NOTE, ARTICLE No: 2
This article is the second article, of a group of articles, about Australia and the housing problems cause and remedy discussions. We are starting with these farming articles, because farmers can also have financial problems, in a way similar to the housing problems, since the Social Security System fails to help them.
Welcome to our
article,
(This article was published in August 2018)
Australia farming and their present problems.
Dear readers, I am
writing this article, “Farming Today Is Still a Risky Business”, because
everybody is talking about it. The problem is the drought that is ruining
farming and there is no end in sight. Now I want to say that I am writing this
article for two reasons: One is to talk about the farmers problems that the
drought is causing, and the failure of the government to help them; when they
know that these things happen in Australia easily, because Australia is the
driest continent on earth.
Now, this farmers
problem gives me the opportunity to talk about the Australian government
failure to help the farmers and other people, because they are in the same
position as the farmer, according to the present, Social Security System, which
I believe it is faulty; but it can be improved, is the assets test is adjusted to the right level, or simetimes ignored if necessary.
Now, let me
explain, the farmers and some other people are cut off the Social Security
System, because they own properties, so, the assets-test eliminate them to
receive help, even when they need help like the farmers today. So, this article
is going to be one the first articles, followed by several other articles about the
Australian politician’s failure to help people in need.
We may argue that
the farmers are rich people, so, they must be the last people to receive money
from the government. Okay, you are right; but when the farmers reach a stage,
where they cannot run their farms anymore, because they have no money; I
believe that the government should step in and help them, even if it is a free
loan, to be paid back when the farms produce enough, and they are able to pay
back that loan. This is only a suggestion, and there are other ways that the
government can help.
I believe that what
is happening to the farmers today, it has happened before, so, I want to point
out that this is the same old failure that most governments have. You see, what
is happening in Australia now, brings back my life-time memories, which are two
folds: one is that farming is a risky business, because the nature of farming
is risky, since the weather and other things influence the outcome, as we can
see from this drought that today is crippling the Australian farmers; the other
is about how the government fails to help the farmers even today, when help is
urgently needed.
I believe that
today we are more advanced, so, these things should be easier to understand and
control, if everything can be worked out and organized, before these things
happen. Now, I may have started to write this article for the farmers, but
there are other things and places that the government is failing to do the
right things, so, I will be writing several articles, to point out what I
believe can be done to fix them; but let us go back to talk about the farmers.
Anyhow, I want to
compare what I know from my life experiences, to what is happening now in
Australia. I must say that it is like when I was young, the Italian government
wanted only to collect the land tax from us farmers, because we owned some
land, even when the land did not produce anything; they still wanted the land tax,
and that was hurting us farmers. You see, we old people will always go back and
compare present happenings to the past and then have our say, therefore, let me
tell you part of my life story, to compare the past with the present.
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Compare old and new
farming problems.
When I was young, I have been working in our
family farm in Southern Italy for twelve years, I gave up farming because we
worked hard but made very little money. During the time that I was working in
the farm, I remember two very bad years for us famers; one of this was in 1951
when we had a drought and the wheat and other crops completely failed. We
harvested what we could, but there was no much in it; the second time was in
1960, this time was too much rain, we again harvested what we could with the
same result, we made about twice as much as the seeds we used for sowing, now
that is bad because a good harvest is ten times plus what you sow, at least
that is what we believed then. Anyhow, also the farm animals did not do well,
because there wasn’t enough good food to go around; so, these events made me
think to give up farming, since it is too risky, and you work for next to
nothing.
But not all farms
were the same, so, let me explain, some people that had more land and more
money than us, had enough money to keep going, but I could not do that because
my family didn’t own enough land, so, I had to find another way to earn a
living. For this reason, I migrated to Australia hoping for the best. In
Australia I switched job and instead of farming, I worked in the building
industry; but in the back of my mind, I always thought about the farmers and
their risky business.
Anyhow, most people
in Australia were and are thinking that farmers are rich people; well, some of
them are rich and some are not, when everything goes well, it is okay, but they
are still running a risky business, and their business can lose money easily.
Now, the worst part
of running a business and losing money; it is when people think you are rich,
and therefore, nobody cares about you, even if you are starving. As it happens,
farmers are at the top of this disadvantaged list, because farming is very
risky; you see, most time it depends from the weather, but the farmers have no
control over the weather, then, they own a lot of land, (they might even be
paying tax because they own this land, (like we did in Italy in the fifties)
but I don’t know much about this issue in Australia). But I know that the farmers are self-employed, so,
they don’t qualify for help from the government, because they are self-employed
and because of the assets-test. I believe that the assets-test should not apply
in special cases, if you cannot make any money even if you work hard to earn
it, the assets-test should not apply. I believe that this is what is wrong with
the assets-test today, they don’t consider if you can make money, from what you
have? And how much money you can make from your assets? We are going to say
something about the assets-test later, where we will be talking also about the
assets test for rental property owners. To do all this, we are going to write
several articles, so, we invite you to follow us.
Now let me go back
to the farmers issues because life problems never come alone. You see, it is
the federal government that can help the farmers, but the federal government is
having trouble today, as we will explain.
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Life problems never come alone.
Anyhow, today I am
writing about what is happening in Australia to farming people, because there
is this drought problem. So, the farmers need help, they cannot keep going the way it is. I believe that they are not being helped enough from
the government when the government can do more to help them. But as it often
happens, our lives problems never come alone; so, troubles can increase other
existing troubles, even when they don’t belong to the original trouble.
Anyhow, what I am
trying to say here is that the federal government must help the farmers, but
today they have their own political problems, so, instead of trying to solve
the farmers problem, the politicians fight each other, they want to elect a new
Prime Minister, believing that it is the fault of the PM the reason that people
are leaving their coalition party; they don’t see that it is the party policies
that people don’t like, and one of this I believe it is the assets test,
because it puts the farmers and other people in a disadvantaged position.
About the political
scene, I believe that changing their leader is not going to solve their
political problem, unless those people that will be in charge, change their
policies. But that is not all, because also, what I am trying to say here is
what, senator Richard Di Natale, is talking about in this video, click the link
to view.
Richard Di Natale flares up in the
Senate - YouTube
OMG finally
somebody is telling the truth. Wake up Australian politicians and think about
the people that have voted for you first, it is your duty. Now, let us hope
that this political problem is solved quickly, so that the politician can go
back to work and solve the farmers problem, then solve the other problems.
Anyhow, let me go back to talk about the farmers problem, since the farmer are
neglected from the government.
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Farmers
are neglected from the government.
When we
compare today farming to the past, today it is easier than it used to be,
because of the progress we have made in farming; good farming practice helps
everybody, the proof of how the farmers help is written in this article, Farming today compared to
the old way, we wrote this article some time ago, and it
explain the benefit that modern farming brings to the people. Because farming helps us all, a
good government must care about the farmers; but today the farmers are
neglected from the government.
Now, as
we have said, today farming is still a risky business, when it should not be
that risky. You see, we need the government to intervene and make laws that
help the farmers when they need help. After all, it is the farmers that feed
the people of Australia, because all the food is grown in the farms; so, it is
necessary that the farmers are kept farming and continue to feed the entire
population, if that cannot be done, then one day food can cost a lot more. So,
let me explain how I see this farming situation.
Australia
is a vast country, but at the same time it is the driest continent on earth,
for this reason the Australian farmers must be organized in a way that they can
survive, when a dry spell happens like it is happening right now. They cannot
copy anybody else to solve their farming problems, when there is a drought or
something else that affects farming, because nobody else has got a problem as
large as Australia, so, we in Australia must be the first in the world to find
a solution to this farming problem.
I believe
that the Australian government must make laws, which will help the farmers
survive and be able to bring their farm back to produce whatever they produce,
when the drought is over. Now, here we are talking about the drought, but it
should apply to other things as well, because farming has too many ups and
downs, so, they need to be organized in such a way, that when things go the
wrong way, like the drought they are experiencing now; this new future set up
that we are suggesting, will keep hardship to a minimum.
At this
point of time, let us imagine what can be done, then make some suggestions.
We can
suggest helping the farmers.
Today the
most important thing that the farmers must do is think how they can survive the
drought, or anything else that puts their livelihood at risk. Here we must
admit that most of the farmers are good at doing that, because farmers are
practical people, but that may not be enough, to save all of them, as we can
see from what is happening today. Therefore, we must think about a helping
solution. Here we suggest that an organization that collect things from the
farmers, when farming is doing well must be created, this is where the
government can step in, by setting up a collective organization, which for
instance collect every year a portion of the farms produce, or even some money
when they are doing well, before taxing them to collect their tax. Then this
government organization, will keep this tax-free reserve of food and money in
reserve, which then, it can be freely distributed, when it becomes necessary to
help those farmers in need.
Well,
this only a suggestion that we have written here. But this thing is not even
new; we are all familiar with the story in the Bible, when the Pharaoh of Egypt
dreamed about the seven fat cows that then were devoured by the seven skinny
cows. Joseph interpreted the dream that in the land of Egypt, there were going
to be seven years of plenty, followed by seven years of famine. The Pharaoh got
Joseph to organize a collection in the years of plenty, to be distributed on
the years of famine, and thus Egypt survived the years of famine.
What
happened in Egypt was a long time ago, and the earth seasons then were more
regular than today, because they did not have global warming to deal with, this
global warming is an extra problem that we have created ourselves, so, today
and in the future, we must create things that can overcome this global warming
problem. Meanwhile, we must be careful what we do; perhaps we should create
more social security for everyone including the farmers. Now, let us talk about
our present farming and other problems that we are having today.
Australia
is having problems.
Anyhow,
today what we want from the government cannot happen; because of what has
happened in Canberra recently; since the federal government has had political
problems; so, on the 24 of August 2018 they have replaced the Prime Minister;
now the new PM. is Scott Morison, but he needs still to choose the other
ministers and then swear them in, before they can talk about anything else.
Anyhow, we can say here that today Australia is still the lucky country,
because there are people that donate things, when people are in need; so, the
farmer get some help that way. Thanks, God, for that!
Anyhow,
meanwhile the farmers are praying for rain and praying that the people in
Canberra will remember them, and then, do something about helping the farmers.
Because, farming is a risky business even today, when things are easier to
organize, for this reason, we need to look at the Australian security system to
see who is responsible and what can be done.
I think I
have said enough in this article, see you in our next article, where we will
discuss about the Australian social security system that today is failing the
farmers, but not only the farmers, because there are other people that can be
served better. We believe that Australia can do better, if the Australian
government can organize the resource better.
Therefore, we will publish more articles about these failures, hoping that somebody in the right circles reads them, and does something about it.
I think we have said enough in this article, see you in our next article, Australian Social Security.
To see more click on this link, Farming Today Is Still a Risky Business.
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NOTE. This article above, is the link to the following article, The Australian Social Security. This article is also the second article of a group of articles that we want to publish. The aim of these articles is to demonstrate that, the Australian Social Security System fails to help those that need their help. And we believe that it must be equal for everyone. The greatest problem is created by the assets test anomalies, so, the ASSETS TEST must be abolished or adjusted, so that those anomalies are eliminated. Because this is one of the reasons why, there are not enough rental properties on the market. We will talk about this in our future articles.
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