The Boomer Legacy

Non-pharmaceutical interventions: A command economy emerged in everything but name

Taped off seating, Sydney Centrepoint [Apr-2020 203kb]

Go for growth mate: We'll get an army of casuals to collect our night-soil, just like a hundred years ago

Outdoor toilet and “dunny lane”, Lithgow NSW [Jun-2019 588kb]

Espresso Kultur: The al fresco revolution gave tantalising significance to our busy lives

Outdoor cafe seating at Little Eveleigh street, Redfern [Sep-2020 394kb]

In the circle of FIRE: There were such vast sums of money to be made from rents & fees & short-term leases & collateralised debt & asset management & asset concealment & asset stripping & short-selling & bear-raids & whale-trades & mergers & demergers & gambling wagering & grey-rhinos & black-swans & shiny tech unicorns & overcooked profit projections & 300-year visions & peer-to-peer lending & off-balance-sheet funding & liar loans & narco-state money-laundering & sequentially flipping cities to rideshare & family trusts & anonymous offshore trusts & Shanghai aged-care schemes & concealing petrostate billions & cloud mining tokens & golden moons & cash-for-visas & child-pornography & coal mining leases & terrorism financing & insurance fraud & lying to corporate regulators & rewriting independent reports & unenforced enforceable-undertakings & dismantling Bretton Woods & undoing Glass-Steagall & democratising currency & hiring ex-ministers as senior regional advisers & influence peddling & door-opening & impunity spells & moral-hazard exceptions & guaranteed bailouts & freezing customer withdrawals & using courts to quash insurance claims & friendly Wagyu-beef-washed-down-with-finest-shiraz judgements & swaps & options & swaptions & binary options & unregulated crypto-loans & coaxing punters to “buy the dips” & “growth phase” IPOs & CDOs & CMOs & CDFs & LDIs & FICCs & REITs & FAANGs & SPACs & BATs & ELPs & PGUCs & P2Es & NFTs & BAYCs & BNPL & NFSC & FOMO & FONGO & concocting ever more abstruse financial instruments to conjure “assets” out of nothing to ensure money kept raining in torrents from the sky, that there was little point in doing anything else

The Elizabeth street facade of the Commonwealth Bank Building [Oct-2020 433kb]

Forging a new deal: The transition from manufacturing to a service-based economy was completely seamless

Derelict Ford truck at The Grounds of Alexandria [Apr-2018 649kb]

Financial kinesiology: Despite all the underlying momentum and near-zero interest rates, it appeared we didn't survive the crash

Outside the Sydney branch of the Deutsche Bank in Hunter Street.

A security guard tried to prevent this photograph from being taken “due to copyright reasons”. A detailed and patient lecture on photography-rights disabused him [Jan-2012 135kb]

Play the Tradie's Game: Contract for a knock-down-rebuild and then wade through years of excuses as to why it took so long to construct a simple suburban house

Debris removal at Warrimoo. The original house was demolished in April 2020 and the replacement was still unfinished two years later… [Apr-2020 523kb]

Stake your claim: A large number of neighbourhood micro-businesses flourished when manufacturing was taken offshore, resulting in vigorous employment growth among non-employees

Small business badge window display, Wentworth Street Port Kembla [Sep-2014 598kb]

Borderline conundrum: Self-service was self-defeating when there was no service to serve

Due to COVID-19 travel restrictions, unused self-service check-in and baggage drop facilities at Sydney Airport's T1 International Terminal, Friday afternoon 12:30 pm [Oct-2020 194kb]

Look back in covfefe: Part of being a winner is knowing when enough is enough. Sometimes you have to give up the fight and walk away, and move on to something that's more productive (Trump, 1987)

Trump impersonator on Broadway, NYC [Oct-2017 334kb]

Creating value: From warehouses to office blocks to strategically empty short-term leases

Motorways and the former Caltex building, Sydney [Sep-2016 122kb]

Back-to-back meetings: Office work turned into being little more than just sitting around and talking

Queen Street office building at night, Melbourne [Apr-2019 147kb]

May be uncomfortable at times: Events were still on, motels were still open, restaurants were still serving food and pubs were still pouring beer (Ayers, 2020)

Tour group at the Sydney Opera House forecourt during the summer bushfires [Jan-2020 265kb]

Practical streetwise living: Stretch out in hygge comfort to swaddle beneath an extra blanket

Pitt Street Mall food-court entrance, Sydney [Jan-2019 439kb]

The carnival is over: The market faithfully rewarded those who took a long-term view

Luna Park Hair Raiser ride, in the rain [Jan-2019 126kb]

Consumer kaizen: A culture had to be created in which our customers were prepared to kill

High Street bus-stop, Penrith [Feb-2017 556kb]

The customer was king: Everything you could ever possibly desire, at your fingertips

Supermarket checkout, Nepean Village Penrith [Apr-2003 119kb]

Financial ouroboros: Australian banks are [indeed] very exposed to the housing market. Around 60 per cent of their lending is for housing. And housing is also common collateral for loans to small and medium businesses. A decline in housing prices impacts the value of that collateral but of itself does not necessarily lead to losses. (RBA, 2021)

Ex-bank branch waiting to be re-purposed, Newtown [Jan-2022 187kb]

Rent not Enterprise: […] that we here highly resolve that these mortgagors shall not have borrowed in vain — that this realm, under Banks, shall have a new birth of fiefdom — and that government of the landlords, by the landlords, for the landlords, shall not perish from the earth

Vacant commercial land at Lawson in the Blue Mountains [Jan-2012 56kb]

The golden hoard: Our cities were filled with built-to-flip empty apartments for yield-desperate offshore investors

The construction boom at Wentworth Point [Sep-2016 286kb]

Potemkin Prosperity: The central irony of the financial crisis was that while it was caused by too much confidence, too much borrowing & lending and too much spending — it could only be resolved with more confidence, more borrowing & lending, and more spending (Summers, 2011)

Fields of green shoots at the Westpac plaza in Sydney [Jan-2014 520kb]

Luxury was a human right: Stand on principle on the way up and you would miss the stampede; stand on principle on the way down and you would be run over

Even the pigeons lived in style at Hogben Street in Kogarah [Apr-2011 98kb]

No map and a broken compass: Cheap goods and MTV were more effective than détente and ICBMs

Stall on Tverskaya St, Moscow [Dec-1991 244kb]

Quality by design: Exclusively appointed apartments riddled with gross structural defects

Nevada Apartments remediation at Darling Point [Dec-2018 278kb]

Not a house of cards then: People's jobs depend on confidence and trust in the financial and banking system. And I can assure [everyone] that, despite the very disturbing and, indeed, shocking revelations we have seen in the Royal Commission, particularly of late, that these issues, while as abhorrent as they are, are completely separate from any question about the stability and strength of [our] banking and financial system. (Morrison, 2018)

Pedestrian footbridge at Barangaroo [Apr-2016 203kb]

Canyons of gold: The decision to pour billions of dollars into commercial property turned out to be spectacular

Castlereagh Street buildings, Sydney [Jan-2019 128kb]

Both feet on the ladder: Everyone became millionaires by inheriting properties bought for pennies, and then flipping them at government-guaranteed prices

Renovations in suburban Stanmore [Sep-2012 119kb]

Incentives to succeed: These truths were held self-evident: that the Rich were job creators and property booms were an efficient way to redistribute wealth

The rear of a Korean restaurant, in a Pitt Street Lane near Town Hall [Oct-2012 324kb]

Structural Ugliness: Ironically regress the accelerating fashion cycle to make the feeds pop

Orthopaedic sandals at the QVB Arcade, Sydney [Nov-2020 351kb]

Frictionless intermediation: Because the Sharing Economy sounded so much nicer than Government Regulation Evading Extractive Capitalism (NYTimes, 2017)

Subterranean ingress and egress aperture cover at Watsons Bay [Dec-2014 902kb]

The emporium struck back: Department stores battled heroically against an invisible enemy

Storm-troopers at the David Jones lift-well [Jan-2019 71kb]

Everywhere the glint of gold: Vibrant cities crammed full of soaring casinos, buzzing with energy and excitement

Microflite City Helipad, Yarra River Melbourne [Apr-2019 314kb]

The user-pays model: We were innately averse to paying for things we would never live to use

Government hoarding at Westpac Plaza, Barangaroo [Aug-2016 492kb]

Keeping interest rates low: No matter what happened, cheap debt could not be blamed

Used car-yard at Parramatta Road Granville [Apr-2017 206kb]

Back to the Futuregate: We were trapped between a rock and a hard place, a perfect storm where the devil was in the details. For everyone was talking about a fairy-tale ending to the question of how legacy-media could continue to remain relevant in world filled with user-generated content

Reporters at the Sydney Opera House [Jul-2014 328kb]

Surrogate activities: The illusion of economic activity was sustained by creating archipelagos of empty construction sites

Green Square hoardings at Zetland [Nov-2018 310kb]

Tourism added value: Tourism contributes towards complete growth and development of a country: one, by bringing numerous economic value & benefits; and, second, helping in build country's brand value, image & identity (Market Width Blog, 2018)

Christmas Day tourists at the Sydney Opera House [Dec-2001 296kb]

Roses of Picardy: The marriage industry flourished despite the cynicism, malaise and lockdowns

Private wedding ceremony at St Marys Cathedral [Mar-2019 371kb]

Unyielding positivity: The ship collided with the iceberg → While acknowledging there may be some evidence of unsettling optics and regrettable client experiences, there are also glimmers of hope and reassuring signs of optimism; The ship then rapidly took on water and listed dangerously → As part of our vision to create a full circle win-win paradigm, it may sometimes be necessary to relinquish ground to guarantee future team success; Some passengers ran about screaming → Team members were pro-actively incentivised to facilitate collaboration; Passengers then had to fight their way topside to escape → Partners scaled peak-less mountains to cultivate growth mindsets; Only wealthy passengers could secure a place in the half-empty lifeboats → Personal on-boarding of inexperienced users meant there may have been areas for improvement alongside the numerous areas of strength; The ship sank, no-one came the rescue, hundreds drowned in the freezing water → Clearly there may have been organisational shortcomings, but we sincerely believe we found the right balance between upholding our high standards and the needs of stakeholders. Furthermore, it should be noted that there are always a few statistical outliers, where unforeseen technical and systems failures may cause processes to fall a little short of expectations

Boutique shop-front, Leura [Aug-2021 123kb]

The convenience of Home Delivery: HungryPanda, Foodora, Uber Eats, DoorDash, EASI, Menulog, Deliveroo, Hey You, GrubHub, goPuff, EatNow, Yelp… We imported an underclass of temporary-visa-holding independent contractors to zip around delivering burrito bowls, bubble-tea and authentic pad thai (ABC News, 2020)

Online food delivery rider at Haymarket, near Chinatown [Apr-2020 135kb]

Easily within reach: With interest rates at five-thousand-year lows, affordable mortgages were flying out the door

Art Gallery of NSW window looking east, Sydney [Mar-2019 251kb]

Forever in Golconda: This time it really was different

Charging bull statue, NYC [Oct-2017 252kb]

A pattern of abundance: Full automation was the next stage in our collaborative journey

NTP Forklifts (since relocated), at Woodville Road Granville [Apr-2017 237kb]

Have a go to get a go: We voted conservative and lived modestly within our means. We worked hard, spent wisely and made prudent leveraged investments. So we deserved to keep more of our own hard-earned money

Hopetoun Road Toorak, Melbourne [Apr-2019 185kb]

Covid Safe: Restricted trading hours [✓] Patron number limits [✓] Temperature checks [✓] Sign-in attendance records [✓] Perspex table-shields [✓] 1.5m social distancing [ ]

The Celsius Cafe at Kirribilli Wharf adapts to business conditions under COVID-19 [Nov-2020 325kb]

Creative Destruction: The most efficient way to neutralise dissent was by levelling the playing-field

The abandoned White Bay Power Station at Rozelle [Jan-2013 206kb]

Tyburn revisited: Decades of infrastructure deals and back-room favours continued without consequence

Sydney Metro Project construction site, Martin Place [Jul-2019 286kb]

Waiting for the great leap forward: From blue-collar brewery to the Kings of Kowloon, the third-world was just around the corner

Central Park development, at Broadway in Sydney [Jul-2012 160kb]

Scaffolding to pierce the sky: To better embrace necessary change, our cities were framed within a matrix of sidewalk sheds

One Circular Quay construction site, Sydney [Jan-2018 213kb]

Practising our future: There was always plenty of money for whatever appealed to our sense of adventure

Abandoned front yard yacht, Kirribilli [Jan-2020 566kb]

The engine of growth: Our generation reaffirmed the notion that markets could remain irrational for much longer than investors could stay solvent

The window-display for Central Autohaus in Alexandria [Jun-2015 180kb]

Extremely well serviced: Only the wealthiest suburbs had regular bus, rail and ferry services

The F5 Neutral Bay ferry leaves Kirribilli wharf [Nov-2020 192kb]

Franchisee nation: The nature of employment changed. We didn't know what the new jobs would be, but we did know they would surely come

Food cart on 37th Street, NYC [Oct-2017 328kb]

Good sports with your money: Thursday night drinks with the GPS boys after the Dragon Boat Race; City lights twinkle far below the 32nd floor windows; Fetch whole legs of ham from the firm's kitchen to hang in the partners' dining room, then stash the original artworks in the ladies toilet a couple of floors down; Piggyback steeplechase around the associates' floor, although rearrange the desks first into a proper obstacle course; Even better, grab an old jockey cap from one of the partner's offices and use our neck-ties as whips; And then whooping and hollering and running and falling all over the place and pissing ourselves like it was the best night of our lives…

The ghosts of lawyering at Martin Place [Oct-2014 876kb]

Attainder by process: There was no disconnect between the prosperity we enjoyed and the systematic initiatives we took to achieve them

Philip Lodge Motel demolition at Haberfield [Jun-2016 391kb]

Agile entrepreneurs: Surveillance cameras [✓]  Motion-activated floodlights [✓]  Canvas-covered windows [✓]  3m high fencing [✓]  Steel chained front gates [✓]  Threatening no-trespass signs [✓]  Resourceful SMEs servicing a niche-market [✓]

Domestic security on Neville Street in Marrickville [Sep-2012 422kb]

The road to zero: A globalised market where all tastes were equal and we voted only with our dollars

William Street beverage hoarding (since rebuilt) at Kings Cross [Oct-2012 326kb]

Curate your educational passport: The uncapping of university places accomplished exactly what it set out to achieve

University of Sydney main quadrangle [Oct-2017 507kb]

Plan for robust & inclusive growth: Keep doubling the population every 35 years → boosted aggregate demand → vigorous GDP growth → buoyant budget outcomes → more apartment pre-sales → snowballing property values → windfall capital gains → wealthier property-investors → bustling streets → more toll-roads & shopping malls → more bathhouses, nail-salons & shisha lounges → less industry → more construction & business services → more mortgages → more prosperous banks → more stamp-duties → more negative gearing on property investments → more wealth-effects → more tourism & international students → more university & private college enrolments → more waiters, maids, au-pairs, fruit-pickers, concierges, nail-artists, migration agents & community-liaison officers → more subclass-482 & spousal visas → potentially higher rates of workforce participation → projected supply-side potential → likely productivity benefits → forecast greater aggregate income → increasing remittances to family & sponsors overseas → more money in everyone's hip pocket

Front-yard garden gnomes in Summer Hill, Sydney [Oct-2016 569kb]

Exuberant expectations: Great success and performance created its own reality (Pfeffer, 2015)

Church Street car dealership, Parramatta [Apr-2017 278kb]

Multi-million dollar slums: Disintegrating verandahs + Cracks big enough to fit both hands + Aspergillus from foundations to eaves = The bones of the property seem pretty decent and it's got a fair bit of character

Ex seminary on Forbes Street, Newtown [May-2022 595kb]

Practise social distancing: So we stayed home, most of the time

Townhall Arcade foot court [Jul-2021 165kb]

Strength through joy: Everyone denounced the enemies of growth

Suburban Toorak, Melbourne [Apr-2019 199kb]

Improving inequality: Our elites were more focused on growing the pie than on how it was divided

Darling Harbour Marina [Jan-2017 139kb]

The cranes were flying: At one stage there were more tower cranes along the Australian eastern seaboard than in all the major cities in the USA (ABC News, 2016)

Tower crane jibs at Lewisham [Sep-2015 149kb]

The one sure bet: One of the interesting things about the years 1982—2022 was that markets always kept rising, no matter what. By the 2020's an army of commentators and economists and experts all agreed that equities were irrationally overpriced, and yet the bourses kept on climbing…

Financial reporter at the Sydney ASX [Oct-2018 152kb]

Down from the mountain: … and into the markdowns

Leura antique store [Oct-2018 198kb]

The shadow state: Our top-down globalist system will endure forever

North from the Empire State Building [Oct-2017 474kb]

Living in a film-set: Months spent wandering through a terrain filled with shuttered restaurants and disoriented diners

Deserted food court, Centrepoint Sydney [Apr-2020 175kb]

What this little black rock could do: We have to make sure this economy works. We have to export dollars. We have to realise we have a moral responsibility to other people in other nations to keep their lights on (Joyce, 2017)

The Steelworks and Coal Loader at Port Kembla harbour [Sep-2014 66kb]

Reflating the economy: Old debt could be retired easily by taking on new debt

Tumbalong Park attractions, Darling Harbour [Jul-2014 220kb]

Forget your past: Architectural awards counted for little when it came to prime development sites

Darling Harbour Conference Centre demolition, Sydney [Apr-2014 238kb]

Too big to fail: It took a long time to establish a perfectly balanced equilibrium between collateralised debt and rising property values

Barangaroo office construction, Millers Point [Aug-2016 364kb]

Epistemic insouciance: Full speed ahead for the fly-in fly-out money-launderers high-rollers in the sky (ABC News, 2020)

Crown casino construction, Barangaroo [Jan-2020 183kb]

Tulips in the rough: Tax laws were frequently rewritten and interest rates kept artificially low, to ensure the price of land-banked property could increase by more each day than most people could earn in a week

Irelands Road in Blacktown, western Sydney [Dec-2012 532kb]

Fierce, Wonderful & Closed: What little trade remained ended up bleeding out slowly

Cafe shop-front during a level-four lockdown, Katoomba NSW. It closed permanently eighteen months later during another extended lockdown [Apr-2020 224kb]

Jobs & Growth: Social cohesion was a luxury we could no longer be afford

Wall markings behind Parramatta Road, Strathfield [Jul-2014 564kb]

North to Avoska: Perhaps-bags accompanied us everywhere, before mobile phones

Totes diptych at Hornsby and Wynyard, Sydney [Apr-2005 248kb]

Taming animal spirits: There is something more systematic about the way people behave irrationally, especially during periods of economic stress (Greenspan, 2013)

Lunchtime in a George Street amusement arcade, Sydney, demolished a few years later [Sep-2003 326kb]

A million jobs Mr Speaker: Decades of monetarism and offshoring provided enormous economic benefits

Shepherd Street factory yard, at Marrickville [Sep-2012 337kb]

Stakeholder: One could either use General Relativity equations to derive the Schwarzschild metric in n-dimensions, or else go shopping

Supermarket freezer aisle, Katoomba [Dec-2003 98kb]

Within Skinner's Box: Anyhow…™ we Thought Different™, Opened Happiness™ and Flew the Friendly Skies™ because We Were Worth It™

Wall advertising, Pitt Street Sydney [Mar-2021 250kb]

Wealth always trickled down: Our system endured for so long because enough of the electorate believed they still had some chance to get rich (Citigroup, 2005)

Begging for loose change near Sydney Town Hall [Sep-2016 421kb]

In Goldman, Sachs We Trust: The financial sector was the bedrock of our entire social structure and facilitated massive cultural progression. Whereas the 1960s were squandered on aerospace and NASA, the 2010s had asset growth via cheap debt and the ISDA

The financial district in eastern Sydney, with the rocket-shaped 1 O'Connell Street in the middle background [Jul-2011 128kb]

Business service industries: The only way to counter economic headwinds was by being more nimble than the market

Finance workers at Australia Square [Dec-2004 280kb]

Outside the property bubble: Runaway house prices were regarded as being not only acceptable, but necessary

Toorak Road for-sale sign, Melbourne [Apr-2019 575kb]

Driven by unceasing mobility: Remember the physical-distancing rule and only travel when essential

Waiting for the Cronulla Ferry at Bundeena Wharf [Aug-2020 297kb]

From blue to fluoro collar: Vast sums were borrowed to create a cornucopia of employment opportunities

Re-tiling the Sydney Opera House forecourt [Jul-2014 159kb]

Cargo Culte: We lounged about in ill-fitting uniforms, languidly pressing buttons on small screens… waiting for the day He would return, bearing tremendous gifts

Palm tree outside the abandoned St Mary & St Mina's Coptic Orthodox Church at Sydenham, near Sydney airport [Sep-2012 355kb]

Α Ω: Every last particle of our faith was poured into equities & real-estate

Birrell Street front yard, Bondi Junction [Oct-2018 448kb]

Stroking the hidden hand: Everyone was free to choose their own circumstances

Tents for the homeless at Wentworth Park, Sydney [Jul-2017 604kb]

City of forgotten men: There's class warfare all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war and we're winning (Buffet, 2006)

Unhoused on George Street, Sydney [Aug-2014 463kb]

Unearthing the past: The house was gone and the yard excavated so deep that every trace of your childhood was obliterated

What was once 12 Kensington Street in Kogarah [Apr-2011 424kb]

Segregation now, tomorrow & forever: Only the most privileged could afford the right to live in their own city

Distillery Drive cutting at Jacksons Landing, in Pyrmont [Jan-2013 321kb]

The retail ziggurat: The domestic-consumption model was the ideological apex of our economy

Shopping trolleys huddle beneath the mobile-phone towers on top of Marketplace Leichhardt [Sep-2010 374kb]

Keep doubling your money every 7–10 years: Dr Wilson said that Sydney was likely to have a $2 million median house price by 2030 and a $3 million median by 2038 (Daily Telegraph, 2018)

Hopscotch squares at the Woodcroft housing estate, in Blacktown [Dec-2012 491kb]

Back in the CCCP: The centralised command economy disintegrated almost straight away

Street vendors on the day the Belavezha Accords were signed, Tverskaya St Moscow [Dec-1991 248kb]

The shadow workforce: The solution to mass unemployment was as simple as redefining what was meant by “unemployed”

Red flags at the Circular Quay promenade [Jul-1992 475kb]

Exit strategy: How could we have been anything other than healthy, prosperous, secure and optimistic?

Fig Street tunnel, Ultimo [Jul-2017 403kb]

Bubble watch: Rising property prices were carefully manipulated to create more economic winners than losers

Spectators on the steps of the former CBC Bank, Martin Place [Apr-2006 278kb]

Clip service: Legacy media could always revert to nostalgia for a past brimming with promise

Testaroossa Sammy-Santino Mens Hairstylist, Double Bay [Jan-2019 364kb]

Flygskam: One cheap long-haul flight produced more CO₂ per passenger than driving an SUV for four months

Runway approach lights, Sydney International Airport [May-2019 74kb]

Positive growth model: A modern 24-hour economy filled with baristas, bloggers, interns, cash-in-hand hospitality workers and itinerant artisans

Lower Baldwin Street, Dunedin NZ [Nov-2017 294kb]

Filled with delight: Non-inclusive apartment developments on the site of an old gasworks

Breakfast Point apartments (formerly Mortlake Gasworks), Sydney [Jul-2014 229kb]

This weight of calorific delights: Just a spoon full of HFCS helped the processed food go down (Hyman, 2014)

Candle wax at a Kent Street wine-bar, near Town Hall [Jan-2014 284kb]

Consumer karoshi: A culture had to be created in which our customers were prepared to die

Market Street escalators at Centrepoint, Sydney [Jan-2016 260kb]

Rust belt potential: Our suburbs were rife with agility, propagation and replacement

Lett Lane, Lithgow [Jun-2019 483kb]

Flags of convenience: Our vision was to create a better everyday life, by getting our customers to do all the work for free

The united nations of IKEA, at Tempe [Sep-2012 147kb]

In a fugue world: Feel the love through the acquisition of merchandise

St Collins Lane shopping arcade, Melbourne [Apr-2019 182kb]

The boom in retailing: Sell everything, take on even more debt and cancel Christmas

McEvoy Street pop-up retailer, Alexandria [Mar-2018 240kb]

Life in the Bunkercene: The lockdowns caused us to cocoon just that little bit extra

Martin Place hoardings, Sydney [Mar-2019 277kb]

Zero sum game: The link between free trade and rising global prosperity was self-evident: designed in the USA → marketed from the UK → manufactured by Uyghur forced-labour → shipped via Panama → channelled through a Singaporean marketing-hub → transfer-priced through Luxembourg → laundered in a Melbourne casino → banked in the Cayman Islands → stashed away in a Geneva Freeport vault → splurged on trophy homes, super-yachts, racing cars, helicopters, private school fees, casinos, parties, mistresses, divorce lawyers, bribes and political favours… in New York, Beijing, Bucharest, Riyadh, Lagos, Monaco, Sydney and Londongrad

Shipping container facility at Tempe, near Sydney Airport [Sep-2012 286kb]

The best that money can buy: Of particular interest to ICAC has been the planning decisions along Canterbury Road and Charles Street, which saw some Liberal and Labor councillors voting together to approve developments which council's planning staff had previously rejected due to non compliance (SMH, 2017)

Apartment construction at Charles Str, Canterbury [Oct-2015 329kb]

Ponzimonium: We ran a Koretz immigration scheme to prop up the Madoff property market to keep the Henan banks flush

Wedding Cake rock, RNP [Jul-2019 211kb]

All snakes, no ladders: We stuck to the plan, even though we kept changing it

Subterranean utilities footpath markings outside the QVB [Apr-2015 773kb]

Defenestrate your livelihood: We mortgaged the future and bet it all on there not being one

Waverton Coal Loader wharf [Feb-2022 671kb]

Ghosts of the CBD: Governments had to resort to pleading, bribes and uplifting slogans to entice voters to return to the city

Commuters at the new Central station concourse [Jun-2022 281kb]

Knowledge-based economy: If you could no longer make a profit by making things, then you could profitably spend your time making things up

The interior of the Queen Victoria Building, near Sydney Town Hall [Jan-2012 246kb]

A licence to kill: There was nothing on your dinner table that wasn't put there by highly skilled transport professionals

The “roo bar” of a prime-mover at Kings Langley, near Blacktown [Aug-2015 414kb]

One country, two systems: There was endless argument about Income Inequality, but careful silence about Wealth Redistribution

Woodcroft housing estate versus Harris Street Ultimo [Jan-2013 177kb]

Thrusting for yield: The ubiquity of synchronised growth led social experiments imposed from above

Tower cranes at Australian Technology Park [Mar-2018 217kb]

Ford to city: Drop Dead: Socialism in one class for Moses and Le Corbusier's bastards

The southern ramp to the Anzac Bridge expressway, at Pyrmont in Sydney [Jan-2013 150kb]

Dog-boxes in the sky: Mate, phone-in punters bought them off the plan like it was Christmas

Spacious and exclusively appointed apartments at Broadway, near Central [Jul-2016 226kb]

Twilight's last gleaming: We slid down the Phillips Curve until we reached the Minsky Moment

Construction hoarding at Barangaroo, Sydney [Sep-2016 163kb]

Dutch disease done right: Not to worry. If the economy works the way the textbook says, the gain to miners should flow through to the economy, causing higher wages and tax receipts (Gittins, 2017)

Remnants of the 2000's resources boom at Lithgow [Aug-2012 304kb]

Braving the abyss: Despite challenging market conditions, and a negative return for your superannuation this year, we continue to deliver strong long-term returns. […] Significant market falls can be worrying, but staying invested remains vitally important. […] When we invest your super, our approach is focussed on the long term, to help maximise your retirement savings. But it also manages short-term risks in times like these. I want to reassure you, our members, that we remain committed to investing to help you achieve your best retirement outcomes. Bulk email from the CEO of Aware Super, 8 July 2022

Waterrun cliff-side, RNP [Aug-2020 627kb]

Click and collect: Socially responsible trading during yet another level-four lockdown

George Street boutique, Sydney - which closed within a year of this photo being taken [Jul-2021 109kb]

The Moneyland luxe vibe: Prestige brands rode out the pandemic rather well

Luxury goods store entrance, George Street Sydney [Nov-2020 252kb]