Australia in the grip of "Dollar Darwinism"

Australia, like the rest of the developed world, is in the grip of 'Dollar Darwinism'-survival of the most economically efficient without regard for the social consequences, according to a University of Queensland study.

In his PhD thesis, Dr Phil Day explores why many people view globalisation as a threat.

'A major reason is that there is no international government regulating trade between nations, imposing safeguards and ensuring some proportion of corporate profits finds its way back into less developed communities,' he said.

'The image of mindless lemmings, frenetically pursuing globalised economic efficiency at an ever-increasing pace is hard to erase.

'Will Nirvana be recognisable when we get there after frenzied time-saving but even longer working hours-discarding older workers at an ever-earlier age while at the same time life expectancy is increasing?

'Globalised efficiency, or quality of life here and now?'

A retired town planner, senior administrator and academic, Dr Day examines the economic, social and environmental consequences of the failure of Western societies to capture revenue from changes in land values.

'Since the Middle Ages, land has been treated as a human-made commodity to be owned and traded for private profit or to be speculatively withheld from the market,' Dr Day said.

'Apart from our limited local government rating system, the benefits of increased land values are not flowing back into the community.

'This could be an enormous source of revenue-to effectively tax what people take from the system-instead of continually taxing what people add to society-their labour and capital.'

Dr Day, who was Head of UQ's Department of Regional and Town Planning from 1977 until 1980, said such a change in government revenue-raising would mean sections of the community such as land speculators would pay more while income taxes on the wider community could be lowered and the Goods and Services Tax (GST) abolished.

He said he saw a bleak future unless the commodification of land was reversed-the downsizing of public institutions and services, the erosion of 'mateship' and community values, ever-increasing inequality, insecurity and social alienation plus, not least, the commercialisation of Australian universities and their research.

'The commodification of land is also an intractable impediment to reconciliation with Indigenous Australians,' Dr Day said.

Dr Day is seeking a publisher for his thesis, Hijacked Inheritance, in a book subtitled The Enshrinement of Dollar Darwinism.

For more information, contact Dr Phil Day (telephone 07 3870 3562) or Shirley Glaister at UQ Communications (telephone 07 3365 2339).