathing) rates to change so much, and is this healthy?</p> <h2>When heart rates and respiratory rates rise</h2> <p>If you are still and calm as you read this, your heart is probably beating 60–100 times per minute and you are likely breathing 12–20 times per minute.</p> <p>These are the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-should-my-heart-rate-be-and-what-affects-it-98945">normal ranges for a resting adult</a>.</p> <p>During physical activity when muscles are contracting, the muscles need more oxygen to provide them with energy to work.</p> <p>To deliver this extra oxygen (<a href="https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-why-is-blood-red-229121#:%7E:text=Haemoglobin%20is%20like%20a%20red,oxygen%2C%20our%20blood%20is%20red.">carried in our blood</a>), our heart pumps blood faster. In other words, our heart rate increases.</p> <p>We also breathe faster to get more oxygen into our lungs to be delivered to the exercising muscles.</p> <figure><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/3YOap5k0R_8?wmode=transparent&start=0" width="440" height="260" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe><figcaption><span class="caption">Your resting heart rate can tell you plenty about your health and fitness.</span></figcaption></figure> <h2>How fast can our heart rate get during exercise?</h2> <p>Aerobic means “with oxygen”. In <a href="https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/articles/7050-aerobic-exercise">aerobic exercise</a> (“cardio”) you use large muscles repetitively and rhythmically. For example, walking, running, cycling, swimming and rowing.</p> <p>Muscles that are contracting during aerobic exercise use a lot of energy and need ten times <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4551211/">more oxygen than at rest</a>.</p> <p>High intensity aerobic events that involve large muscles or the entire body cause the highest heart rates.</p> <p>An <a href="https://www.heartonline.org.au/resources/calculators/target-heart-rate-calculator">estimate</a> of maximum heart rate (beats per minute) is 220 minus your age. This equates to 195 beats per minute for a 25-year-old – close to the average age of the Australian Olympic team of 26.5 years.</p> <p>Athletes competing in Olympic events of endurance or speed will reach their maximum heart rate.</p> <p>You can usually only maintain maximum heart rate for a few minutes. But in a 2000-metre rowing race, the rowers maintain intense effort at close to maximum heart rate for 6–8 minutes.</p> <p>This is one of the toughest events for the heart. It’s no wonder rowers often collapse in the boat <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-cambridgeshire-68731840">as they cross the finish line</a>.</p> <p>Highly trained endurance athletes can have a maximum heart rate higher than expected for their age. <a href="https://olympics.com/en/athletes/eliud-kipchoge">Eliud Kipchoge</a> from Kenya is considered the greatest marathon runner of all time. During his <a href="https://au.coros.com/stories?world-record">world record run</a> in the 2022 Berlin marathon, he ran with a heart rate of around 180 beats per minute for almost the entire race.</p> <h2>How does breathing change with exercise?</h2> <p>Our breathing changes with exercise to increase oxygen uptake from the air.</p> <p>At low-to-moderate intensity exercise, you start to take deeper breaths. This brings in more air and oxygen with each breath. However, there is a limit to how much the chest can expand.</p> <p>With higher intensity exercise, respiratory rate increases to increase oxygen intake.</p> <p>Elite athletes can breathe <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4818249/">more than 50 times</a> per minute. This is driven by <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-breathwork-and-do-i-need-to-do-it-231192">our diaphragm</a>, the most important muscle of breathing.</p> <p><a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-07-28/paris-olympics-grace-brown-cycling-gold-medal-australia/104151466">Grace Brown</a>, Olympic gold medal cyclist in Paris, <a href="https://inscyd.com/article/grace-brown-olympic-gold-physiology/">breathes close to a maximal oxygen uptake</a> when she is cycling at high intensity.</p> <h2>Some athletes need to slow things down</h2> <p>Archery and shooting athletes perform better with a lower heart rate. They time their shots to be <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/3580727/#:%7E:text=Results%20showed%20that%20the%20champion,both%20during%20diastole%20and%20systole">between heart beats</a> when the body is the most still.</p> <p>This is easier with a slower heart rate, with more time between beats.</p> <p>Archers consciously lower their heart rate <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6441821/">prior to shooting</a> by <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6721071/">slowing their breathing</a>.</p> <p>Other Olympians use <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10224217/#:%7E:text=For%20practicing%20slow%20and%20deep,minutes%20before%20starting%20the%20exercise.">breathing techniques</a> to calm pre-race anticipation and high heart rates.</p> <p>Slowing the breath, <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-breathwork-and-do-i-need-to-do-it-231192">especially the exhale</a>, is the best way to lower your heart rate.</p> <p>Beta-blockers also reduce heart rate, by blocking adrenaline. This is why they are on the <a href="https://www.wada-ama.org/en/prohibited-list">prohibited substances list</a> of the World Anti-Doping Agency.</p> <h2>What about resting heart rates?</h2> <p>Athletes often have a <a href="https://www.health.harvard.edu/heart-health/is-a-low-heart-rate-worrisome">low resting heart rate</a>, around 40-50 beats per minute, and slower during sleep.</p> <p>Some are even lower – five time Tour de France winner Miguel Indurain famously had a resting heart rate of <a href="https://www.cyclingweekly.com/fitness/miguel-indurain-vs-your-body-34288">28 beats per minute</a>.</p> <p>Legendary US swimmer Michael Phelps is the <a href="https://olympics.com/en/news/michael-phelps-olympic-medals-record-how-many-gold-swimmer-world-record">most successful Olympian</a> of all time – he had a resting heart rate of <a href="https://www.reanfoundation.org/low-resting-heart-rate-and-lifespan/#:%7E:text=Studies%20on%20Athletes%20and%20Low%20Resting%20Heart%20Rate&text=It%20could%20also%20hint%20at,BPM%20throughout%20his%20professional%20career">less than 40 beats per minute</a>.</p> <p>Regular moderate-to-vigorous intensity aerobic exercise makes the <a href="https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/athletes-heart-rate">heart stronger and more efficient</a>. A stronger heart pumps more blood per beat, which means it doesn’t need to beat as often.</p> <p>Exercise also <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12477376/">increases vagus nerve</a> activity to the heart and <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms4775">slows down</a> the heart’s pacemaker cells. These both reduce heart rate.</p> <p><a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6306777/">A large review</a> found endurance training and yoga were the best exercises to reduce resting heart rate. But training needs to be maintained to keep resting heart rate low.</p> <p>When elite athletes reduced their training volume by half during COVID lockdown, their <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/13/5/2970">resting heart rate increased</a>.</p> <h2>What does this mean for our health?</h2> <p>A slower resting heart rate is linked to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6306777/">longer life expectancy and reduced death from cardiovascular disease</a>. Indeed, <a href="https://bjsm.bmj.com/content/55/4/206">a study</a> of more than 8,000 Olympians from the United States found they lived longer than the general population.</p> <p>So it is healthy to do activities that increase your heart rate in the short-term, whether as an Olympian or Paralympian competing, or a fan with your heart racing watching a gold medal event.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/235594/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/theresa-larkin-952095">Theresa Larkin</a>, Associate professor of Medical Sciences, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-wollongong-711">University of Wollongong</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/gregory-peoples-1556509">Gregory Peoples</a>, Senior Lecturer - Physiology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-wollongong-711">University of Wollongong</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-maxing-out-to-slowing-down-how-much-do-heart-rates-vary-across-sports-235594">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Body

Australia’s tax system is being weaponised against victims of domestic abuse. Here’s how

<div class="theconversation-article-body"> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ann-kayis-kumar-466422">Ann Kayis-Kumar</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p>When women seeking financial help from the government-funded UNSW <a href="https://www.unsw.edu.au/business/our-schools/accounting-auditing-taxation/about-us/unsw-clinic">Tax and Business Advisory Clinic</a> are asked whether they have ever been affected by family or domestic violence, most say they have.</p> <p>In the past year this number has grown from <a href="https://cdn.theconversation.com/static_files/files/3339/sub009.pdf?1718777706">65%</a> to over 80%.</p> <p>And about <a href="https://ssrn.com/abstract=4746954">14%</a> of the clinic’s clients say their tax debts are a result of intimate partner violence. These debts often arise from business debts, bankruptcy, corporate directorships and director penalty notices.</p> <p>We know that economic abuse is a red flag for other forms of domestic violence. Economic abuse occurs in nearly all Australian domestic and family violence cases, affecting more than <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/crime-and-justice/personal-safety-australia/latest-release">2.4 million Australians</a> and costing the economy an estimated <a href="https://www.commbank.com.au/content/dam/caas/newsroom/docs/Cost%20of%20financial%20abuse%20in%20Australia.pdf">A$10.9 billion</a> a year.</p> <p>Unfortunately, existing laws fall well short of protecting abuse victim-survivors from financial loss.</p> <h2>How violent partners weaponise tax</h2> <p>The perpetrators of violence can effectively weaponise the tax system by placing tax debts solely in the names of former partners, often because they have made them directors of companies or through family businesses operating through partnerships or trusts.</p> <p>There is a policy assumption that family members benefit from family partnerships.</p> <p>But this does not always hold in practice and can be problematic when there is economic abuse because Australian tax law requires victims report and pay tax on their “share” of the family partnership’s income.</p> <p>The average tax debt at the tax clinic is about $90,000. This can result in debilitating financial burdens, exhausted savings, insecure housing and prolonged economic instability, well after abusive relationships end.</p> <h2>Change is needed</h2> <p>Australia has no specific strategy for relief of tax debts caused by financial abuse. There are “serious hardship” provisions in Australian taxation law, but these are outdated and in need of <a href="https://theconversation.com/sometimes-people-can-do-with-a-break-3-ways-tax-debt-relief-rules-are-too-tough-156948">reform</a>.</p> <p>Usually people do not have the funds up front so the only way the Australian Taxation Office can collect debts from the abused partner is through (generally two-year) payment plans, offsetting future tax refunds, engaging external debt collectors and initiating bankruptcy proceedings.</p> <p>To that end, the decision announced in this year’s budget to give the Tax Commissioner discretion <a href="https://www.ato.gov.au/about-ato/new-legislation/in-detail/businesses/changes-to-offsetting-debts-on-hold">not to offset</a> against tax returns debts previously placed “on hold” is welcome.</p> <p>It will provide short-term relief by enabling abuse victims to get their refunds instead of having it used by the Tax Office to reduce their debt.</p> <p>Colleagues Christine Speidel, Leslie Book and I want this power extended to all <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4746954">forms of tax debts</a> not just for tax debts that have been placed “on hold” especially where the taxpayer is known to have experienced financial abuse.</p> <p>But this wouldn’t go far enough – the victim-survivors would still have the perpetrator’s tax debt hanging over them.</p> <p>Where this happens, financial instability can <a href="https://www.commbank.com.au/content/dam/commbank-assets/support/2021-01/unsw-report-key-findings.pdf">drive women back</a> into abusive relationships.</p> <h2>The US shows what can be done</h2> <p>Legislative reform to shift tax liability from abuse survivors to perpetrators is the key to helping solve the problem.</p> <figure class="align-right zoomable"></figure> <p>The United States has offered some form of “<a href="https://www.irs.gov/individuals/innocent-spouse-relief">innocent spouse relief</a>” since 1971. In 2011 it widened eligibility and <a href="https://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-news/ir-11-080.pdf">removed a two-year time limit</a> for requesting relief.</p> <p>It is important to understand the US provisions apply because the country offers jointly filed “married” tax returns. In Australia tax returns are filed by individuals.</p> <p>Australia’s laws would need to change to ensure abused women do not find themselves jointly liable. Any changes should also include debts incurred in the name of partnerships and company directors.</p> <p>The US is the first and only country to do this, largely because of the advocacy of US low-income tax clinics over decades. Australia now has such clinics, funded as part of the Tax Office <a href="https://www.ato.gov.au/individuals-and-families/financial-difficulties-and-disasters/support-to-lodge-and-pay/national-tax-clinic-program">National Tax Clinic Program</a>.</p> <p>Australia’s adoption of US-style rules could provide a model for other jurisdictions, increase tax debt collection (as perpetrators are likely to have better capacity to pay than victims) and foster greater confidence in the Tax Office.</p> <p>Most importantly, it would acknowledge that victim-survivors with tax debts should not bear responsibility for debts incurred by perpetrators.</p> <hr /> <p><em>For information and advice about family and intimate partner violence contact 1800 RESPECT (<a href="https://www.1800respect.org.au/">1800 737 732</a>). If you or someone you know is in immediate danger, contact 000. The Men’s Referral Service (<a href="https://ntv.org.au/get-help/">1300 766 491)</a> offers advice and counselling to men looking to change their behaviour.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/232609/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></em></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ann-kayis-kumar-466422">Ann Kayis-Kumar</a>, Founding Director of UNSW Tax and Business Advisory Clinic, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock</em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/australias-tax-system-is-being-weaponised-against-victims-of-domestic-abuse-heres-how-232609">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Money & Banking

Channel 10 axes another show amid ratings crisis

<p>Channel 10 has decided to axe yet another popular show as they continue to grapple with declining ratings and viewers leaving. </p> <p>Following the cancellation of <em>The Bachelors </em>and <em>The Masked Singer</em>, <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-13449749/Channel-10-axes-amid-ratings-crisis-revealed-Channel-Seven-considering-saving-unlikely-series.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener"><em>Daily Mail Australia</em></a> reported that the network was also cancelling <em>Gladiators</em>. </p> <p>Despite the show's success in the UK, the Australian reboot struggled to find the same effect as they failed to sustain their initial viewership. </p> <p>The show produced by Warner Bros and hosted by Beau Ryan and Liz Ellis was launched with high hopes and attracted 395,000 metro viewers during its premiere. </p> <p>However, by the second episode the numbers plummeted to just 196,000 - over half of the initial viewership. </p> <p>Critics on social media were also quick to point out the lack of crowd presence, despite the show being filmed under normal conditions, with one person saying: "It felt like watching an event without any real energy."</p> <p>The Traitors is another the show that was axed by the network after just two seasons, and now an insider has revealed that Channel Seven is considering commissioning the series.</p> <p>"The show's concept has potential, but it needs a fresh approach and a new platform," the insider told <em>Daily Mail Australia</em>. </p> <p>They also shared what's in store for Channel 10 as they attempt to revive their ratings. </p> <p>"Channel 10 is now deciding to put all their eggs in one basket, planning to roll out not one, but two seasons of Australian Survivor in 2025," the insider said. </p> <p>"They are putting together a 10th season special as well as an Australia vs USA Survivor all-star showdown which will be screened simultaneously in America and Down Under."</p> <p>A Channel 10 executive said: "Survivor has consistently performed well for us, and we believe this new approach will reignite audience interest."</p> <p>The <em>Daily Mail</em> reported that they have contacted Channel Seven and 10 for a comment. </p> <p><em>Image: Ten</em></p>

What are heart rate zones, and how can you incorporate them into your exercise routine?

<div class="theconversation-article-body"><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/hunter-bennett-1053061">Hunter Bennett</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-south-australia-1180">University of South Australia</a></em></p> <p>If you spend a lot of time exploring fitness content online, you might have come across the concept of heart rate zones. Heart rate zone training has become more popular in recent years partly because of the boom in wearable technology which, among other functions, allows people to easily track their heart rates.</p> <p><a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6537749/">Heart rate zones</a> reflect different levels of intensity during aerobic exercise. They’re most often based on a percentage of your maximum heart rate, which is the highest number of beats your heart can achieve per minute.</p> <p>But what are the different heart rate zones, and how can you use these zones to optimise your workout?</p> <h2>The three-zone model</h2> <p>While there are several models used to describe heart rate zones, the most common model in the scientific literature is the <a href="https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijspp/9/1/article-p100.xml">three-zone model</a>, where the zones may be categorised as follows:</p> <ul> <li> <p>zone 1: 55%–82% of maximum heart rate</p> </li> <li> <p>zone 2: 82%–87% of maximum heart rate</p> </li> <li> <p>zone 3: 87%–97% of maximum heart rate.</p> </li> </ul> <p>If you’re not sure what your maximum heart rate is, it can be calculated using <a href="https://www.jacc.org/doi/full/10.1016/S0735-1097%2800%2901054-8">this equation</a>: 208 – (0.7 × age in years). For example, I’m 32 years old. 208 – (0.7 x 32) = 185.6, so my predicted maximum heart rate is around 186 beats per minute.</p> <p>There are also other models used to describe heart rate zones, such as the <a href="https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijspp/14/8/article-p1151.xml">five-zone model</a> (as its name implies, this one has five distinct zones). These <a href="https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijspp/9/1/article-p100.xml">models</a> largely describe the same thing and can mostly be used interchangeably.</p> <h2>What do the different zones involve?</h2> <p>The three zones are based around a person’s <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.2165/00007256-200939060-00003">lactate threshold</a>, which describes the point at which exercise intensity moves from being predominantly aerobic, to predominantly anaerobic.</p> <p>Aerobic exercise <a href="https://www.healthline.com/health/fitness-exercise/difference-between-aerobic-and-anaerobic">uses oxygen</a> to help our muscles keep going, ensuring we can continue for a long time without fatiguing. Anaerobic exercise, however, uses stored energy to fuel exercise. Anaerobic exercise also accrues metabolic byproducts (such as lactate) that increase fatigue, meaning we can only produce energy anaerobically for a short time.</p> <p>On average your lactate threshold tends to sit around <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.2147/OAJSM.S141657">85% of your maximum heart rate</a>, although this varies from person to person, and can be <a href="https://journals.physiology.org/doi/full/10.1152/japplphysiol.00043.2013">higher in athletes</a>.</p> <p>In the three-zone model, each zone loosely describes <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/physiology/articles/10.3389/fphys.2015.00295/full">one of three types of training</a>.</p> <p><strong>Zone 1</strong> represents high-volume, low-intensity exercise, usually performed for long periods and at an easy pace, well below lactate threshold. Examples include jogging or cycling at a gentle pace.</p> <p><strong>Zone 2</strong> is threshold training, also known as tempo training, a moderate intensity training method performed for moderate durations, at (or around) lactate threshold. This could be running, rowing or cycling at a speed where it’s difficult to speak full sentences.</p> <p><strong>Zone 3</strong> mostly describes methods of high-intensity interval training, which are performed for shorter durations and at intensities above lactate threshold. For example, any circuit style workout that has you exercising hard for 30 seconds then resting for 30 seconds would be zone 3.</p> <h2>Striking a balance</h2> <p>To maximise endurance performance, you need to strike a balance between doing enough training to elicit positive changes, while avoiding over-training, injury and burnout.</p> <p>While zone 3 is thought to produce the largest improvements in <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1440244018309198">maximal oxygen uptake</a> – one of the best predictors of endurance performance and overall health – it’s also the most tiring. This means you can only perform so much of it before it becomes too much.</p> <p>Training in different heart rate zones improves <a href="https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/document?repid=rep1&type=pdf&doi=38c07018c0636422d9d5a77316216efb3c10164f">slightly different physiological qualities</a>, and so by spending time in each zone, you ensure a <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/bf00426304">variety of benefits</a> for performance and health.</p> <h2>So how much time should you spend in each zone?</h2> <p>Most <a href="https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fspor.2023.1258585/full">elite endurance athletes</a>, including runners, rowers, and even cross-country skiers, tend to spend most of their training (around 80%) in zone 1, with the rest split between zones 2 and 3.</p> <p>Because elite endurance athletes train a lot, most of it needs to be in zone 1, otherwise they risk injury and burnout. For example, some runners accumulate <a href="https://journals.humankinetics.com/view/journals/ijsnem/22/5/article-p392.xml?content=pdf">more than 250 kilometres per week</a>, which would be impossible to recover from if it was all performed in zone 2 or 3.</p> <p>Of course, most people are not professional athletes. The <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/physical-activity">World Health Organization</a> recommends adults aim for 150–300 minutes of moderate intensity exercise per week, or 75–150 minutes of vigorous exercise per week.</p> <p>If you look at this in the context of heart rate zones, you could consider zone 1 training as moderate intensity, and zones 2 and 3 as vigorous. Then, you can use heart rate zones to make sure you’re exercising to meet these guidelines.</p> <h2>What if I don’t have a heart rate monitor?</h2> <p>If you don’t have access to a heart rate tracker, that doesn’t mean you can’t use heart rate zones to guide your training.</p> <p>The three heart rate zones discussed in this article can also be prescribed based on feel using a simple <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1600-0838.2004.00418.x">10-point scale</a>, where 0 indicates no effort, and 10 indicates the maximum amount of effort you can produce.</p> <p>With this system, zone 1 aligns with a 4 or less out of 10, zone 2 with 4.5 to 6.5 out of 10, and zone 3 as a 7 or higher out of 10.</p> <p>Heart rate zones are not a perfect measure of exercise intensity, but can be a useful tool. And if you don’t want to worry about heart rate zones at all, that’s also fine. The most important thing is to simply get moving.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/228520/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/hunter-bennett-1053061">Hunter Bennett</a>, Lecturer in Exercise Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-south-australia-1180">University of South Australia</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Getty Images </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-are-heart-rate-zones-and-how-can-you-incorporate-them-into-your-exercise-routine-228520">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Body

Our housing system is broken and the poorest Australians are being hardest hit

<div class="theconversation-article-body"> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/rachel-ong-viforj-113482">Rachel Ong ViforJ</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/curtin-university-873">Curtin University</a></em></p> <p>Just when we think the price of rentals could not get any worse, this week’s <a href="https://www.anglicare.asn.au/publications/2023-rental-affordability-snapshot/">Rental Affordability Snapshot</a> by Anglicare has revealed low-income Australians are facing a housing crisis like never before.</p> <p>In fact, if you rely on the <a href="https://www.servicesaustralia.gov.au/youth-allowance">Youth Allowance</a>, there is not a single rental property across Australia you can afford this week.</p> <h2>How did rental affordability get this bad?</h2> <p>Several post-COVID factors have been blamed, including our preference for <a href="https://www.rba.gov.au/publications/bulletin/2023/jun/new-insights-into-the-rental-market.html">more space, the return of international migrants</a>, and <a href="https://www.corelogic.com.au/news-research/news/2023/could-the-peak-in-interest-rates-signal-an-end-to-rising-rents">rising interest rates</a>.</p> <p>However, the rental affordability crisis pre-dates COVID.</p> <p>Affordability has been steadily declining for decades, as successive governments have failed to make shelter more affordable for low-to-moderate income Australians.</p> <h2>The market is getting squeezed at both ends</h2> <p>At the lower end of the rental sector, the growth in the supply of social housing persistently lags behind demand, trending at under <a href="https://povertyandinequality.acoss.org.au/data/annual-growth-rates-social-housing-stock-and-population-2011-2020/">one-third</a> the rate of population growth.</p> <hr /> <p><iframe id="OA0cS" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/OA0cS/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <hr /> <p>This has forced growing numbers of low-income Australians to seek shelter in the private rental sector, where they face intense competition from higher-income renters.</p> <p>At the upper end, more and more aspiring home buyers are getting <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03085147.2021.2003086">locked out</a> of home ownership.</p> <p>A recent <a href="https://www.ahuri.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/2024-02/AHURI-Final-Report-416-Affordable-private-rental-supply-and-demand-short-term-disruption.pdf">study</a> found more households with higher incomes are now renting.</p> <p>Households earning <a href="https://www.ahuri.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/2024-02/AHURI-Final-Report-416-Affordable-private-rental-supply-and-demand-short-term-disruption.pdf">$140,000</a> a year or more (in 2021 dollars) accounted for just 8% of private renters in 1996. By 2021, this tripled to 24%. No doubt, this crowds out lower-income households who are now facing a shortage of affordable homes to rent.</p> <h2>Why current policies are not working</h2> <p>Worsening affordability in the private rental sector highlights a housing system that is broken. Current policies just aren’t working.</p> <p>While current policies focus on supply, more work is needed including fixing <a href="https://theconversation.com/governments-are-pouring-money-into-housing-but-materials-land-and-labour-are-still-in-short-supply-205471">labour shortages</a> and providing greater <a href="https://theconversation.com/people-want-and-need-more-housing-choice-its-about-time-governments-stood-up-to-deliver-it-122390">stock diversity</a>.</p> <p>The planning system plays a critical role and <a href="https://theconversation.com/confusing-and-not-delivering-enough-developers-and-councils-want-new-affordable-housing-rules-139762">zoning rules</a> can be reformed to support the supply of more affordable options.</p> <p>However, the housing affordability challenge is not solely a supply problem. There is also a need to respond to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/home-prices-are-climbing-alright-but-not-for-the-reason-you-might-think-158776">super-charged demand</a> in the property market.</p> <p>An overheated market will undoubtedly place intense pressure on the rental sector because aspiring first home buyers are forced to rent for longer, as house prices soar at a rate unmatched by their wages.</p> <p>Yet, governments continue to resist calls for winding back the <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-02-15/ken-henry-australias-tax-system-in-worse-position-after-15-years/103465044">generous tax concessions</a> enjoyed by multi-property owners.</p> <p>The main help available to low-income private renters - the Commonwealth Rent Assistance scheme - is <a href="https://theconversation.com/1-billion-per-year-or-less-could-halve-rental-housing-stress-146397">poorly targeted</a> with nearly one in five low-income renters who are in rental stress deemed ineligible, while another one in four receive it despite not being in rental stress.</p> <h2>Can affordable housing occur naturally?</h2> <p>Some commentators support the theory of <a href="https://www.ahuri.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/2022-09/Executive-Summary-FR387-Filtering-as-a-source-of-low-income-housing-in-Australia-conceptualisation-and-testing.pdf">filtering</a> - a market-based process by which the supply of new dwellings in more expensive segments creates additional supply of dwellings for low-income households as high-income earners vacate their former dwellings.</p> <p>Proponents of filtering argue building more housing anywhere - even in wealthier ends of the property market - will eventually improve affordability across the board because lower priced housing will trickle down to the poorest households.</p> <p>However, the persistent affordability crisis low-income households face and the rise in homelessness are crucial signs filtering <a href="https://cloud.3dissue.com/122325/122578/143598/WhyNewSupplyisnotExpandingHousingOptionsfortheHomeless/html5/index.html?page=1&noflash">does not work well</a> and <a href="https://www.ahuri.edu.au/sites/default/files/documents/2022-09/AHURI-Final-Report-387-Filtering-as-a-source-of-low-income-housing-in-Australia-conceptualisation-and-testing.pdf">cannot be relied upon</a> to produce lower cost housing.</p> <h2>Location, location, location</h2> <p>Location does matter, if we expect building new housing to work for low-income individuals.</p> <p>What is needed is a steady increase of affordable, quality housing in areas offering low-income renters the same access to jobs and amenities as higher-income households.</p> <p>The <a href="https://treasury.gov.au/housing-policy/accord#:%7E:text=The%20Accord%20includes%20an%20initial,5%20years%20from%20mid%E2%80%912024.">National Housing Accord</a> aims to deliver 1.2 million new dwellings over five years from mid-2024. But it must ensure these are “well-located” for people who need affordable housing, as suggested in the accord.</p> <p>Recent <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/02673037.2023.229051">modelling</a> shows unaffordable housing and poor neighbourhoods both negatively affect mental health, reinforcing the need to provide both affordable and well-located housing.</p> <h2>The upcoming budget</h2> <p>While the <a href="https://www.dss.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/05_2023/payments-cra_budget_fact_sheet_fa_0.pdf">15% increase</a> in the maximum rent assistance rate was welcomed in the last budget, the program is long overdue for a major restructure to target those in rental stress.</p> <p>Also, tax concessions on second properties should be wound back to reduce competition for those struggling to buy their first home. This would eventually help ease affordability pressures on low-income renters as more higher-income renters <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1467-8454.12335">shift into homeownership</a>.</p> <p>The potential negative impacts on rental supply can be mitigated by careful design of tax and other changes that guard against market destabilisation concerns.</p> <p>Overall, housing affordability solutions have to be multi-faceted. The housing system is badly broken and meaningful repair cannot be achieved unless policymakers are willing to confront both supply and demand challenges.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/228511/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/rachel-ong-viforj-113482">Rachel Ong ViforJ</a>, ARC Future Fellow & Professor of Economics, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/curtin-university-873">Curtin University</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Getty Images </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/our-housing-system-is-broken-and-the-poorest-australians-are-being-hardest-hit-228511">original article</a>.</em></p> </div>

Money & Banking

Why Mary Poppins has received a new rating 60 years on

<p dir="ltr">Almost 60 years after <em>Mary Poppins</em> was first released, the classic film has been given a new rating by the British Board of Film Classification (BBFC). </p> <p dir="ltr">The BBFC, which regulates films and video content in the country, changed the rating of the 1964 Disney musical last week from U (Universal) to PG (Parental Guidance) because it features a racial slur once used by white Europeans to refer to the native peoples of southern Africa.</p> <p dir="ltr">"<em>Mary Poppins</em> (1964) includes two uses of the discriminatory term 'hottentots'," a BBFC spokesperson said in a statement to CNN.</p> <p dir="ltr">"While <em>Mary Poppins</em> has a historical context, the use of discriminatory language is not condemned, and ultimately exceeds our guidelines for acceptable language at U."</p> <p dir="ltr">The approaching 60th anniversary of the film is what prompted the BBFC to reexamine the film, as it is set to return to UK cinemas in celebration of the milestone. </p> <p dir="ltr">Even as <em>Mary Poppins</em> remains a treasured part of UK culture, the film has long been criticised for the use of blackface. It's partly in this context that the discriminatory language referenced by BBFC appears in the film.</p> <p dir="ltr">In one scene, the eccentric Admiral Boom asks one of the Banks children if he is going on an adventure to "defeat hottentots." </p> <p dir="ltr">Later in the film, as Admiral Boom sees chimney sweeps with soot-blackened faces dancing in the distance, he shouts, "We're being attacked by hottentots!" and orders a cannon to be fired in their direction.</p> <p dir="ltr">"Hottentot" is a derogatory term used by European settlers to refer to Khoikhoi peoples of South Africa and Namibia, according to the Oxford Dictionary reference.</p> <p dir="ltr">Per the new film rating, children of any age can still watch without an adult present, but parents should consider whether the content might upset younger or more sensitive children, a BBFC spokesperson said.</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Image credits: Disney</em></p>

Movies

“The system is too soft”: Ally Langdon fires up over stabbing death of Vyleen White

<p>Ally Langdon has called for an overhaul of the youth crime system in the wake of the violent death of Queensland grandmother Vyleen White. </p> <p>The <em>A Current Affair</em> host was discussing the death of the 70-year-old, as she became visibly frustrated while talking about the rising rates of youth crime.</p> <p>Langdon hinted at a nationwide issue, citing the recent stabbing death of young doctor Ash Gordon in Melbourne, who was also allegedly murdered by a teenager less than a month ago.</p> <p>“Whatever we’re doing to deal with youth crime, it’s failing,” she said.</p> <p>“The police do everything they can, but the system is too soft on serious crime, and we have lost faith in it and our politicians.”</p> <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/reel/C29TB0HvWGj/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/C29TB0HvWGj/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by A Current Affair (@acurrentaffair9)</a></p> </div> </blockquote> <p>Ms White’s daughter and widowed husband echoed Ally's sentiment thoughts on the program, saying, “Justice has to be done, not for my sake, for the memory of Vyleen.”</p> <p>“People want action and harsher laws for crimes they are committing,” her husband Victor said.</p> <p>“For several years (politicians) have been promising a lot, a lot of rubbish talk to the public out there, and nothing happens."</p> <p>“All you hear is increase of violence, car stealing … This is due to slackness in the law."</p> <p>“The law is weak as water.”</p> <p> Ms White’s daughter, Cindy Micallef said harsher penalties for youth crimes are needed.</p> <p>“Youth crime, I hate to say it, it’s like having a koala, it’s a protected species, there’s no action,” she said.</p> <p>“They do heinous crimes and it’s getting worse, I don’t care what nationality or race.</p> <p>“If we let people get away with this, it’s going to increase.”</p> <p>A 16-year-old boy was <a href="https://oversixty.com.au/finance/legal/update-on-tragic-stabbing-of-queensland-grandmother" target="_blank" rel="noopener">charged</a> with Ms White’s murder on Tuesday morning, and is also facing charges of unlawful use of a motor vehicle and stealing. </p> <p>Vyleen was <a href="https://www.oversixty.com.au/health/caring/grandmother-fatally-stabbed-in-front-of-granddaughter" target="_blank" rel="noopener">fatally stabbed</a> in the chest in Town Square Redbank Plains Shopping Centre’s underground carpark around 6pm on Saturday, while she was shopping with her granddaughter. </p> <p><em>Image credits: Facebook / A Current Affair</em></p>

Legal

How does Australia’s health system stack up internationally? Not bad, if you’re willing to wait for it

<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/stephen-duckett-10730">Stephen Duckett</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p>When things are going bad in the health system, we are reassured we’ve got one of the best health systems in the world. But we’re rarely told where we actually stand relative to others.</p> <p>A <a href="https://www.oecd.org/health/health-at-a-glance/">new report</a> from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) shows where Australia is doing relatively well – and not so well. The report is more than 200 pages with dozens of charts and tables.</p> <p>Here we highlight five charts showing Australia’s relative performance. Overall, Australia’s health system performs well, but can come after long waits. And our use of antibiotics is trending in the wrong direction.</p> <h2>1. We spend less than average but live longer than average</h2> <p>Despite the rhetoric about the unsustainability of the health system, Australia performs well. When mapping health expenditure against life expectancy, Australia (marked by the red dot) sits in the best performing quadrant – and has done so for the past decade.</p> <p><iframe id="tc-infographic-996" class="tc-infographic" style="border: none;" src="https://cdn.theconversation.com/infographics/996/32f7548791bf05b7559d74976bfa0b955319adc5/site/index.html" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>In contrast, the United States is stuck in the worst performing quadrant for the whole period – significantly higher spending than other countries with worse life expectancy.</p> <p>The life expectancy measure is used here but it involves an implicit assumption that the principal impact on life expectancy is from the health system, which is not really the case. Nevertheless, it is a good measure of overall system performance and combined with spending provides a good measure.</p> <h2>2. Most Australians rate their health as good or very good</h2> <p>The vast majority of Australians (about 85%) rate their health as good or very good, with Australia performing better on this metric than most other similar countries. Often good health is conflated with good health care, and the data show that Australia also has more doctors per head than other countries.</p> <p><iframe id="Ygo7Z" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/Ygo7Z/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>The founding charter of the World Health Organization (WHO) recognised that health is not just the absence of disease, but a “<a href="https://www.who.int/about/accountability/governance/constitution">state of complete physical, mental and social well-being</a>”. This points to a flaw in the nexus between good health and more health professionals. The WHO focus on well-being helps to explain why it is not surprising that, looking across countries, the number of doctors doesn’t appear to be a key determinant of performance on self-rated health.</p> <h2>3. It’s harder to get a bed in aged care</h2> <p>About 30% of people in OECD countries are over 65, while the Australian proportion is about 20%. The proportion of over-65s is rising everywhere.</p> <p>A minority of older Australians (14%) use aged care, with most of these using home care. However, monitoring access to residential aged care (represented here by the number of long-term care beds per thousand population over 65) might act as a “canary in the coal mine”, highlighting where access problems exist.</p> <p><iframe id="lBe4O" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/lBe4O/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>In Australia, access to aged care beds is falling, by about 27% between 2011 and 2021. We started in the middle of the pack so this is a concern and probably contributes to more Australians being stuck in acute hospitals, rather than being in more appropriate accommodation in residential aged care. This “<a href="https://www.ama.com.au/articles/hospital-exit-block-symptom-sick-system">exit block</a>” in turn leads to problems of ambulance ramping.</p> <h2>4. Australians wait too long for public hospital hip replacements</h2> <p>Most publicly funded health systems are characterised by long waiting times for access to planned procedures such as hip replacements. Some waiting is to be expected as part of efficient management of operating theatre scheduling. But long waits, especially when the person is in pain, reflect poorly on management of the public hospital system.</p> <p><iframe id="LNntD" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/LNntD/2/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>The data shows that almost two-thirds of people waiting for hip replacement surgery in Australia waited more than three months. This is marginally worse than the OECD average. Unfortunately, our performance is deteriorating.</p> <p>A number of states, such as <a href="https://www.health.vic.gov.au/planned-surgery-reform-blueprint">Victoria</a>, have developed strategies to improve the performance of the planned procedure system, or have identified opportunities for <a href="https://www.sahealth.sa.gov.au/wps/wcm/connect/public+content/sa+health+internet/about+us/about+sa+health/reporting+and+advisory+groups/health+performance+council/health+performance+council+reports">efficiency improvements in public hospitals</a> which would help address this issue.</p> <p>Although it’s understandable that <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2049080122011554">planned procedures were affected</a> by the first few years of the COVID pandemic, governments should have adapted their funding and provision systems to bring waiting times back to the pre-pandemic levels.</p> <h2>5. Our use of antibiotics is going in the wrong direction</h2> <p>Antibiotics have saved millions of lives. But public health experts have long recognised the emerging <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/antimicrobial-resistance">problem of antimicrobial resistance</a>, where inappropriate use of these drugs can lead to their reduced effectiveness over time.</p> <p>Worldwide campaigns to promote appropriate use of antibiotics are bearing fruit and across the OECD, use of antibiotics is going down.</p> <p>Unfortunately, Australia’s trend is in the reverse direction.</p> <p><iframe id="AK4GO" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/AK4GO/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe><img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/218031/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/stephen-duckett-10730">Stephen Duckett</a>, Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p><em>Image </em><em>credits: Getty Images </em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-does-australias-health-system-stack-up-internationally-not-bad-if-youre-willing-to-wait-for-it-218031">original article</a>.</em></p>

Caring

Women and low-income earners miss out in a superannuation system most Australians think is unfair

<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/antonia-settle-1019551">Antonia Settle</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p>Most Australians think the superannuation system is unfair, with only one in three agreeing the retirement savings scheme is fair for most Australians, according to a survey conducted for the University of Melbourne.</p> <p>In fact, only about half of those <a href="https://melbourneinstitute.unimelb.edu.au/publications/research-insights/search/result?paper=4630688">surveyed</a> agreed superannuation works well for them.</p> <p>These results contradict a conventional view based on earlier studies and held by academics and many in the personal finance sector, that Australians give little thought to superannuation.</p> <p>A 2013 survey found Australians have <a href="https://search.informit.org/doi/abs/10.3316/INFORMIT.285049750322819">poor knowledge</a> of how the superannuation system works, while another study in 2022 highlighted <a href="https://melbourneinstitute.unimelb.edu.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0011/4382057/HILDA_Statistical_Report_2022.pdf">low financial literacy</a> in general.</p> <p>Australians also showed <a href="https://behaviouraleconomics.pmc.gov.au/sites/default/files/projects/retirement-planning-saving-attitudes_0_0.pdf">little interest in superannuation</a>, according to a 2020 Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet survey, with few Australians showing interest in reading their superannuation statements, choosing their fund or making voluntary contributions.</p> <p>With Australian households seen as uninformed and uninterested, their opinions tend to be left out of the public debate. We hear much about the gender pension gap, for example, but little about what women actually think about superannuation.</p> <p>Similarly, the distribution of tax advantage in superannuation is hotly debated by economists but survey data tends to refrain from asking households what they think about equity in the superannuation system.</p> <p>The University of Melbourne survey of 1,003 Australians was undertaken by Roy Morgan Research in April.</p> <p>Its results show women and low-income households are widely seen as disadvantaged in the superannuation system.</p> <p>In fact, only one in five Australians see the superannuation system as well suited to the needs of women and of low-income households, while 70% believe super favours wealthy households.</p> <p><iframe id="5VX3K" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/5VX3K/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>This suggests although Australians may show little interest in the management of their super accounts and may report they find the system confusing or even <a href="https://www.professionalplanner.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/Attitudes-to-Super-Report-May-2016.pdf">boring</a>, they are surprisingly aware of how superannuation is distributed.</p> <h2>Women, singles and low-income earners miss out</h2> <p>The federal government’s 2020 <a href="https://treasury.gov.au/publication/p2020-100554">Retirement Income Review</a> documents these gaps. Renters, women, uncoupled households and those on low-incomes fare poorly in the retirement income system.</p> <p>With little super to supplement the public pension, these groups are vastly over-represented in elderly poverty statistics, which are among the <a href="https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/d76e4fad-en/index.html?itemId=/content/component/d76e4fad-en">highest in the OECD</a>.</p> <p>Mirroring the gaps in the superannuation system reported by the review, the University of Melbourne survey shows that it is outright homeowners and those who are married who believe the superannuation system works well.</p> <p>Concerns the system works poorly for women and low-income households are strongest among women and low-income households. Only one in three renters believe the superannuation system meets their needs.</p> <p><iframe id="N9GO6" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" style="border: none;" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/N9GO6/1/" width="100%" height="400px" frameborder="0"></iframe></p> <p>This suggests individuals’ concerns about fairness in the superannuation system are driven by their own experiences of disadvantage, regardless of financial literacy.</p> <p>This is consistent with my own <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13563467.2023.2195159">research</a> into household attitudes to superannuation, which showed some resentment among women who were well aware their male partners had substantially higher superannuation balances than them.</p> <p>This all matters for policymakers.</p> <h2>Why public perceptions are important</h2> <p>In the short term, these results suggest public support for making super fairer is likely to be stronger than previously thought. Recent government changes to tax concessions on large balances, for example, could have gone much further without losing support from the 70% of households that think the system favours the wealthy.</p> <p>But it matters for the longer term too.</p> <p>Public perceptions of fairness, effectiveness and efficiency are crucial to policy sustainability. This is well established in the academic literature from <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/spol.12683">B Ebbinghaus</a>, 2021 and <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/1911-3838.12171">H Chung et al.</a>, and accepted by the Retirement Income Review.</p> <p>The review assessed the public’s confidence in the system to both “deliver an adequate retirement income for them(selves) and (to) generate adequate outcomes across society”.</p> <p>As the review makes clear, the system must avoid a loss of public confidence from perceptions of unfairness.</p> <p>Yet perceptions of unfairness are exactly what the University of Melbourne results suggest. This would have been clearer to policymakers if they asked earlier.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207633/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/antonia-settle-1019551">Antonia Settle</a>, Academic (McKenzie Postdoctoral Research Fellow), <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Getty Images</em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/women-and-low-income-earners-miss-out-in-a-superannuation-system-most-australians-think-is-unfair-207633">original article</a>.</em></p>

Retirement Income

Five ways to take advantage of rising interest rates to boost your savings

<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/fredrick-kibon-changwony-234363">Fredrick Kibon Changwony</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-stirling-1697">University of Stirling</a></em></p> <p>With the Bank of England base rate <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-the-bank-of-englands-interest-rate-hikes-are-filtering-through-to-your-finances-210344">currently the highest</a> it has been since early 2008, you may have a valuable opportunity to increase your earnings on pensions, investments and savings accounts. After all, when the central bank raises its main rate – the base rate, which is typically used as a benchmark for loans as well as savings accounts – it is trying to encourage people to spend less and save more.</p> <p>But UK banks and building societies have <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/money/martin-lewis-savings-rates-mortgage-crisis-b2362955.html">recently been accused</a> of letting their savings rates lag the recent rapid rise in the base rate. UK regulator the Financial Conduct Authority has urged these financial firms to offer “<a href="https://www.fca.org.uk/news/press-releases/action-plan-cash-savings">fair and competitive</a>” savings rates in response to the increasing interest rates.</p> <p>Many financial institutions do offer accounts with <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/money/2023/jul/15/uk-savings-accounts-interest-nsi-building-societies-banks-deals">rates of 6% or more</a>. This is good news for avid savers – but only if you keep an eye on the market so you can switch from less competitive products. This is why it’s important to establish a regular savings habit, but many people are unsure about what that should involve.</p> <p>My colleagues and I have studied the <a href="https://dspace.stir.ac.uk/handle/1893/32240">correlation between people’s savings goals</a> (if they have any) and how they invest their money. We also looked at how seeking financial information advice, and being “good with numbers”, both influence this correlation.</p> <p>We analysed data from more than 40,000 individuals in 21,000 UK households from five waves of the Office for National Statistics Wealth and Assets Survey (WAS), conducted between 2006 and 2016. This data captures comprehensive economic wellbeing information and attitudes to financial planning.</p> <p>Our research shows the importance to your finances of setting multiple savings goals, keeping up with financial news, and seeking professional advice. Based on this, here are five research-based ways to make the most of your money.</p> <h2>1. Set specific savings goals</h2> <p>Establishing personal savings goals is one of the first steps most financial institutions and advisers will recommend to their customers, because it’s a good idea to <a href="https://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/compoundinterest.asp">save regularly</a>. Plus, our study shows that total financial assets increase in line with the number of savings goals you have, and that setting specific, rather than vague, goals leads to higher performance.</p> <p>Specific savings goals should have an end date, target figure, and even a meaningful name – for example, “£1,000 for 2024 trip to Asia” or “£250 for 2023 Christmas present fund”. This will create tangible reference points that encourage self-control and increase the pain you feel if you fail to meet your goal.</p> <h2>2. Seek professional financial advice</h2> <p>Rather than relying on friends, family and social media for financial advice, speak to an expert.</p> <p>Our research shows households that access professional financial advice were more likely to allocate a higher share of their wealth to stock portfolios than those that rely on friends, family and social media for financial advice. This result was consistent even across different wealth and income levels, with lower earners possibly using products like ISAs to make investments in stocks and shares. Other <a href="https://academic.oup.com/qje/article/134/3/1225/5435538">research shows</a> stock portfolios outperform most other types of investment in the long term.</p> <p>We also found that access to professional financial advice can substitute for setting goals, because your adviser should help you to determine the kinds of products to invest in (which is called asset allocation) for specific timelines and aims.</p> <h2>3. Brush up on your maths</h2> <p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1475-5890.2007.00052.x">Several studies</a> show numerical skills affect how households gather and process information, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/a0013114">set goals</a>, perceive risks, and <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/P?h=hein.journals/fedred89&i=791">decide to invest</a> in various financial assets. So, by brushing up on your basic numeracy and financial literacy skills – even with free online videos – you could boost your savings for the long term.</p> <p>Our study shows that individuals with high confidence in their numerical skills tend to have better financial planning habits – such as investing more in stocks and bonds than cash, which carries more risk but also the potential for greater returns. This trend is particularly evident among households with no savings goals, suggesting that numerical ability could compensate for failing to set such goals.</p> <h2>4. Adopt appropriate savings strategies</h2> <p>Diversified stock market portfolios generally outperform bonds and cash savings <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/qje/qjz012">over longer periods</a>. However, stock markets can be volatile, so putting savings into less risky assets like bonds and cash is wise for savings goals of less than five years.</p> <p>In the longer term, investing across different global stock markets for more than five years can help counteract inflation. And you can access low-cost, diversified investment portfolios via financial products based on indices of stocks or other assets, such as exchange traded funds.</p> <h2>5. Set, monitor and adjust your plan</h2> <p>Free financial planning and budgeting apps can help you save money by tracking your spending and savings goals, and encouraging you to adhere to a budget.</p> <p>Most importantly, once you set savings goals and create a budget, don’t forget about them. Check regularly to see how your savings are building up and to monitor for any spending changes. A growing array of fintech tools can prompt and encourage this kind of long-term planning.</p> <p>Keeping an eye on savings rates is also important. As banks change rates or create new accounts, consider switching to get a better deal if you can do so without falling foul of account closure fees.</p> <p>It’s important to make sure your savings are working for you at any time, but its crucial in the current economy, when finances are tight but interest rates are rising.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208853/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/fredrick-kibon-changwony-234363">Fredrick Kibon Changwony</a>, Lecturer in Accounting & Finance, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-stirling-1697">University of Stirling</a></em></p> <p><em>Image credits: Shutterstock</em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/five-ways-to-take-advantage-of-rising-interest-rates-to-boost-your-savings-208853">original article</a>.</em></p>

Money & Banking

The $500 million ATO fraud highlights flaws in the myGov ID system. Here’s how to keep your data safe

<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/rob-nicholls-91073">Rob Nicholls</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p>The Australian Tax Office (ATO) paid out more than half a billion dollars to cyber criminals between July 2021 and February 2023, according to an <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-07-26/ato-reveals-cost-of-mygov-tax-identity-crime-fraud/102632572">ABC report</a>.</p> <p>Most of the payments were for small amounts (less than A$5,000) and were not flagged by the ATO’s own monitoring systems.</p> <p>The fraudsters exploited a weakness in the identification system used by the myGov online portal to redirect other people’s tax refunds to their own bank accounts.</p> <p>The good news is there’s plenty the federal government can do to crack down on this kind of fraud – and that you can do to keep your own payments secure.</p> <h2>How these scams work</h2> <p>Setting up a myGov account or a myGov ID requires proof of identity in the form of “<a href="https://www.afp.gov.au/sites/default/files/PDF/NPC-100PointChecklist-18042019.pdf">100 points of ID</a>”. It usually means either a passport and a driver’s licence or a driver’s licence, a Medicare card, and a bank statement.</p> <p>Once a myGov account is created, linking it to your tax records requires two of the following: an ATO assessment, bank account details, a payslip, a Centrelink payment, or a super account.</p> <p>These documents were precisely the ones targeted in three large data breaches in the past year: at <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-does-the-optus-data-breach-mean-for-you-and-how-can-you-protect-yourself-a-step-by-step-guide-191332">Optus</a>, at <a href="https://theconversation.com/medibank-hackers-are-now-releasing-stolen-data-on-the-dark-web-if-youre-affected-heres-what-you-need-to-know-194340">Medibank</a>, and at <a href="https://asic.gov.au/about-asic/news-centre/news-items/guidance-for-consumers-impacted-by-the-latitude-financial-services-data-breach/">Latitude Financial</a>.</p> <p>In this scam, the cyber criminal creates a fake myGov account using the stolen documents. If they can also get enough information to link to the ATO or your Tax File Number, they can then change bank account details to have your tax rebate paid to their account.</p> <p>It is a sadly simple scam.</p> <h2>How government can improve</h2> <p>One of the issues here is quite astounding. The ATO knows where salaries are paid, via the “<a href="https://www.ato.gov.au/business/single-touch-payroll/what-is-stp-/">single touch</a>” payroll system. This ensures salaries, tax and superannuation contributions are all paid at once.</p> <p>Most people who have received a tax refund will have provided bank account details where that payment can be made. Indeed, many people use precisely those bank account details to identify themselves to myGov.</p> <p>At present, those bank details can be changed within myGov without any further ado. If the ATO simply checked with the individual via another channel when bank account details are changed, this fraud could be prevented. It might be sensible to check with the individual’s employer as well.</p> <p>Part of the problem is the ATO has not been very transparent about the risks. If these risks were clearly set out, then calls for changes to ATO procedures would have been loud and clear from the cyber security community.</p> <p>The ATO is usually good at identifying when a cyber security incident may lead to fraud. For example, when the recruitment software company <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2018-06-06/australian-data-may-be-compromised-in-pageup-security-breach/9840048?itm_campaign=newsapp">PageUp was hacked in 2018</a>, the ATO required people who may have been affected to reconfirm their identities. This was done without public commentary and represents sound practice.</p> <p>Sadly, the millions of records stolen in the Optus, Medibank and Latitude Financial breaches have not led to a similar level of vigilance.</p> <p>Another action the ATO could take would be to check when a single set of bank account details is associated with more than one myGov account.</p> <p>A national digital identity would also help. However, this system has been in development for years, is not universally popular, and may well be <a href="https://www.themandarin.com.au/226280-gallagher-warns-community-support-for-digital-identity-not-ubiquitous/">delayed</a> until after the federal election due in 2024.</p> <h2>Protecting yourself</h2> <p>The most important thing to do is make sure the ATO does not use a bank account number other than yours. As long as the ATO only has your bank account number to transfer your tax rebate, this scam does not work.</p> <p>It also helps to protect your Tax File Number. There are only four groups that ever need this number.</p> <p>The first is the ATO itself. The second is your employer. However, remember you do not need to give your TFN to a prospective employer, and your employer only needs your TFN <em>after</em> you have started work.</p> <p>Your super fund and your bank may ask for your TFN. However, providing your TFN to your super fund or bank is optional – it just makes things easier, as otherwise they will withhold tax which you will need to claim back later.</p> <p>Of course, all the usual data safety issues still apply. Don’t share your driver’s licence details without good reason. Take similar care with your passport. Your Medicare card is for health services and does not need to be shared widely.</p> <p>Don’t open emails from people you do not know. Never click links in messages unless you are sure they are safe. Most importantly, know your bank will not send you emails containing links, nor will the ATO.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/210459/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/rob-nicholls-91073">Rob Nicholls</a>, Associate professor of regulation and governance, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p><em>Image </em><em>credits: Shutterstock</em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-500-million-ato-fraud-highlights-flaws-in-the-mygov-id-system-heres-how-to-keep-your-data-safe-210459">original article</a>.</em></p>

Technology

Outrage after renters confronted with cleaning “scoring system”

<p dir="ltr">An Australian real estate agent has come under fire for their “demoralising” scoring system for tenants during routine inspections. </p> <p dir="ltr">One fired up renter said they were shocked to receive a scorecard from the agent after they complied with an inspection, and shared their feedback on Reddit. </p> <p dir="ltr">The scorecard rated the tenant’s efforts cleaning the property in 17 different rooms and areas, marking them on cleanliness, and if the areas were damaged or required maintenance. </p> <p dir="ltr">The renter was then also given an overall rating out of five stars, based on the upkeep of their rental home. </p> <p dir="ltr">The Reddit user showed that they received just three and half stars, despite being marked down in only one area due to a light globe not working.</p> <p dir="ltr">In their post, the tenant said they had made every effort to clean the home, adding that the rating was “demoralising”.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I’ve been renting a long time, and my deep cleaning routine is based around inspections,” they explained.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I go all out - every room in my little 3x2 villa is given a spring clean, every surface is washed including walls, doors, lights, windows, carpets etc.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“Had my latest inspection a few weeks ago and just received the report. Despite the agent commenting once again that she never sees houses as clean as mine, and taking 112 (!) photos of every single thing that shows how great the condition of the house is - having one light globe not working is so terrible that I’m scored three and a half out of five.”</p> <p dir="ltr">The renter went on to say that they had only recently discovered that the broken light globe was the real estate’s responsibility to replace, and does not warrant such a severe marking down in their “score”.</p> <p dir="ltr">“The globe in question is a downlight fitting. We have so many downlights that I don’t even use this particular one,” they continued.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I can’t replace the globe itself, I need to get into the roof to replace the whole unit. Thanks to people here I’ve learned this isn’t even my responsibility to fix!”</p> <p dir="ltr">The renter’s post sparked a huge outrage online, with many up in arms over the current state of the rental market and unrealistic expectations of estate agents. </p> <p dir="ltr">One person said, “I fully believe that the average renter keeps a home to a higher standard than an owner, and it seems deliberately demoralising that someone could be marked down for having a light out.”</p> <p dir="ltr">Another added, “This is ridiculously petty, and more importantly, totally irrelevant to the purpose of a periodic inspection. Which is to identify whether any maintenance is needed.”</p> <p dir="ltr">A third person took their anger out on the entire system, summing it up by writing, “I sort of wonder what little lightbulb clicks in your mind and you wake up one day and ask yourself, ‘How can I be a massive c*** who offers no value to society? I know! I will get into real estate.’”</p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Image credits: Getty Images / Reddit</em></p>

Real Estate

“My sex statue is famous”: Larry Emdur reacts to X-rated home reveal

<p dir="ltr"><em>The Morning Show</em> host Larry Emdur has been making a name for himself in the world of game show TV for a few years hosting<em> The Chase Australia</em>, but despite his success, he’s still had his sights set on one more goal: making an appearance on the<em> Have You Been Paying Attention?</em> series. </p> <p dir="ltr">And now, it seems like Larry’s dream has come true, though not exactly in the way he might have expected. </p> <p dir="ltr">The popular host and his wife, Sylvie, have had their hands full recently trying to sell their Kangaroo Valley retreat, better known as Sky Ridge. </p> <p dir="ltr">And while pictures of the property and its picturesque surrounds are available thanks to Belle Property, it wasn’t the property’s luxury four bedrooms or sweeping views that saw it get a mention on the Channel 10 game show.</p> <p dir="ltr">Instead, it was a statue situated in the home’s main living space that caught their attention, with <em>Have You Been Paying Attention? </em>host Tom Gleisner asking his panel if they knew why Larry’s holiday home had gone viral throughout the week. </p> <p dir="ltr">Ed Kavalee was quick to suggest that it was because “the price was right”, while Sam Pang asked if it was because “it has to do with the backyard, they found a shallow grave?”</p> <p dir="ltr">Kavalee eventually got to the right answer, revealing that “there was, like, a pornographic statue in there.”</p> <p dir="ltr">The statue in question could be found perched on top of Larry’s dining room table, and appeared to catch two people caught up in the moment having “X-rated raunchy sex”, as Larry himself put it. </p> <p dir="ltr">The <em>HYBPA?</em> audience found it hilarious, and thankfully, Larry was more than happy to see the funny side of it all, too. </p> <p dir="ltr">Taking to social media after learning about his unexpected cameo, Larry shared that he’d “always wanted to be on <em>Have You Been Paying Attention?</em> but not for a disgraceful reason like this.”</p> <p dir="ltr">“My sex statue is famous,” he added, before sharing details of the property and that “YES !!!! <em>The Price is Right</em>”.</p> <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/reel/CttOo9pByBy/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/reel/CttOo9pByBy/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by @larryemdur</a></p> </div> </blockquote> <p dir="ltr">Larry’s fans raced to express their amusement, with dozens sharing laughing emojis, while others assured him that the feature piece was certainly “a work of art”. </p> <p dir="ltr">“Love a good conversation piece,” one user said. </p> <p dir="ltr">“It’s…… unique,” another added. </p> <p dir="ltr">“Can’t stand that show,” one confessed. “But at least this time they are talking about something interesting”.</p> <p dir="ltr">And one other agreed that it had been “so funny”, noting that it was also a “nice house”, but that most importantly, they were sorry you weren't nominated for a gold logie, you sure deserved it”. </p> <p dir="ltr"><em>Images: realestate.com.au, Getty</em></p>

Real Estate

Ratings results after Shirvo’s first day in Kochie’s chair

<p dir="ltr">The results are in and <em>Seven</em> has maintained its position on top, with thousands of viewers tuning in to watch newly appointed <em>Sunrise </em>co-host Matt Shirvington <a href="https://www.oversixty.com.au/news/news/kochie-s-sunrise-replacement-revealed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">replace Kochie</a> on the breakfast TV show.</p> <p dir="ltr">Over 235,000 metro viewers tuned in to Seven on Monday, while Nine’s Today drew around 188,000 viewers, and 104,000 watched ABC’s News Breakfast.</p> <p dir="ltr">The reactions were positive and many took to social media to share their well-wishes for the former sprinter after his first day on the show.</p> <p dir="ltr">“Your first morning Shirvo, great, So natural,” one viewer posted on Instagram.</p> <p dir="ltr">“The best person to replace Kochie,” wrote another.</p> <p dir="ltr">“Matt Shirvo is exactly what Sunrise needed,” another viewer added.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I am so glad they went with Shirvo. A fresh start for Sunrise,” commented another.</p> <p dir="ltr">The 44-year-old was<a href="https://www.oversixty.com.au/news/news/kochie-s-sunrise-replacement-revealed" target="_blank" rel="noopener"> announced as the new host</a> alongside Nat Barr on June 5, and officially replaced Kochie a week later.</p> <p dir="ltr">He has shared his delight and excitement over joining the show, and even posted an <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CtWFmBhPAT4/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link&igshid=MzRlODBiNWFlZA==" target="_blank" rel="noopener">image </a>of all the alarms he set in preparation for his new job.</p> <p dir="ltr">“I’m so excited but also humbled by the opportunity to co-host such an important show to so many Australians,” he said last week.</p> <p><em>Image: Sunriseon7 Instagram</em></p>

An El Niño looms over Australia’s stressed electricity system – and we must plan for the worst

<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/dylan-mcconnell-1602">Dylan McConnell</a>, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/iain-macgill-576">Iain MacGill</a>, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p>The Bureau of Meteorology this week declared a 70% chance of an <a href="https://media.bom.gov.au/releases/1170/the-bureau-of-meteorology-issues-an-el-nino-alert/">El Niño</a> developing this year. It’s bad timing for the electricity sector, and means Australians may face supply disruptions and volatile prices.</p> <p><a href="http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/updates/articles/a008-el-nino-and-australia.shtml">El Niño events</a> are <a href="https://theconversation.com/from-floods-to-fire-a-climate-scientist-on-the-chances-el-nino-will-hit-australia-this-year-197408">associated with</a> increased temperatures and heatwaves. These conditions drive demand for electricity, especially in summer.</p> <p>These same conditions can also mean some generators don’t produce at full capacity. And unfortunately, the likely El Niño comes as the electricity sector grapples with other significant headwinds.</p> <p>Australia’s electricity grid may be fine this summer. But given what’s on the horizon, it would be prudent to plan for the worst.</p> <h2>How does hot weather affect energy supplies?</h2> <p>Increased air conditioning use in summer can cause <a href="https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/electricity/nem/planning_and_forecasting/nem_esoo/2022/forecasting-approach-electricity-demand-forecasting-methodology.pdf">demand to peak</a>, particularly during heatwaves, as the below graph shows.</p> <figure class="align-center "><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=208&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=208&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=208&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=262&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=262&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530604/original/file-20230607-27-m1kddg.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=262&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" alt="Scatterplot of New South Wales demand and temperature, example based on 2017 calendar year" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Scatterplot of New South Wales demand and temperature, example based on 2017 calendar year.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AEMO</span></span></figcaption></figure> <p>At the same time, electricity generators – including coal, gas, <a href="https://www.climatechangeinaustralia.gov.au/en/projects/esci/esci-case-studies/case-study-heat/">solar and wind</a> – can become less efficient in hot temperatures, and so provide less energy to the system. And the hotter transmission lines get, the less electrical current they can safely carry. This lowers their capacity to transport energy.</p> <p>When the electricity grid is under stress, this can lead to “load shedding” or blackouts – when power companies deliberately switch off the power supply to groups of customers to prevent the overall system from becoming dangerously unstable.</p> <p>This happened in Victoria in early 2019, when more than <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-01-26/victorian-blackouts-what-caused-them-and-is-this-the-new-normal/10751412">200,000 customers</a> lost power during a period of extreme heat.</p> <p>El Niño events are also associated with reduced rainfall. Among other effects on the electricity grid, this can reduce output from hydroelectricity generators (which produce electricity by pumping water through turbines). This <a href="https://theconversation.com/praying-for-rain-50085">occurred</a> in Tasmania in 2016, and contributed to an energy crisis in that state.</p> <h2>Other headwinds are blowing</h2> <p>Aside from facing a likely El Niño, the electricity sector faces other headaches.</p> <p>Earlier this year, the Australian Energy Market Operator <a href="https://aemo.com.au/newsroom/media-release/aemo-issues-nem-reliability-update">warned</a> electricity demand “may exceed supply” at times over the next decade due to factors such as weather conditions or generator outages.</p> <p>The market operator pointed to delays to the Snowy 2.0 hydro project and the gas-fired <a href="https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/new-snowy-ceo-can-t-rule-out-further-delays-at-projects-20230213-p5cjzr">Kurri Kurri Power Station</a>, both in New South Wales.</p> <p>The Kurri Kurri project has been delayed for a year. It was scheduled to begin operating in December this year – in time for the first summer since the Liddell coal-fired power station closed.</p> <p>The Australian Energy Market Operator said the electricity system was expected to meet the “reliability standard” in all regions for the next five years. The <a href="https://www.aemc.gov.au/energy-system/electricity/electricity-system/reliability#:%7E:text=What%20is%20the%20Reliability%20Standard,to%20be%20met%20each%20year.">standard requires</a> at least 99.998% of forecast demand be met each year. Unmet demand can lead to interrupted supply, or blackouts.</p> <p>But the operator also said delays to the Kurri Kurri project posed risks to reliability in NSW this summer.</p> <p>Adding to the pressures on the system, Queensland’s Callide C coal-fired power station is still not back to capacity more than two years after an explosion at the site. The station’s owners last week <a href="https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/energy-grid-fears-as-callide-c-return-delayed-until-mid-2024-20230529-p5dc90">announced</a> the plant would not be fully operational until mid-2024.</p> <p>Combine all this with a likely El Niño, and the electricity sector may be facing a challenging summer.</p> <h2>El Niño years are not normal</h2> <p>In August, the Australian Energy Market Operator is due to publish a new <a href="https://aemo.com.au/-/media/files/electricity/nem/planning_and_forecasting/nem_esoo/2022/esoo-and-reliability-forecast-methodology-document-2022.pdf">assessment</a> of the grid’s expected reliability over the next decade. It may well show reliability standards will be achieved.</p> <p>On first blush, that sounds like good news. However, the way the assessment is derived may mask the real risk during El Niño periods.</p> <p>The assessment combines a number of scenarios, which are based on different <a href="https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/national-electricity-market-nem/nem-forecasting-and-planning/forecasting-and-reliability/projected-assessment-of-system-adequacy">forecasts</a> of electricity demand. The scenarios based on average weather conditions are given the most weight.</p> <p>But if an El Niño arrives, this summer will not be average. We’re likely to experience very hot and dry conditions. This may lead to higher demands on the energy system, and a greater likelihood of blackouts.</p> <p>This won’t be properly reflected in the assessment. So the grid may be deemed reliable even though electricity supplies are under immense pressure.</p> <figure class="align-center "><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/530771/original/file-20230608-30-lb28wc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" alt="repair person climbs power pole" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The grid may be deemed reliable even though it’s under pressure.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Shutterstock</span></span></figcaption></figure> <h2>What can be done?</h2> <p>You might find all this news worrying. But there are measures and technologies in place to help reduce the risks.</p> <p><a href="https://aemo.com.au/en/energy-systems/electricity/emergency-management/reliability-and-emergency-reserve-trader-rert">A mechanism</a> exists that allows the market operator to secure emergency energy reserves. It could mean, for example, calling on a large industrial plant to pause operations to reduce its electricity use, or starting up a standby diesel generator. The operator can start procuring this months ahead of time, and will no doubt be monitoring the situation closely.</p> <p>In the medium term, the uptake of so-called “consumer energy resources” such as rooftop solar farms and small-scale battery storage shows promise. These technologies are located at homes and businesses. They can reduce demand on the grid at peak times and can potentially be built faster than big projects.</p> <p>Longer term, we need to build more “stuff”. This includes renewable energy and other “dispatchable” resources – which can provide energy when it’s needed – as well as more transmission infrastructure.</p> <p>Several federal funding measures – the <a href="https://www.energy.gov.au/government-priorities/energy-supply/capacity-investment-scheme">Capacity Investment Scheme</a> and <a href="https://www.energy.gov.au/news-media/news/rewiring-nation-supports-its-first-two-transmission-projects">Rewiring the Nation</a> – might help realise these projects.</p> <p>The reality is that ageing coal plants are closing – and while they remain open, they’re contributing to reliability challenges in the energy system. Unchecked climate change will also add considerable strain, through natural disasters and more extreme weather.</p> <p>Unfortunately, investment in renewable and other low-emission technology has been <a href="https://www.cleanenergycouncil.org.au/news/clean-energy-construction-peaks-as-investment-pipeline-battles-headwinds">slower than necessary</a>. This has slowed Australia’s emissions reduction efforts and cast questions over the reliability of our energy supplies as an El Niño looms.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/207210/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /></p> <p><a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/dylan-mcconnell-1602">Dylan McConnell</a>, Senior Research Associate, Renewable Energy & Energy Systems Analyst, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/iain-macgill-576">Iain MacGill</a>, Joint director, Collaboration on Energy and Environmental Markets, and Professor, School of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications, <em><a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/unsw-sydney-1414">UNSW Sydney</a></em></p> <p><em>This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/an-el-nino-looms-over-australias-stressed-electricity-system-and-we-must-plan-for-the-worst-207210">original article</a>.</em></p> <p><em>Images: Getty</em></p>

Technology

RBA announces major interest rate rise

<p>The Reserve Bank of Australia has lifted its official interest rate to 4.1 per cent, an increase not seen since early 2012.</p> <p>The bank’s board chose to lift the cash rate target by 0.25 of a percentage point for the second month in a row amid concerns that inflation is taking too long to decrease.</p> <p>The latest monthly consumer price index from the Australian Bureau of Statistics saw prices rise 6.8 per cent from 2022 to April 2023, up from the March reading due to statistical uncertainties caused by last year’s temporary fuel excise cut.</p> <p>Reserve Bank governor Phillip Lowe warned the public about rising costs of services including hospitality which are labour intensive and vulnerable to increased wages.</p> <p>"Recent data indicate that the upside risks to the inflation outlook have increased and the board has responded to this," he highlighted in his post-meeting statement.</p> <p>"While goods price inflation is slowing, services price inflation is still very high and is proving to be very persistent overseas. Unit labour costs are also rising briskly, with productivity growth remaining subdued.”</p> <p>Lowe noted the most recent and bigger than expected rise in minimum and award wages, which was the highest increase in decades.</p> <p>"Wages growth has picked up in response to the tight labour market and high inflation," he explained.</p> <p>"At the aggregate level, wages growth is still consistent with the inflation target, provided that productivity growth picks up.”</p> <p>The interest rate spike will add around $76 a month to the repayments on a $500,000 loan, and double that on a million-dollar 25-year mortgage.</p> <p>Someone with $500,000 owing on their home loan will see their monthly repayment increase by around $1,134 a month since the RBA started lifting rates from a record low of 0.1 per cent in May 2022.</p> <p>However, there is still the risk of another rate rise.</p> <p>"Some further tightening of monetary policy may be required to ensure that inflation returns to target in a reasonable time frame, but that will depend upon how the economy and inflation evolve," Lowe warned.</p> <p><em>Image credit: Twitter</em></p>

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