Trade & competition policy

John is the principle author of two books on trade issues, including “Free Trade Areas v Free Trade” and “Greening Farm Subsidies”, which considers the impact of worldwide agricultural subsidies on the economy and the environment. He was also part of the CIE team that reviewed the economic impacts of the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement (FTA) and has published his research on an Australia-EU FTA and trade reforms for South Korea.

In 2004 John was involved in preparing and presenting training courses in trade policy analysis in Indonesia. He has previously been involved in training courses on competition policy and micro-economic reform more broadly.

In 2002 John was involved in an analysis of the benefits of trade facilitation for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade which resulted in the publication “APEC Economies: Realising the benefits of trade facilitation”.

From 2000 to 2002 John worked for the Commonwealth Department of the Treasury on issues related to public governance, budgeting and the government decision-making processes. Since becoming a consultant John has given several seminars on Australia’s budget policy and public policy process and has conducted a comprehensive review of the public governance arrangements for the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN).

At Treasury, John has worked in the budget policy areas – including work on the Charter of Budget Honesty, sustainability issues, the coordination of Cabinet committees (Expenditure Review Committee and the Revenue Committee) and production of Budget documents (such as the Tax Expenditure Statement, the long-term Intergenerational Report, Budget Paper II: Budget Measures and the Revenue statement).

John was centrally involved in the Commonwealth government¡¦s revenue forecasts during his time with Treasury. This included the creation of the GST forecasting model and the updating and use of models for the estimation of individual income tax and GST.

In his capacity as a consultant John has developed and updated several complex excel-based partial equilibrium models as well as using the global general equilibrium model, GTAP. John has also been involved in the construction and use of financial models, estimating market returns on investments both ex-poste and ex-ante.

During his time at the CIE John worked on a number of reviews of R&D projects and government programs. Project evaluations using an economic benefit-cost framework and triple bottom line analysis were conducted on R&D in areas such as agro-forestry, metal manufacturing and wine production.

John has also been involved in reviews of public policy as it relates to R&D, innovation and economic growth – including involvement in the Federal Government’s review of the R&D START program and the review of the R&D Tax Concession. Through this work and academic research, John has a robust knowledge of the role of R&D in the economy and its importance for economic growth.

John has a keen interest in the economics of security issues. During his tenure at Treasury, John was involved in the 2000 White paper review of defence, as well as working on defence funding reform and various other defence issues.

In 2003 John completed a review of the impact of the October 12 Bali bombing on Australia and Indonesia for the Australian Federal Police and has written an award-wining published article on terrorism, liberty and the value of life.

John has a keen interest in economic policy, most especially in welfare and tax issues and the relationship between the tax and welfare systems. This interest has resulted in continued research, primarily on tax-transfer issues, for the past six years.

* John’s 1999 honours thesis was on welfare and wage policy reform, effective marginal tax rates and poverty alleviation in Australia;
* Working in Taxation Analysis Division, John worked closely with the Australian Taxation Office and the tax policy divisions of Treasury on tax policy, administration and forecasting issues;
* Consulting jobs have included reviews of tax concessions and the role of taxes and subsidies as tools for government policy;
* John has presented papers and published articles on tax, welfare reform and education policy; and
* In 2005 John had a book published on tax & welfare reform.

John’s involvement with environmental issues primarily relates to how economic issues (such as R&D and trade) impact on the environment. In this regard John has worked with the World Wide Fund for Nature in looking at the effect of agricultural subsidies on the environment and has investigated the environmental impact of various R&D projects. In addition, John has been involved in research into water issues, such as the development of water markets and issue of sustainable water use.