I worked more on the Industrial Relations reform issue last night and I have written a draft paper, which you can read and, hopefully, comment on.
IR is a very complex topic, and for that reason I’ve tended to shy away from detailed analysis in the past. But with major changes inevitable, there’s no alternative but to get immersed in the details. This is going to be a slow process, but at least I’ve now made a start. I’m pretty much flat-out at present, so progress on this is likely to be slow.
Anyway, you can read my analysis, for what it’s worth (PDF file over the fold).
John Quiggin 
Biggles adds a nice touch to the discussion and is even pertinent to one of my examples below.
My point about lack of choice re contracting is that many jobs are simply never offered as anything but a contract job. This occurs in cleaning, security, software and university teaching.
Whether professionals understand about contracts isn’t important. Also it’s not correct that a contractor, as we’re using the term in this discussion, has to take out professional indemnity insurance. Most contractors working through labour hire firms are hired as casual staff by umbrella firms or the labour hire firm itself.
The public sector problems you refer to are problems of employers. Whether contracting is a solution to those problems is of no interest to the contractor choosing a mode of working.
Being able to work overseas isn’t really related to contracting. In fact, a popular route for overseas work is as a staffer in large multinational accounting, law or IT firms.
It is true that some people prefer contracts for higher short term pay, and that is good, especially where they are direct contracts between interested parties. Unfortunately, a large proportion of modern contracts are mediated by labour hire firms, and that occurs in ways that harm contractors. For example, labour hire firms pocket up to 70 percent of workers’ pay.
In terms of AWA’s, government claims of higher pay seem to be misleading, in that early adopters of AWA’s have typically beeen highly paid managers, as would be expected. David Peetz from Griffith University points out that non-managerial workers on AWA receive less pay per hour than those on collective agreements, and that average weekly earnings for those on AWA’s have declined from 2002 to 2004. more
Examples of workers who don’t want to move to contracts but are being forced include Boeing technicians working on our F/A-18 jet fighters,
nursing home workers in Broken Hill and storemen at Appaloosa Holdings. On a related note, >a href=”http://www.labor.net.au/news/1117529640_6710.html”>union members at Sydney Airport have long complained about pyramid contracting of security at the airport. Recent reports have borne out those concerns.
We’ll try that last paragraph again.
Examples of workers who don’t want to move to contracts but are being forced include Boeing technicians working on our F/A-18 jet fighters, nursing home workers in Broken Hill and storemen at Appaloosa Holdings. On a related note, union members at Sydney Airport have long complained about pyramid contracting of security at the airport. Recent reports have borne out those concerns.
I must admit that i don’t understand the whole complexity of IR. But what i do understand after living in Australia for last 6 yeras, anything which John Howard propses, you watch out!, because whatever he will bring as he has shown in past, that it will harm the general public and will help only his idealogy.
I know John want to to go in history books as one of the best PM of Australia, but i think time will tell that this is the other way around, from 1996 to this date, he has caused so much harm that it will take some time to repair it, whether it was Tampa, Iraq, Medicare, Senate Reforms (under review), IR. As you have said in yr doc’s summary, which really is well analysed and i can’t agree more than that.
S Brid
Krugman nailed Okrent, not vice versa. Read deLong as John suggests.
As for the kind of person Okrent is, well… he wouldn’t lack soulmates at the Grey Lady. Check this out:
http://www.counterpunch.org/weir04252005.html
Some liberal.
Ros, the idea that the trade union movement can’t afford to fund a high court case is preposterous, and in any event it may well be the states who take up the challenge. Personally, I’m fed up with all the huffing and puffing that the feds have long (pre-Howard) gone on and on and on with about the potential of the corporations power. Regardless of the result, increasing certainty over this head through the high court would leave us (i.e. our system of government) all better off.