Monday Forum - what's it all about, Alfie?

Here in Australia, Treasurer Hockey has proudly proclaimed that the age of entitlement is over, the age of personal responsibility has begun. Presumably that means that Mr Abbott's paid parental leave scheme won't proceed, at least in its current form. And perhaps its time to put a cap on at least any increases in funding for private schools.

I really shuddered when I saw the latest increases in private school fees. Year after year they have been going up in real terms.

In a very short post in May last year, The world is awash with money, I wondered about the end of quantitative easing. My problem at the time was that I simply couldn't see anything approaching a safe exit strategy. That remains my difficulty. You can see the problem now in quite simple terms in way the slimmest taper in the US QE, the Fed it actually still pumping a lot of money out, led to major capital flows from emerging market economies. I haven't followed this in detail, but this piece will give you a feel  -Emerging markets crisis deepens. A bit much hype for my taste, but still.

In The impact of reform on growth, Michael Pettis spells out in a little more detail his argument about the nature of structural imbalance and what it means for future Chinese growth rates. Interesting how Professor Pettis' views have become so mainstream.

The Australian economic continues mixed. I last update my assessment in December - Friday Economics- economic outlook 2014. I need to do another proper review. I suspect that my views are still the same, if with somewhat different weightings.

Well, time to finish for my main focus tonight is history. Still, treat this as the Monday Forum post. Feel free to go anywhere you like!