Australia

Honestly, I just hope society collapses before I'm no longer able to afford rent, so the police have better things to do than drag my family out of our home. My pay has gone up 50% over the last 5 years and I've never been poorer despite cutting the few luxuries we ever enjoyed. There's nothing left to cut.

It's pretty clear what's ahead with this Strait of Hormuz bullshit. I've spent a chunk of my meagre savings on lifetime purchases that'll help us survive regardless of our circumstances, now all I can do is tend my garden, wait for it to all play out, and have my pitchfork ready if needed.

If you are rich and given the choice of taking money out of your business to buy more property and a bigger yacht or invest in modern equipment and processes you are most likely going to run your business like a slum lord until the business is no longer competitive and then blame the unions and buy goods from overseas and slap your name on them instead. Particularly if your a multinational (eg US, UK owned) and have no particular interest in this country beyond extracting its natural wealth. Meanwhile overseas the winning countries are nation building and trying to dominate strategic industries and supply chains for the benefit of their people.

Hence we don't have refinery capacity or competitive steel mills. It was run into the ground. Owners blamed local costs. Then threw their hands in the air. Always the same. Stupid country run by stupid people.

Australia is a lucky country run mainly by second rate people who share its luck. It lives on other people's ideas, and, although its ordinary people are adaptable, most of its leaders (in all fields) so lack curiosity about the events that surround them that they are often taken by surprise. -- Donald Horne, 1964

It started when the Liberal Party closed down all defence supply factories in Australia and sourced materiels overseas.

And Target and Myers had a policy in the 80s of sourcing from overseas in preference to Australian made. This was to put pressure on Australian manufacturers.

Real Estate driving up prices and rent because they earn income determined by percentage, not per job .

Driving jobs overseas, making Aussies poorer and having less power to determine policy and standard of living is not some accident but a thought out policy by morally corrupt un Australian oligarchs.

Glad to see this getting more attention. I swear you'd see Scabs catch flack in any left leaning space. But if you destroy unions by effectively having those same people overseas it flies under the radar. ¯\(ツ)/¯

A(ctually) I(ndonesian)