9 September 2013: Election recap, farmer sentiment, and gender grad imbalance stats

The elections are over and I have moved to a new career. Feels like a good time to re-start the Fin Review Review to keep with the "fresh start" theme. 

The election

• Abbott's promises for scrapping carbon and mining taxes will likely wait until June when the new Senate sits.
• Green's leader Christine Milne "everyone elected has an obligation to uphold the policies they were elected on." [CR: not sure how that holds up to the sport and motoring enthusiasts who squeaked in on preferences.]
• Coalition beat Labor 53% to 47%. Coalition secured 81 seats (could be 87), Labor 51 (could be 57). Labor's primary vote of 35% was lowest in the century.
• In the senate as of current count, Coalition lost one seat to hold 33 spots, Labor lost six spots to hold 25. Greens picked up one to reach 10. Potential 8 independents and minor party Senators.
• When voters dumped Labor on Saturday but opted in droves to give their votes to minor parties instead of the Coalition, they created a nightmare for then new government beyond July 2014. [CR: I am sure there is a life lesson in here about knowing what you don't want but not necessarily getting what you do want.]
• Clive Palmer of the Palmer United Party: registered with the electoral commission two months ago, spent close to $20 million on then campaign, $12 million in advertising, won 5.6% of then primary votes, 11.3% support in Qld. Does not plan on giving up his business interests as an MP. [CR: Apart from potential conflicts of interest, I am just thinking about the time involved. Usually, I stop doing my old job when I get a new one... but that may just be me.]

Rabobank farming sentiment survey shows confidence higher

• Survey of 1,000 primary producers across varying geographies and commodities: 21% had a negative view, 46% positive.
• Confidence at 15-month high, 75% of farmers expect agriculture economy to improve or remain steady after five quarters of negative sentiment.
• Rabobank CEO Thos Gieskes, speaks of the need for flows, incoming from foreign investment, outgoing from exports.
• Geiskes says to help feed exploding world population, amount of food produced needs to double but productivity is lagging. Year-on-year productivity growth was about 1.3%, needs 1.7% to realise opportunity.
• R&D spending needs to increase, farming needs to become less labour-reliant and more capital intensive. Challenge to double production with less land, less water, and less fertiliser.

Telco mobile customer count statistics by year, in millions of customers

• Telstra: 2011 (12.20), 2012 (13.80), 2013 (15.10)
• SingTel-Optus: 2011(9.10), 2012 (9.51), 2013 (9.53)
• Vodaphone Hutchison Australia: 2011 (7.20), 2012 (6.84), 2013 (6.03)
• There are 31 million active mobile subscribers in Australia (for perspective, the population of Australia is 23 million)

Coalition education promises

• Schools
• Match Better Schools funding over four years - $2.8bn plus "secret deals"
• $70m for independent public schools
• $22m for reading and writing in remote primary schools
• $10m trial of online language learning for pre-school children
• 40% of year 12 students studying a foreign language within a decade
• More science, technology, engineering, maths (STEM) study for year 12 students
• MBA-style executive education for principles
• Vocational education and training
• Income-contingent loans up to $20,000 for apprentices
• Higher education
• $100m New Columbo Plan to send Australian students to Asia
• $100m boost to medical research by cutting grants to 'fringe' research areas.

MOOC on the walking dead

• University of California Irving to launch a cross-disciplinary MOOC based on The Walking Dead TV show.
• Course to cover topics including post-disaster nutrition, human survival, and stereotypes in Darwinian environment.
• Experiment to see if tying pop culture to traditional academic ideas improves learning.
• [CR: Cool, make it relevant. Will have to try Zombifying grade 5 math to see if it takes.]

Gender imbalance in education

• 60% of domestic undergraduate completions in Australian universities in 2012 were women. 50% more women than men complete bachelor's degrees.
• 59% of students from Australian universities studying abroad in 2012 were women. 44% more women than men studies abroad.
• 70% of Australia's indigenous undergraduates in 2012 were women.
• Julia Gillard set a target of 40% of 25 to 34 year olds holding a bachelor's degree by 2025. By 2012, 36.8% of 25 to 34 year olds held a bachelor's degree (40.5% women, 33.1% men).
• In 2012, undergraduate completions increased 13%, and the population of those aged 25 to 34 years old also increased 13%.
•  [CR: Yes, but in what courses? And are the opportunities the same for the graduates? Interesting to see the extent that the leadership imbalance towards men is driving the imbalance in education.  Will be interesting to see the impact in tow to three generations.]

Fewer Americans seeking jobs

• Participation rate 63.2% lowest since 1978, blamed on baby  boomers entering retirement and jobseekers giving up.
• Unemployment at a four-year low of 7.3%, but if adjusted for participation rate of 2008 would be 11%.

Yahoo!7 returns to Google

• Decision last week by Australian Yahoo!7 to align with Google and move away from Microsoft's Bing. Yahoo!7 not tied up with global agreements due to joint venture with Seven West Media.
• $1.8 billion spent on search advertising annually
• Google used for around 92% of searches in Australia (about 65% in the States). Australia is one of the best performing markets in terms of share.
• Yahoo!7 used for 2% to 3% of searches, Bing used for about 5%.