It's not a bad measure but I don't think it's the best, I'm currently working my way through Spirit Level and so I think some measure like the Gini coefficient would be important.

I think that median income, Gini coefficient, poverty rate and something like the human development index would give a decent overall picture. I don't think a single metric really does the job.

This group is interesting

Global Governance Forum

Especially their Second UN Charter .

Sensible people have been suggesting that investing in real estate needs to be less attractive for decades. F***ing Paul Keeting tried to end negative gearing in the 80s. Millionaires didn't like it to the degree that it might've swung a couple of marginal seats and it probably didn't help that Hawke had a few investment properties himself.

When the only people with political power would lose out from sensible policy then it doesn't happen.

Let's all agree to stop calling our system a democracy.

In much the same way that almost no one has perfect physical health, almost no one has perfect mental health.

You don't need to be a complete wreck to be able to benefit from paying attention to your mental wellness.

Eating well, regular exercise, mindfulness, forgiveness, good sleep practices are all worth practicing whether you feel unwell or not.

I'm a huge advocate of gardening. It gets you outdoors and active, gives a sense of achievement, you learn and improve over time, it's popular enough that you can get involved in a community, if you're growing veg it promotes healthy eating.

It should be mandatory.

I'm lucky to have been able to experiment a bit with this as my work is flexible and I'm in a pretty good bargaining position. I also do a fair bit of unpaid work out of hours.

Having either Friday or Monday I've found to be little different. Having alternating Fridays and Mondays is pretty awesome, 4 days on, 2 off, 4 on, 4 off.

There's a lot to be said for a mid week day off too. I'm looking at moving to a new employer and hoping to go negotiate a 3 day week, maybe Mon-Tues-Thur for example which will be heaven if I can pull it off.

The idea that capitalism and liberal representative (I refuse to use the word democratic) government are the only viable option are so ingrained. It makes it difficult to engage anyone in serious discussion of alternatives.

What I do is point out injustice when you come across it and suggest a socialist solution. Don't mention socialism, talk about unions, worker ownership, workplace democracy, social housing, structural injustice.

If you get pushback I will say something like "I feel like our political system is so focused on capitalist solutions that often good sensible policies don't get considered"

With people you interact with frequently this approach will usually, over time, result in them no longer thinking you're a crackpot and often soften them up for a more detailed discussion in which you can discuss revolutionary change.

This is the best I have been able to do. Interested to see other responses.

Wondering if you read the linked article which presents evidence that this has changed?

It made me laugh, it's not silly per se but the idea that such an esteemed title as blue zone was earned through pension fraud is hilarious.

The more schadenfreude version is that the idea of these blue zones has been trotted out ad nauseum by longevity nuts for at least a decade and now they look like fools.

Gittins kind of leaves us hanging for a conclusion here. Governments can't be afraid of actually providing a service, the idea that leaving things to the market is automatically efficient is a myth.

I call myself 'functionally atheist'. I'm philosophically agnostic in that I hold no strong opinion on the existence of a god/gods as that is fundamentally unknowable but for all practical purposes I act as though there is no god.

I can't say that I'm very familiar with the UK laws in depth other than that they have been in operation for many years and are generally considered effective.

For referenda there's no reason you can't have a publicly funded campaign for yes and no and limit private advertising, we have something like that here in Australia.

Sortition, random selection, when combined with an elected body has a lot of benefits. It has the advantage of having professional politicians with institutional knowledge and relationships while also having a body the that is actually representative of the larger population.

100% agree!

As an addition to this I firmly believe medical marijuana is a phase.

Now I've made people angry here's the nuance.

CBD/THC combinations certainly have a role in some patients with chronic pain, especially where it's use can avoid or reduce the use of opioids.

There are clear specific uses such as intractable epilepsy where it is clearly the best treatment. It is effective for glaucoma but there are better treatments available.

I'm highly suspicious of marijuana having any role in mental health and there are, in my opinion, no convincing studies published showing that it is useful at all despite the fact that large studies have been done and presumably file-drawed.

The idea that smoking is an appropriate delivery method for a medication when other methods are available is insane. Very few things are as bad as tobacco smoke but inhaling smoke is bad for you.

My prediction is that in 20 years we will have cannabis derivatives in capsules that fulfil the specific purposes and the idea that any doctor prescribed marijuana to smoke will seem insane to younger doctors.

A bicameral legislature, one house elected by mixed member proportional system and the other selected at random from the voting age population. Legislation must pass both houses, if it passed one house but not the other it can go to referendum at the same time as the next general election.

You can also have things like citizen initiated referenda. Campaign finance laws similar to those in the UK are also desirable.

No. This sort of arrogant rubbish needs to be shut down.

In my job - a doctor - I routinely discuss difficult and complex topics with people of all backgrounds and education levels. With very few exceptions people are able to understand difficult topics.

It is my experience that the most difficult people to work with are not ordinary people but those who hold the opinion that everyone else is stupid.

With very few exceptions sortition and participatory democracy have worked well whenever they've been tried.

I'm a doctor and my partner is a nurse and the size of the difference is straight up injustice. Join your union and vote for militant leaders that will push for better conditions and salaries. If you don't fight you lose

I have an idee fixe that I could set up a non profit that bought homes and rented them at a price somewhere between the maintenance cost and the market price. It would make a profit and slowly expand providing more and more affordable housing. Ideally it would start with more than 1 million but doesn't need to.

Also anything potentially breakable. Crockery, glassware etc. Best to have something that's already been stress tested in someone else's home.

Could you expand on what you mean by presuming human entitlement can subsume the laws of nature? I'm always interested in a good critique.

Australian doctor here, certainly in Australia There are dozens of jobs for nurses that require minimal or no patient contact.

Things like administration and management would usually require at least a reasonable amount of experience but clinic work is very different to hospital work.

My own fiance works in infection control which is a lot of reviewing charts, advising ward staff on isolation protocol, ensuring staff vaccinations are up to date.

Just quit nursing is a little otp.