4 ms·

> But don't kid yourself: Australian citizenship is profoundly valuable. Relative to what other citizenship?

jacques_chester 8y ago
It depends on your criteria. But it's a wealthy country with a high standard of living, relatively safe and stable, with well-established democratic and legal systems, has relatively low corruption, safety nets for health and welfare, subsidised education and if you avoid the crocodiles it can be very pleasant in parts.
- microcolonel 8y ago
  > well-established democratic and legal systems Given the topic at hand, this doesn't seem like a distinct strength of Australia, unless you're coming from a despotic regime or recently New Zealand.
  - roganartu 8y ago
    I think it's important to have some context here though. I can't speak for the parent commenter, but I am Australian and how I interpreted it was that our democratic system is reasonably mature, functional, and relatively free from large scale corruption. I think the last point is the big one. Political lobbying, while still a thing, isn't as rampant as in the US for example. Bad power-grab legislation like the bill being discussed still happen, as do bad laws as a result of general incompetence, but in my experience there are far less laws that happen as a result of corporate lobbying. A good example is the Australian tax system. There is a government provided website for filing your individual income tax return. For the vast majority of people it is prefilled, takes about 5 mins, and it's also free for everyone. Contrast this with the US where companies like Intuit lobby specifically to keep the tax code complex and to require returns prepared online be submitted through one of them so they can collect their fees.
    - microcolonel 8y ago
      > Bad power-grab legislation like the bill being discussed still happen, as do bad laws as a result of general incompetence, but in my experience there are far less laws that happen as a result of corporate lobbying. I think I care a bit less about corporate welfare lobbying than infringements on my civil rights. You can fix corporate lobbying if you have real civil rights, but if you don't have the right to communicate privately, the corporations can literally just stop you from organizing, with the littlest nudges (just make the messages of dissent mysteriously not deliver). It might not even be illegal.
- perilunar 8y ago
  Also, Australia ranks well above the USA on most indices of economic freedom. e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom
  - throw0101a 8y ago
    This is put out by the Heritage Foundation. You may want to read up on their ideologies before deciding that a rating of "good" from them is something you actually want to achieve. For example, their affiliations are: Republican Party, Thatcherism, Reaganomics. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heritage_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heritage_Foundation Even a broken clock is right twice a day (as the saying goes), but I'm not sure I'd really strongly rely on their policy ideas.
- throw0101a 8y ago
  Canada meets a lot of these criteria, though the climate may not agree with everyone--though at least we don't have a plant that causes you to suicide yourself (gympie-gympie) * https://curiosity.com/topics/the-suicide-plant-has-the-most-painful-stingers-in-the-world-curiosity/ https://curiosity.com/topics/the-suicide-plant-has-the-most-... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrocnide_moroides https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrocnide_moroides
  - brokenmachine 8y ago
    Wow, I'm Australian and I'd never heard of that plant.

It depends on your criteria. But it's a wealthy country with a high standard of living, relatively safe and stable, with well-established democratic and legal systems, has relatively low corruption, safety nets for health and welfare, subsidised education and if you avoid the crocodiles it can be very pleasant in parts.

microcolonel 8y ago
> well-established democratic and legal systems Given the topic at hand, this doesn't seem like a distinct strength of Australia, unless you're coming from a despotic regime or recently New Zealand.
- roganartu 8y ago
  I think it's important to have some context here though. I can't speak for the parent commenter, but I am Australian and how I interpreted it was that our democratic system is reasonably mature, functional, and relatively free from large scale corruption. I think the last point is the big one. Political lobbying, while still a thing, isn't as rampant as in the US for example. Bad power-grab legislation like the bill being discussed still happen, as do bad laws as a result of general incompetence, but in my experience there are far less laws that happen as a result of corporate lobbying. A good example is the Australian tax system. There is a government provided website for filing your individual income tax return. For the vast majority of people it is prefilled, takes about 5 mins, and it's also free for everyone. Contrast this with the US where companies like Intuit lobby specifically to keep the tax code complex and to require returns prepared online be submitted through one of them so they can collect their fees.
  - microcolonel 8y ago
    > Bad power-grab legislation like the bill being discussed still happen, as do bad laws as a result of general incompetence, but in my experience there are far less laws that happen as a result of corporate lobbying. I think I care a bit less about corporate welfare lobbying than infringements on my civil rights. You can fix corporate lobbying if you have real civil rights, but if you don't have the right to communicate privately, the corporations can literally just stop you from organizing, with the littlest nudges (just make the messages of dissent mysteriously not deliver). It might not even be illegal.
perilunar 8y ago
Also, Australia ranks well above the USA on most indices of economic freedom. e.g. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Index_of_Economic_Freedom
- throw0101a 8y ago
  This is put out by the Heritage Foundation. You may want to read up on their ideologies before deciding that a rating of "good" from them is something you actually want to achieve. For example, their affiliations are: Republican Party, Thatcherism, Reaganomics. * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heritage_Foundation https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heritage_Foundation Even a broken clock is right twice a day (as the saying goes), but I'm not sure I'd really strongly rely on their policy ideas.
throw0101a 8y ago
Canada meets a lot of these criteria, though the climate may not agree with everyone--though at least we don't have a plant that causes you to suicide yourself (gympie-gympie) * https://curiosity.com/topics/the-suicide-plant-has-the-most-painful-stingers-in-the-world-curiosity/ https://curiosity.com/topics/the-suicide-plant-has-the-most-... * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrocnide_moroides https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dendrocnide_moroides
- brokenmachine 8y ago
  Wow, I'm Australian and I'd never heard of that plant.