Letters to the Editor

A Cultural Problem

A Cultural Problem Sir: Our country does not have an economic problem. It has a cultural one. Look everywhere and anywhere and you will not see any significant engineered or electronic product manufactured in Australia. Cars, lifts, bicycles, demolition machinery, planes, helicopters, pathology analytical equipment, whitegoods, polished gems, watches, computers, optical equipment (and these are just ones that come to mind now)—essentially none are manufactured here. And any idea that does sprout from an inventor’s pencil moves offshore as soon as it has any potential. All we do in any commercially significant quantities is dig rocks out of the ground…

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