It's not just the ABS. It's also the Productivity Commission downplaying the growth in inequality
- Written by Christopher Sheil, Visiting Senior Fellow in History, UNSW
We now know the Bureau of Statistics did quite a bit of soul-searching before producing the bland and ultimately misleading press release headed “Inequality Stable Since 2013-14[1]” last month.
Late last week we pointed to the odd way in which the release included no data to back up the claim[2], and how journalists from the ABC[3] and Sydney Morning Herald[4] and Age quickly discovered the statistics it purported to summarise actually showed wealth inequality climbing.
References
- ^ Inequality Stable Since 2013-14 (www.abs.gov.au)
- ^ no data to back up the claim (theconversation.com)
- ^ ABC (www.abc.net.au)
- ^ Sydney Morning Herald (www.smh.com.au)
- ^ Sydney Morning Herald (www.smh.com.au)
- ^ The Guardian (www.theguardian.com)
- ^ Australian Bureau of Statistics disclosure log (bit.ly)
- ^ Australian Bureau of Statistics disclosure log (bit.ly)
- ^ Australian Bureau of Statistics disclosure log (bit.ly)
- ^ internally with no external influence (www.abs.gov.au)
- ^ Productivity Commission (www.pc.gov.au)
- ^ Rising Inequality? (www.pc.gov.au)
- ^ For notes, see full paper: Inequality stocktake ... or snowjob? Evatt Journal, November 2018 (evatt.org.au)
- ^ Evatt Foundation (evatt.org.au)
- ^ Don't believe what they say about inequality. Some of us are worse off (theconversation.com)
- ^ Rising Inequality? (www.pc.gov.au)
- ^ effects (politybooks.com)
- ^ What the Bureau of Statistics didn't highlight: our continuing upward redistribution of wealth (theconversation.com)
Authors: Christopher Sheil, Visiting Senior Fellow in History, UNSW