The Bearing (Page 4)

The Bearing

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Woman's silhouette at doorway marked 'No Vacancy' with shadowy houses in background

Linking housing spend to domestic violence risks solutions to both

Australia has two urgent crises and one funding announcement — but solving them together may mean solving neither one properly.

Pencil hovering over a checkbox marked Male on a form.

Census collects LGBTQ+ data - but will we see it?

Australia is counting its LGBTQ+ population for the first time — but the number is only as useful as what the ABS chooses to do with it.

Gas canister with Australian dollar notes spraying out of it in all directions

Greens just wanna tax gas

Gas companies posting record profits while paying little tax looks like an open goal — but the mechanism behind those low bills matters more than the Greens want to admit.

Man in superhero cape stands in courtroom while others point at him in anger

Men of ‘Good Character’ don’t control their partners

Victoria's new family violence laws close specific loopholes that perpetrators had learned to exploit — but how well does each mechanism actually hold up?

Marina Bay Sands transformed into a giant petrol pump against Singapore's skyline

Australia fills up at the Singapore servo

Australia has been caught nearly out of fuel twice in a decade. A quiet trade deal amendment with Singapore is the government's answer — but is it a strategy or just a queue-jump?

Small puppy sitting in front of a large building, shadow showing aggressive pit-bull with bared teeth

WA corruption watchdog wants more power. When is it too much?

WA's corruption watchdog wants power over private contractors — and the case for it is real. But so is the risk of building an institution no one can check.

Indonesian farmer wearing a large traditional hat in a rice paddy field

Indonesia hasn’t collapsed. Yet.

Indonesia's rupiah is weaker than during the crisis that toppled Suharto — and more than half the damage is self-inflicted.

New sparkling home beside old dilapidated rental building

Focus on new homes and forget the existing.

285 public housing homes sit empty in Canberra while 3,650 people wait — so why does fixing them fall to a volunteer with a paintbrush?

Hand positioned above a pause button, symbolizing hesitation or delay in decision-making.

Housing crash makes thing interesting for RBA.

The RBA held rates steady — but the data it officially watches may be hiding the clearest sign of whether its hikes are working.

Raw unpolished rock next to gleaming microchip separated by thick fortress wall, representing Australia's mineral processing

The rare-earth mirage: why Australia's mineral riches mean nothing without processing

Australia has the geology. China has the industry. The gap between them is where Australia's critical minerals strategy is currently living.

American military tanks operating in an Australian mining pit

US war machine leaves Australia in the dust. Literally.

A foreign defence department just put $560 million into an Australian mine. Canberra called it a vote of confidence. That depends on who you think it's confidence in.

Helium balloon lifting a bundle of Australian dollar notes upward into the sky

Proof that capitalism drives productivity. The market works, eventually

A single Iranian strike removed a third of the world's helium supply overnight. What happened next is a test case for how markets handle the unthinkable.

Wine bottle pouring out Australian coins instead of wine onto a surface.

Wine cycle. Who will survive the hardest race in decades?

Global wine demand has fallen by a third in under a decade — and Australian exporters are only now reckoning with what that means for who survives.

Pauline Hanson depicted with four arms simultaneously shaking hands with four different people

Pauline’s object lesson in politics

Pauline Hanson admitted she doesn't care about the economic consequences of her migration policy. That honesty reveals more about the policy than she intended.

Mobile phone glowing alone in vast bushland landscape at dusk

The realities of a mega-telco for the bush

Forcing telcos to share towers in the bush sounds like an obvious fix — but the last time the ACCC looked at it, the answer was more complicated than that.

Reporter gazes at computer screen displaying a YouTuber recording a video in a studio setting

ABC doesn’t do edgy stuff very well.

Three programs pulled, four senior figures gone, and an apology issued despite a clean Ombudsman finding — what the ABC's bad weeks reveal about institutional nerve.

Carry-on luggage with multiple price tags hanging from the handle, symbolizing travel costs

Everything in aviation has a price. Now we know how much.

Jetstar says unbundling overhead locker fees is transparency. Critics say it's a trap. The real question is who bears the cost either way.

Bird with extremely long outstretched wings dripping cash from the wing tips

Facebook’s creator funding raises eyebrows at the extreme

Facebook is paying creators who post white nationalist content — but is the real problem Meta's politics, or its broken enforcement model?

Two houses side by side: a modest suburban home next to an enormous mansion, with residents gazing toward the larger property

How AI will disrupt workers

Australia's unions have a plan for AI disruption. History suggests it won't arrive the way they're promising — and the workers most at risk aren't the ones they're thinking of.

Electric vehicle charging in garage next to old rusted car

Driving and EV is just better

One in five new cars sold in Australia is now electric — but whether the shift is as liberating as owners claim depends entirely on where you live.

Data centre building casting a large shadow of a government official's silhouette across it.

Data centres are great (but only if the sun shines)

Australia's data centre rules were written for a grid that doesn't yet exist in the NT — and the investment won't wait.

Older couple standing beside a house while younger couple watches from a distance, illustrating housing affordability gap

Housing is less affordable now. Lets get a committee together!

Australia's housing affordability inquiry is on its seventh hearing — while the construction pipeline is going backwards. When does analysis become organised delay?

Crowd of people lifting a small business icon above their heads in a mosh pit-style gathering

Is it better to take your company public?

ASIC wants more companies on the ASX — but does a public listing actually make a business succeed, or does it just take credit for success that was already coming?

Billionaire sitting in luxury private jet cabin with sheep scattered throughout the interior

Government Spending

Farms are the new billionaire flex

When a billionaire buys 1.3 million hectares of sheep country, is it a smart diversification play — or the beginning of something more structural for Australian agriculture?

Giant robot hand flicking away old newspapers, symbolizing tech dominance over traditional media

Tech giants hold upper hand in media negotiations

Australia raised the penalty rate on tech giants that won't pay local news outlets — but quietly changed the calculation in ways that may cost the platforms less than before.