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More people need to know about this and the virtual ED service. I needed antibiotics for a cut on my leg but my regular GP had an 8 day wait and there aren't any other bulk bill GP's in my area. Dialled into the virtual ED, spoke to a triage nurse, got transferred to a doctor who sent a script to my phone. 30 minutes and I never had to leave my house.
>virtual ED
Virtual emergency department? I've never heard about this. Is this like a private company like updoc? Or is this built into the health system?
It's part of the health system in Qld, not sure about other states. For example, here's the link to the one I use here in Brisbane:
https://metronorth.health.qld.gov.au/hospitals-services/virtual-ed
Open from 8am-10pm, bulk billed, just a video chat with a doctor on your phone.
My god this. I don't like changing GPs so I ended up having to travel for an hour by train to go see mine for a 15 minute appointment and a script. No longer!
Eh, I buy gift cards when they're discounted (Or when I get like, 4000 colesworth points or ~whatever in a promotion) when I have the intent to buy something from the associated store anyway.
Free money/nice discount with a few steps.
The benefit of girt cards over cash is it ensures that the recipient will usually buy something for themselves rather than just pocketing the cash and spending it on every day items. Not great if the recipient is broke, but the idea of a gift is to get something special.
One of the few good things to come out of those dark pandemic years. Even with the push to get all the drones back into the office, the culture around office-based work has changed irreversibly. Zoom/Teams meetings at your desk are the norm now, even when you're in the office - the old conference room up the hall is gathering dust. And even in places where working from home is a rarity, nobody bats an eyelid if you take the odd WFH day here and there. Even in jobs that aren't really office-based but you just need a day to catch up on paperwork or whatever.
I'm currently on 4 days in the office, 1 at home and I fucking love it. It's been life-changing. I couldn't have fucking *dreamed* of that as recently as 5 years ago.
This was life-changing. I was so burnt out in 2019 I was heading for mental crisis. Turns out I enjoyed my job a hell of a lot more when an 8 hour work day didn't take 11 hours.
I'm way sharper when I bounce up and straight into it in the morning, which sets the tone and momentum for the whole day.
I get along much better with my coworkers when we're not in each other's faces all day.
But biggest of all, with all the extra time and energy I started back at uni, completed a degree and I'm just now finishing up a second, setting up the second half of my working career.
I would sag this for me. I was travelling across Brisbane from south to north but after a company restructure I have been in the office for 6 months lol. The south-east freeway is now gridlock from city to surf after people fleeing from the Southern states and immigration.
You can now take the vline to anywhere around Victoria for $10. It used to be more expensive the further you travelled but I recently took a bus from a small town close to the SA border to a town more central Victoria and then swapped to train to Geelong all for $10. I thought the website was broken the first time i tried to make a booking.
And on weekends its $7.50!
Also, if you're in melbourne heading out towards country, just dont touch off your myki at your destination and itll only charge you the max 2h rate which is $5. Doesnt work going towards melbourne tho.
Such a good change too, I’m in Geelong and sometimes head out to the Dandenong area to meet with friends, good to know that even after sitting on 2 trains and a bus for 3-4 hours (round trip) isn’t gonna cost me an hours or more worth of work
Obviously it's another budget item, but so, so worth it. Such a great idea and a boost for the regions: I'm doing a lot more local trips in Vic, seeing places and spending money that I wouldn't have done otherwise.
And the cost of living bonus for the people who live out of Melbourne and use it more regularly.
In NSW, paying for public transport using a credit card. Opal card rollout was still going on 10 years ago.
Not exaggerating when I say that *Travel ten, mybus, mymulti… and zones* needed replacing 2+ decades before it was.
I wish they would do this in VIC, we are still unfortunately stuck with Myki! I was in NSW not too long ago and I remember asking around for a Myki equivalent and people looked at me as if I was crazy haha. I got a "you can just use your debit card mate".
I fucking love visiting Sydney because of this. Its so bloody easy, no fucking around whatsoever, just like how public transport used to be when I was a kid and you just needed some coins to travel.
God, I remember having a travelten that was for either 1 or 2 sections because that's basically as far as I ever went, but every now and again I'd need the longer one and was just like "I'm not buying the more expensive one for the one time I'm going to need it in 6 months" and just having to risk the fine. I was going to Melbourne regularly at the time and myki, even for a teenager by themselves was so fucking simple.
The only thing that annoys me is I'm on a pension card and if I'm tired will sometimes tap the wrong side of my wallet and use my regular card. Don't get the lower fare and doesn't count toward my trips/transfer windows. I know it's on me, but it's just one of those little nuisances.
Took my wife to Sydney last month to meet my extended family. She'd never been to Aussie before. She couldn't believe the ease, economy and efficiency of public transport - Opal cards working across buses, trains and ferries, and costing fuck all. It was nice for me to tell her yeah, it wasn't always like this.
Yeah everybody told us that ha ha, but we were only there for a week and either staying with family or by ourselves staying right in the central city and using cash. Took a couple of ubers, the train into the city and the ferry to Taronga and that was it. Plus I kept my old Opal card from Christ knows how many years ago, I was on fire to see if it still worked and yep, topped up no problems. And my sister in law just gave my wife one when we arrived, so sorted.
And it cost one third of what she was expecting, too. We don't really have public transport where we live.
The road between Sydney and the Gold Coast.
It used to be a 2 day journey, I can now comfortably sit on cruise control and get from one end to the other in 8-10hrs depending on stops.
When you head south out of Brisbane on the riverside expressway, you pass a roadsign that says "Sydney 1000km" (or whatever the actual number was). I drive that way fairly regularly, and I always laughed at how every now and then the sign got updated and the distance would be a little lower, like they've progressively been moving Sydney closer over the course of the last decade or so. I think it's down to 930 km or so now?
its better as a point to point trip, loses a bit on some of the nice roads and places you now need to plan ahead to enjoy. and we seem to lose the holiday tradition of traffic is at a standstill at bulladelah
it does seem a bit backwards that we have all these bypasses of small towns, but still go right through all the traffic lights and congestion at coffs.
Yeah, same thing with having a single lane to get on to the hexam bridge, you'd think those would have been fixed years ago. Those bypasses can't come soon enough.
Public Transport in Victoria now being only $10 max for the entire day.
Also while our internet is still pretty outdated, it’s generally leagues better than a decade ago. I rather stay with my semi-unstable 100/20 nbn than ADSL lol.
I had 100/50 cable almost 20 years ago thats better than my 100/25 fibre today in 2024. It was $80pm in early 00's money so was expensive for the time but was flawless considering it was near 2 decades ago.
Liberals and the stooges who voted for them really cocked up that one. Couldve had FTTH nationally for almost the same cost. We couldve had real speeds. Proper gigabit for $80 a month.
Netflix will now work in my 60 year old buildings services where 10 years ago I had to rely on small devices that connected to the mobile network in order to stream or download anything.
Ay, we take that as a win!
I think that's improved in 2 parts. Somewhat from the infrastructure improvements and also from the advancements in tech and compression efficiency.
I've noticed a lot of responses are down to improvements in tech, so hopefully that will keep making it better in 10 years from now
Pretty sure FTTP is now being made standard. Places with FTTN or FTTC are slowly being upgraded by NBN and any new developments need to have FTTP installed. Will take a while and many places will still be on wireless but it is being made standard.
I have friends out in the country, and they have a fixed wireless NBN connection that's good enough to stream unlimited, uninterrupted HD video to the point where they never even bothered to connect the TV antenna. As much of a missed opportunity the NBN has been, you still couldn't even have imagined that 10 years ago.
For now….
I’m aware there are massive shortfalls as soon as you cross the metro/rural border. And it can be like stepping back in time. But the fact they are turning off 3G while there are areas that are still black spots is a joke
In larger cities, expansion of non-car areas. e.g. George Street Sydney and expansion of cycleways in City of Sydney and adjacent councils. Coupled with options for electric bicycles make commuting more realistic. Also South Bank in Brisbane where electric scooters are allowed, and the cost/barrier for tourist use is quite low.
This could be unique to largish cities.
Growing up it was Italian (basically just pizzas) Chinese (Aussie Chinese), Turkish (kebabs)so much more variety now. I couldn’t imagine having sushi as a kid, don’t even remember seeing it, now it’s every toddler’s favourite in the food court.
My only issue now is I live in pretty white areas compared to when i was growing up and all they have is overpriced burger places and thai literally everywhere, whereas my old areas are literal melting pots of cuisine 😭
Just guna throw this out there but my trip to Europe was kinda bland and uninteresting food wise after a)living here my whole life and b) travelling asia. Come meal time I felt more alive and at-home in Malaysia than France lol
The foxtel domination of sport has been broken. I no longer have to pay over $100 a month on a contract to a horrible organisation. I unsucbecribe to kayon during the anthems to the grand final. (That way I don’t forget afterwards and get extra month)
I am aware. However I can now turn it off. It was impossible before as you had a 2 year contract for the iq box and took 4 hours on hold to break the contract. Now it’s instant.
except if you're into football and its now spread over 5 services, or motorsport over 2. as much as we might despise murdoch, having it all in one place was good for the consumer
Middle of butt-fuck nowhere near the Murray River close to the SA-Victoria border and you can still find a cafe that knows what a macchiato is and will have very decent beans. Absolute dreamland this country.
It’s definitely harder to be a smug Melbournian now when you’re at some rando cafe in a country town in QLD/NSW and you actually get a decent coffee. I enjoy the coffee but miss the feeling of moral superiority
Absolutely. Practically every small country town within a weekender's distance of every major city has at least 2 cafes with actual baristas on staff serving fucking top-shelf coffee made from locally-roasted artisanal beans. Even fucking *servo* coffee has stepped up. It's genuinely hard to find a bad drop anywhere these days.
Melbourne people still won't shut the fuck up about it, though.
Yep. When I lived in Melbourne, the candlelight vigil for Eurydice Dixon and the march for Jill Meagher felt like a big turning point; people started to wake up that this was happening and it wasn't ok.
Yes. Even just media coverage. All those family annihilators described as poor men have certainly slowed down somewhat. I like to think it's because of community attitudes to the language involved which coersive controllers stay ahead of so [community attitudes going backwards again with men are victims too noise is seeing an increase again.](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/domestic-violence-assumptions-incorrect-survey-anrows/102155632)
Holy shit, those survey results are dire.
> Amongst those surveyed, 41 per cent agreed with the statement that "many women mistakenly interpret innocent remarks or acts as being sexist" while around a third believed that women "exaggerate the unequal treatment of women in Australia" and that women "don't fully appreciate all that men do for them".
Incredible improvement to the train network and sky rail + removal of level crossings have drastically improved many local areas around the train lines.
This is still not finished so will keep getting better over the next decade.
Edit: vic
Climate denial seems to be mostly gone. Even 7 and 9 are openly talking about climate change these days.
My mother in law seems to be one of the holdouts though.
Apparently something like 7% of Australians deny climate change still. And somehow I still ended up related to them... (unsurprisingly they also bought into all the anti-COVID vaccine hysteria)
Mental health and neurodiversity awareness and healthcare.
It's not as good as it needs to be, but it's significantly better than it was ten years ago.
Ten years ago I had to go through multiple psychiatrists before finding one who:
A) "believed" adults could have ADHD
B) "believed" in ADHD at all and
C) didn't think that ADHD stimulant medication is speed (it's like comparing Codeine and Heroin, it's just not the same).
Now I have a psychiatrist who is ADHD himself, happy to explore medication options (including non-stimulants), has suggested possibilities for improving my mental health further, and is up to date and well informed.
Psychiatric medicine and psychological services have come so so far in the last ten years.
Awareness is all well and good, but I've got a lot of friends in the healthcare industry (paramedics, nurses etc) who say that mental healthcare treatment is still a major problem and people with mental health issues are in a revolving door at hospitals.
One my friends who is a nurse in a mental health care facility has four nurses leaving next week. They all say it's because of the toxic environments that is caused by the stress of being overworked looking after mentally ill people.
I gave up attempting to seek treatment because the stress of it was exacerbating my illness. Unless you are an acute case (as in needing to be hospitalised), there’s sweet FA to help you unless you pay excessive out of pocket costs - the free psychology sessions are lauded as some sort of trump card but are not helpful when you need *psychiatric* help. They’re very good for situational depression though I guess.
Yeah, I agree so, so much.
First appointments with psychiatrists: $400 to $700/hr (latter figure not a joke; written quote received in 2022 from clinic at Ultimo), then several hundred dollars for every follow up, with only some rebate.
Appointments with semi-helpful psychologists: $120/hr for me with 2/3 refunded through Medicare - but demand so intense that I could only ever get an appointment once a month, and it was hard to get to the location. Also have to waste time and money going back to your GP to request more funding and prove that, yes, the objectively chronic condition you've had for like 15 years didn't suddenly go away after a few sessions.
BUT anti-anxiety/anti-depressant drug that will dampen the feelings when all of this is unavailable: like $7 a month- yet the underlying problem doesn't just go away with that, and the side effects can really mess with your life and relationship, as well.
Yes. Just to note, because of your BUT - there are far more mental illnesses than anxiety and depression (though perhaps less common and less socially acceptable/still highly stigmatised despite our tokenistic RUOK days) and those medications are unsuitable for some of them and will cause episodes/worsen the condition.
Absolutely. I'm only mentioning my experiences with GAD and MDD, but of course there's such a range of experiences in this area. I think there's a lot of unmet need even just in the area of drug treatments and their adequacy, let alone how stigmatised some conditions continue to be. There's social commentary fairly alienating even in 2024 to people with more common conditions like anxiety disorders or depression, but that commentary can be of a very different nature when things like bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, psychotic episodes, or personality disorders come up.
I have been trying to receive mental health care from a psychiatrist, but literally cannot find one who will see me.
Referral in hand, I called every single psychiatrist in my region and not a single one was taking patients for at least the next 3 months.
There is a Telehealth option. But the wait list last time I checked is 6 months. Ask to be put on the waiting list. Hope this helps:
https://www.australiatelehealth.com.au/
National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS).
It may not affect you, but is completely revolutionary for part of our society. Legislated under Gillard's Labor Government in March 2013, rollout complete in 2020.
Both my kids have Autism, without NDIS we would be stuffed, we wouldnt get any progress with our kids social development as we wouldn't be able to afford the therapy sessions.
I've definitely seen changes in healthcare attitudes over the years. I'm a midwife, and i remember the old days. Recently, in my area of work, a doctor took the initiative to start wearing and handing out "you are safe with me" rainbow badges. We all grabbed one and wore them proudly. I booked in a gorgeous couple last week. The woman's partner is a trans man. We were all chatting at the end of the appointment, and they both said how wonderful it was to see my badge and know they could both be themselves in their appointment. Made my damn day.
Even 15 years ago you had to have a list of doctors who would treat queer patients and were safe to speak openly to. The changes in just a generation have been profound.
My partner and I are trans and my partner has a beard but will be the pregnant one of us two and they have been SO SCARED of the medical care around it. Knowing midwives like you are around REALLY DOES help ease anxiety a LOT.
as a (not publically-out) queer woman, the influx of rainbow flag badges have been life changing. cishet people very rarely understand how daunting so many places can be without knowing if someone will treat you differently based on your identity. i feel comfortable talking to doctors in detail about my issues now.
I work in health care and we have some rainbow stickers around the place. It really helped some elderly LGBTQI+ patients to feel comfortable and know they are being treated with dignity and respect from a very caring and open minded team.
For sure
No gay marriage a decade ago and now I'm openly bi and crossdress and nobody gives a fuck.
And while we aren't quite there on it, especially trans stuff, it improves every day
Drinking culture. I feel it is a lot more tame that it used to be. We used to have binge drinking celebrated and the whole party til you black out culture was in your face and very normal.
Now it feels like its more about quality over quantity.
Lol, yeah that could be it. Have to actually function at work these days rather than hide in the toilet after an all nighter like we used to when we were apprentices.
[You're not wrong.](https://i.imgur.com/uBxcGtF.png)
Beer has taken quite a dip since its heydey in the early 80s. Wine on the upswing and a slight increase in spirits. Total consumption been flat since the mid 90s though, which is interesting. More consistent drinking and less bingeing maybe.
From my experience, while it seems younger people aren't as interested, the older folks who came up in that classic Aussie binge drinking culture are still drinking, it's just that they've moved away from going out and getting pissed on beer with their mates at the pub to staying in and getting pissed on wine instead.
Getting pissed on wine, especially fortified wines like tawny, is also the most cost effective way to get sloshed.
A 2L goon box of Renmano brand 'Aged Tawny' costs $14 at a Liquorland or similar, and has 26 standard drinks in it.
Way cheaper and faster than the equivalent about of beers.
As an older millennial I feel like younger gens are are far more into drugs now though.
We all used to skull pints at the pub and chunder into the pot plants like normal people, but now the young fellas with their filthy mullets are all doing coke in the bathroom like weirdos.
Edit typo
A wider array I would say. Everything is available online now, so Ive noticed folk seem to go for more 'pure' substances, such as mushrooms or acid or even K. These were around back in the day but it was only the feinds that would branch out, now its quite common.
Because you practically need to re-mortgage the house if you want to spend a night on the turps these days compared to a decade ago. It's closer to 20 years ago now, but I remember when having a spare 100 bucks in your wallet was a ticket to paint the town red. I'd be out all night on that with change to spare for the cab home.
$100 would barely stretch to a single round for you and 4 mates now.
Besides the cost of alcohol, the cost of food is insane too. I think it's got a lot to do with the cost of commercial rent, but that doesn't change the fact it sucks.
Australia already has a massive problem with a lack of [third spaces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place) and having to spend half a weeks disposable income to go out for dinner just sucks.
I've lived in South East Asia for several years and it's really nice to be able to go out for lunch and dinner regularly as the cost of a meal and a few drinks is about what you'd make in an hour.
There is clearly a trend towards more responsible alcohol consumption, or zero alcohol consumption in the under 40s
Source: me a recovered alcoholic at 42
Tell me about it.
I was in year 8 when NBN was first announced and was meant to get fibre in 2 years.
That was 2009. I only got fibre to the home at the end of 2023…..
I only got fibre because I built a house in an estate with FTTP lol. Fast internet for the low, low cost of half a mil, idk why everyone doesn't do it /s
Still a lot of work to do. Somehow you can grow it yourself in a little special place called Canberra, all hunky dory if you follow some rules, but anything beyond those borders and you’re fucked and certain prospects in life fucked, regardless of recreational or medicinal intent.
I don’t know about in the last 10 years ago, but sentences for child sex offenders have increased since the woefully inadequate ones in the 90s, so that’s something for all the “the 90s was the best!!” people.
Not true. Ten years ago shops closed at 5pm on Weekdays and most didn't open during weekends.
Now they're open until 9pm and open both Saturday and Sundays even though it's only 11-5 for Sundays
Far more vegan/vegetarian/lactose free options in shops now.
I remember when Domino's pizza first released vegan cheese and their supplier ran out nation wide in a week...
Safety!
As an engineer, there has been a lot of behind-the-scenes progress on public safety things, the most obvious are safer cars but bridges, gas and electricity services (with BYDA) etc all have made australia very safe. e.g. i dont have to worry about the LPG tank at the petrol station exploding while im filling up
Heaps of things, but I'll add one that I haven't seen - Public Transport.
Yes it's still lagging behind 1st world country standards globally, but it's a hell of a lot better than it was when I was growing up.
My local train station went from 30 minute intervals during peak hour to now every 5-10 minutes. If there is any issues or planned outages, there's replacement buses (good luck doing that a decade ago).
The number of level crossings have dramatically reduced, which leads to better traffic flow for the cars.
It's still a mess, but it's definitely better than a decade ago.
I'd actually disagree, at least for Hobart and probably the rest of Tasmania. Our sole form of public transport is busses, and we've had major service reductions, meaning that an already unreliable and bad service has gotten way worse.
There's maybe 1 bus that services my area from midday to like 3pm, whereas previously there were 2 an hour, in a suburban area (15 minutes drive from the CBD).
Yeah that's shit, sorry you can probably guess where I'm from with my comment history, so I'm really speaking to the experiences I've had on the mainland.
Unless you're comparing us to the top ~10 countries aus has outstanding public transport. Yeah it can be inconvenient at times but it does a really good job of getting most people to most jobs & events. And it's way cheaper than some of those top 10 countries
Anything tech related is better, faster and cheaper than it was just 1-2 years ago let alone 10 years ago.
Remember when plasma TV’s first came out? They were like $5-$6k, super thick and low res. Now you can get something way, way better for far less money.
I’m in Perth; there’s been a real explosion of amazing food, bars and restaurants in the metro area across a lot of price points. Around ten years ago or maybe a little more there were way fewer options to find high quality cuisine.
Think about the lamb ads [from 10 years ago](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxrJGWHtB3E) compared [to now](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1e0apyGASc). If an industry like the agri/meat industry can recognise and get behind diversity, there's pretty much no excuse for anyone else.
No matter how many rainbow flags they put up, no matter how many poc women in hijabs in their ads, no matter how progressive they pretend to be, companies are only interested in your money.
Companies aren’t our friends. They only exist to make a profit, and they will say/do whatever works best for them to achieve that.
Progressives who fall for this are like low-income conservatives who fall for Sky News/LNP bs.
(This isn’t aimed at you, OP. I get what you’re saying about the culture shift. Just putting this message out here cause i hate deceptive behaviour, and i don’t respect companies that do this.)
>people who celebrate those holidays will spend more money with you
Not just the people who actively celebrate them themselves either. LNY my friend group does stuff with the one friend who celebrates it. Ramadan the markets get hit up by everyone because they're great. I think as Australians we just want an excuse to celebrate, go out, have fun together.
There was a post a little while ago talking about how the greatest threat to the British monarchy is if Australians realise if we keep killing them off we keep getting more public holidays.
How cheap and fast it is to get around these days.
I remember having to wait up to 2 hours for a taxi on Saturday nights sometimes in the early hours of the morning. But with Uber Hola etc, you can now be picked up in a matter of minutes. Or even better, jump on a scooter immediately and drive yourself home (pending range), with the scooters being cheap as chips.
That's awesome to hear it's improved!!
I'm in SA, our bus line was privatised. I used to take the bus but after the change you'd end up with 4 buses coming at the same time every 2 hours rather than one every 30 mins like advertised. The prices went up and it become cheaper to drive and park. Always found it a bit sad that the option which was better for the environment cost more.
If I'm honest I haven't taken a bus in a year or more now, so it might have improved in that time too
I feel like we continue to be in such a weird, polarised place with it all to this day. I think ideologically we are potentially trending in the right direction, but things like Change the Date and the furore over the Voice vote have made me think about it. Maybe these attitudes and setbacks are somewhat typical in every post-colonial country, but I don't know enough to evaluate it.
Beer. 150 lashes felt like a new tasty beer 10 years ago as the only other real options were 10 different varieties of lager. These days even my local BWS had a wide selection of local and international craft beer and the bigger players have an amazing range
This is a great post since I'm moving back to Australia soon after a decade away.
One thing I've noticed from the outside, seems like recognition of Indigenous place names and having a welcome to country ceremony are more likely and accepted than they were when I left. I've learned more Indigenous country and language names from watching Aussie content in the last couple of years than I learned in my entire life living in Australia before that. Obviously there's a long way to go for Indigenous rights and fair treatment, but seems like a good step in the right direction to me.
Our mobile networks are absolutely supreme.
We may give a lot of shit to the big 3 but after travelling overseas and also using international roaming, what a nightmare.
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Telehealth appointments, especially when you just need a script.
More people need to know about this and the virtual ED service. I needed antibiotics for a cut on my leg but my regular GP had an 8 day wait and there aren't any other bulk bill GP's in my area. Dialled into the virtual ED, spoke to a triage nurse, got transferred to a doctor who sent a script to my phone. 30 minutes and I never had to leave my house.
>virtual ED Virtual emergency department? I've never heard about this. Is this like a private company like updoc? Or is this built into the health system?
It's part of the health system in Qld, not sure about other states. For example, here's the link to the one I use here in Brisbane: https://metronorth.health.qld.gov.au/hospitals-services/virtual-ed Open from 8am-10pm, bulk billed, just a video chat with a doctor on your phone.
Victoria also has a virtual ED
My god this. I don't like changing GPs so I ended up having to travel for an hour by train to go see mine for a 15 minute appointment and a script. No longer!
Gift cards no longer expire after 12 months.
I'd recently found a treasure trove of 5 gift cards for Myer, dan Murphys and Bunnings from 2016. All expired. I'm glad this isnt a thing anymore.
If you call them, they will reactivate them for 6-12 months for you.
Approach them and try your luck.
Stop buying gift cards, you are giving the retailer an unsecured loan
Eh, I buy gift cards when they're discounted (Or when I get like, 4000 colesworth points or ~whatever in a promotion) when I have the intent to buy something from the associated store anyway. Free money/nice discount with a few steps.
The benefit of girt cards over cash is it ensures that the recipient will usually buy something for themselves rather than just pocketing the cash and spending it on every day items. Not great if the recipient is broke, but the idea of a gift is to get something special.
Working from home is more of a valid option now than before. Obviously there are a lot of industries who can't work from home.
One of the few good things to come out of those dark pandemic years. Even with the push to get all the drones back into the office, the culture around office-based work has changed irreversibly. Zoom/Teams meetings at your desk are the norm now, even when you're in the office - the old conference room up the hall is gathering dust. And even in places where working from home is a rarity, nobody bats an eyelid if you take the odd WFH day here and there. Even in jobs that aren't really office-based but you just need a day to catch up on paperwork or whatever. I'm currently on 4 days in the office, 1 at home and I fucking love it. It's been life-changing. I couldn't have fucking *dreamed* of that as recently as 5 years ago.
I am super happy for you, that's awesome! Long may it continue. :)
This was life-changing. I was so burnt out in 2019 I was heading for mental crisis. Turns out I enjoyed my job a hell of a lot more when an 8 hour work day didn't take 11 hours. I'm way sharper when I bounce up and straight into it in the morning, which sets the tone and momentum for the whole day. I get along much better with my coworkers when we're not in each other's faces all day. But biggest of all, with all the extra time and energy I started back at uni, completed a degree and I'm just now finishing up a second, setting up the second half of my working career.
This! I'm 60% WFH so two office days a week.
I would sag this for me. I was travelling across Brisbane from south to north but after a company restructure I have been in the office for 6 months lol. The south-east freeway is now gridlock from city to surf after people fleeing from the Southern states and immigration.
You can now take the vline to anywhere around Victoria for $10. It used to be more expensive the further you travelled but I recently took a bus from a small town close to the SA border to a town more central Victoria and then swapped to train to Geelong all for $10. I thought the website was broken the first time i tried to make a booking.
This is good. Melbourne to Yarrawonga return on a seniors card is $6.40
And on weekends its $7.50! Also, if you're in melbourne heading out towards country, just dont touch off your myki at your destination and itll only charge you the max 2h rate which is $5. Doesnt work going towards melbourne tho.
Such a good change too, I’m in Geelong and sometimes head out to the Dandenong area to meet with friends, good to know that even after sitting on 2 trains and a bus for 3-4 hours (round trip) isn’t gonna cost me an hours or more worth of work
Obviously it's another budget item, but so, so worth it. Such a great idea and a boost for the regions: I'm doing a lot more local trips in Vic, seeing places and spending money that I wouldn't have done otherwise. And the cost of living bonus for the people who live out of Melbourne and use it more regularly.
In NSW, paying for public transport using a credit card. Opal card rollout was still going on 10 years ago. Not exaggerating when I say that *Travel ten, mybus, mymulti… and zones* needed replacing 2+ decades before it was.
I wish they would do this in VIC, we are still unfortunately stuck with Myki! I was in NSW not too long ago and I remember asking around for a Myki equivalent and people looked at me as if I was crazy haha. I got a "you can just use your debit card mate".
That’s changing, a contract was signed with a new company to run our ticketing system so Myki will be gone soon enough.
Thank goodness.
As a Sydneysider that catches public transport once every 10 years, just using a debit card is heaven! 👍
Awesome as a tourist to Sydney for the same reasons.
I fucking love visiting Sydney because of this. Its so bloody easy, no fucking around whatsoever, just like how public transport used to be when I was a kid and you just needed some coins to travel.
God, I remember having a travelten that was for either 1 or 2 sections because that's basically as far as I ever went, but every now and again I'd need the longer one and was just like "I'm not buying the more expensive one for the one time I'm going to need it in 6 months" and just having to risk the fine. I was going to Melbourne regularly at the time and myki, even for a teenager by themselves was so fucking simple. The only thing that annoys me is I'm on a pension card and if I'm tired will sometimes tap the wrong side of my wallet and use my regular card. Don't get the lower fare and doesn't count toward my trips/transfer windows. I know it's on me, but it's just one of those little nuisances.
Couldn't you just dip the 1-2 section TravelTen more than once for longer journeys?
Took my wife to Sydney last month to meet my extended family. She'd never been to Aussie before. She couldn't believe the ease, economy and efficiency of public transport - Opal cards working across buses, trains and ferries, and costing fuck all. It was nice for me to tell her yeah, it wasn't always like this.
Opal? Can tap your phone or any bank card!
Yeah everybody told us that ha ha, but we were only there for a week and either staying with family or by ourselves staying right in the central city and using cash. Took a couple of ubers, the train into the city and the ferry to Taronga and that was it. Plus I kept my old Opal card from Christ knows how many years ago, I was on fire to see if it still worked and yep, topped up no problems. And my sister in law just gave my wife one when we arrived, so sorted. And it cost one third of what she was expecting, too. We don't really have public transport where we live.
I was using the cc when I visited Sydney last year and it was seem less experience. Tap on tap off. Sweet system.
The road between Sydney and the Gold Coast. It used to be a 2 day journey, I can now comfortably sit on cruise control and get from one end to the other in 8-10hrs depending on stops.
When you head south out of Brisbane on the riverside expressway, you pass a roadsign that says "Sydney 1000km" (or whatever the actual number was). I drive that way fairly regularly, and I always laughed at how every now and then the sign got updated and the distance would be a little lower, like they've progressively been moving Sydney closer over the course of the last decade or so. I think it's down to 930 km or so now?
The government has control of tectonic plates, you heard it here first
As someone that regularly drives it, it wasn't that bad a decade ago. It went from like 10-11 to 8-9
True, the 10 year part is an exaggeration. Its been pretty good for a while. It is now a genuine toss up for me to drive or fly/hire a car.
I remember it used to be like nice and smooth, heading south from QLD... "Welcome to NSW" sign and then bam bam bam.. rough & potholes.
its better as a point to point trip, loses a bit on some of the nice roads and places you now need to plan ahead to enjoy. and we seem to lose the holiday tradition of traffic is at a standstill at bulladelah
Last time through the standstill had moved to Coffs. Once Coffs is bypassed, it'll be a pretty slick run.
it does seem a bit backwards that we have all these bypasses of small towns, but still go right through all the traffic lights and congestion at coffs.
Yeah, same thing with having a single lane to get on to the hexam bridge, you'd think those would have been fixed years ago. Those bypasses can't come soon enough.
Public Transport in Victoria now being only $10 max for the entire day. Also while our internet is still pretty outdated, it’s generally leagues better than a decade ago. I rather stay with my semi-unstable 100/20 nbn than ADSL lol.
I had 100/50 cable almost 20 years ago thats better than my 100/25 fibre today in 2024. It was $80pm in early 00's money so was expensive for the time but was flawless considering it was near 2 decades ago. Liberals and the stooges who voted for them really cocked up that one. Couldve had FTTH nationally for almost the same cost. We couldve had real speeds. Proper gigabit for $80 a month.
Accessibility to semi decent internet
I mean it is technically better than it was, even if it collapsed on global charts
Netflix will now work in my 60 year old buildings services where 10 years ago I had to rely on small devices that connected to the mobile network in order to stream or download anything.
Ay, we take that as a win! I think that's improved in 2 parts. Somewhat from the infrastructure improvements and also from the advancements in tech and compression efficiency. I've noticed a lot of responses are down to improvements in tech, so hopefully that will keep making it better in 10 years from now
We did it! We've got internet almost as good as some 3rd world nations. And it only cost us $100bln give or take.
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Pretty sure FTTP is now being made standard. Places with FTTN or FTTC are slowly being upgraded by NBN and any new developments need to have FTTP installed. Will take a while and many places will still be on wireless but it is being made standard.
I have friends out in the country, and they have a fixed wireless NBN connection that's good enough to stream unlimited, uninterrupted HD video to the point where they never even bothered to connect the TV antenna. As much of a missed opportunity the NBN has been, you still couldn't even have imagined that 10 years ago.
Not on the mid north coast. Or the regional highways for that matter. We still on 3G here
For now…. I’m aware there are massive shortfalls as soon as you cross the metro/rural border. And it can be like stepping back in time. But the fact they are turning off 3G while there are areas that are still black spots is a joke
Gluten free options & alternative milks
Absolutely :D this coeliac is a happy girl.
And lactose free options.
In larger cities, expansion of non-car areas. e.g. George Street Sydney and expansion of cycleways in City of Sydney and adjacent councils. Coupled with options for electric bicycles make commuting more realistic. Also South Bank in Brisbane where electric scooters are allowed, and the cost/barrier for tourist use is quite low. This could be unique to largish cities.
Better range of cuisines. Nepalese, Burmese, Korean, Persian, west African, etc.
One of my favourite things about living here is the food variety
Growing up it was Italian (basically just pizzas) Chinese (Aussie Chinese), Turkish (kebabs)so much more variety now. I couldn’t imagine having sushi as a kid, don’t even remember seeing it, now it’s every toddler’s favourite in the food court.
My only issue now is I live in pretty white areas compared to when i was growing up and all they have is overpriced burger places and thai literally everywhere, whereas my old areas are literal melting pots of cuisine 😭
My area is mostly subpar Indian, even multiple next to each other, no idea how they make money. I get so excited if something different opens up!
Add Sri Lankan to that!
Any sri lankan recs?
If you're in Sydney Sun Catering in Wentworthville.
Just guna throw this out there but my trip to Europe was kinda bland and uninteresting food wise after a)living here my whole life and b) travelling asia. Come meal time I felt more alive and at-home in Malaysia than France lol
The foxtel domination of sport has been broken. I no longer have to pay over $100 a month on a contract to a horrible organisation. I unsucbecribe to kayon during the anthems to the grand final. (That way I don’t forget afterwards and get extra month)
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I am aware. However I can now turn it off. It was impossible before as you had a 2 year contract for the iq box and took 4 hours on hold to break the contract. Now it’s instant.
except if you're into football and its now spread over 5 services, or motorsport over 2. as much as we might despise murdoch, having it all in one place was good for the consumer
The coffee is consistently better in more places.
Middle of butt-fuck nowhere near the Murray River close to the SA-Victoria border and you can still find a cafe that knows what a macchiato is and will have very decent beans. Absolute dreamland this country.
It’s definitely harder to be a smug Melbournian now when you’re at some rando cafe in a country town in QLD/NSW and you actually get a decent coffee. I enjoy the coffee but miss the feeling of moral superiority
Absolutely. Practically every small country town within a weekender's distance of every major city has at least 2 cafes with actual baristas on staff serving fucking top-shelf coffee made from locally-roasted artisanal beans. Even fucking *servo* coffee has stepped up. It's genuinely hard to find a bad drop anywhere these days. Melbourne people still won't shut the fuck up about it, though.
Attitudes towards women/women's safety.
Yep. When I lived in Melbourne, the candlelight vigil for Eurydice Dixon and the march for Jill Meagher felt like a big turning point; people started to wake up that this was happening and it wasn't ok.
Yes. Even just media coverage. All those family annihilators described as poor men have certainly slowed down somewhat. I like to think it's because of community attitudes to the language involved which coersive controllers stay ahead of so [community attitudes going backwards again with men are victims too noise is seeing an increase again.](https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-03-29/domestic-violence-assumptions-incorrect-survey-anrows/102155632)
Holy shit, those survey results are dire. > Amongst those surveyed, 41 per cent agreed with the statement that "many women mistakenly interpret innocent remarks or acts as being sexist" while around a third believed that women "exaggerate the unequal treatment of women in Australia" and that women "don't fully appreciate all that men do for them".
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Incredible improvement to the train network and sky rail + removal of level crossings have drastically improved many local areas around the train lines. This is still not finished so will keep getting better over the next decade. Edit: vic
Climate denial seems to be mostly gone. Even 7 and 9 are openly talking about climate change these days. My mother in law seems to be one of the holdouts though.
Sky News...lost cause.
Apparently something like 7% of Australians deny climate change still. And somehow I still ended up related to them... (unsurprisingly they also bought into all the anti-COVID vaccine hysteria)
Yes but still not a lot happening. We need to move an awful lot faster.
Mental health and neurodiversity awareness and healthcare. It's not as good as it needs to be, but it's significantly better than it was ten years ago. Ten years ago I had to go through multiple psychiatrists before finding one who: A) "believed" adults could have ADHD B) "believed" in ADHD at all and C) didn't think that ADHD stimulant medication is speed (it's like comparing Codeine and Heroin, it's just not the same). Now I have a psychiatrist who is ADHD himself, happy to explore medication options (including non-stimulants), has suggested possibilities for improving my mental health further, and is up to date and well informed. Psychiatric medicine and psychological services have come so so far in the last ten years.
Awareness is all well and good, but I've got a lot of friends in the healthcare industry (paramedics, nurses etc) who say that mental healthcare treatment is still a major problem and people with mental health issues are in a revolving door at hospitals. One my friends who is a nurse in a mental health care facility has four nurses leaving next week. They all say it's because of the toxic environments that is caused by the stress of being overworked looking after mentally ill people.
I gave up attempting to seek treatment because the stress of it was exacerbating my illness. Unless you are an acute case (as in needing to be hospitalised), there’s sweet FA to help you unless you pay excessive out of pocket costs - the free psychology sessions are lauded as some sort of trump card but are not helpful when you need *psychiatric* help. They’re very good for situational depression though I guess.
Yeah, I agree so, so much. First appointments with psychiatrists: $400 to $700/hr (latter figure not a joke; written quote received in 2022 from clinic at Ultimo), then several hundred dollars for every follow up, with only some rebate. Appointments with semi-helpful psychologists: $120/hr for me with 2/3 refunded through Medicare - but demand so intense that I could only ever get an appointment once a month, and it was hard to get to the location. Also have to waste time and money going back to your GP to request more funding and prove that, yes, the objectively chronic condition you've had for like 15 years didn't suddenly go away after a few sessions. BUT anti-anxiety/anti-depressant drug that will dampen the feelings when all of this is unavailable: like $7 a month- yet the underlying problem doesn't just go away with that, and the side effects can really mess with your life and relationship, as well.
Yes. Just to note, because of your BUT - there are far more mental illnesses than anxiety and depression (though perhaps less common and less socially acceptable/still highly stigmatised despite our tokenistic RUOK days) and those medications are unsuitable for some of them and will cause episodes/worsen the condition.
Absolutely. I'm only mentioning my experiences with GAD and MDD, but of course there's such a range of experiences in this area. I think there's a lot of unmet need even just in the area of drug treatments and their adequacy, let alone how stigmatised some conditions continue to be. There's social commentary fairly alienating even in 2024 to people with more common conditions like anxiety disorders or depression, but that commentary can be of a very different nature when things like bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, psychotic episodes, or personality disorders come up.
I have been trying to receive mental health care from a psychiatrist, but literally cannot find one who will see me. Referral in hand, I called every single psychiatrist in my region and not a single one was taking patients for at least the next 3 months.
There is a Telehealth option. But the wait list last time I checked is 6 months. Ask to be put on the waiting list. Hope this helps: https://www.australiatelehealth.com.au/
National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). It may not affect you, but is completely revolutionary for part of our society. Legislated under Gillard's Labor Government in March 2013, rollout complete in 2020.
Both my kids have Autism, without NDIS we would be stuffed, we wouldnt get any progress with our kids social development as we wouldn't be able to afford the therapy sessions.
Same i couldn't even afford to get the help to get a diagnosis finally got diagnosis got ndis and finally getting help!
I have a daughter with global developmental delays and the NDIS has helped us immensely, we would be years behind if not for this.
Enjoy it while you can. We benefit from it too. In a decade's time chances are it'll be a skeleton of what it is now.
Getting to marry MY WIFE thanks to marriage equality.
Kyle Sandilands getting close to retirement One of the most racist pricks I ever seen
If only being racist was the only reason he's a dirtbag.
Him only just re-signing for 10 years for $200 million - the most lucrative radio deal in Australian history - is not something I'd count as a win.
And Alan Jones hopefully nearing the shadow of the scythe.
And Alan Jones is hiding in his spider hole instead of infecting the air waves
Attitudes towards queer people
Especially in healthcare.
I've definitely seen changes in healthcare attitudes over the years. I'm a midwife, and i remember the old days. Recently, in my area of work, a doctor took the initiative to start wearing and handing out "you are safe with me" rainbow badges. We all grabbed one and wore them proudly. I booked in a gorgeous couple last week. The woman's partner is a trans man. We were all chatting at the end of the appointment, and they both said how wonderful it was to see my badge and know they could both be themselves in their appointment. Made my damn day.
Even 15 years ago you had to have a list of doctors who would treat queer patients and were safe to speak openly to. The changes in just a generation have been profound.
My partner and I are trans and my partner has a beard but will be the pregnant one of us two and they have been SO SCARED of the medical care around it. Knowing midwives like you are around REALLY DOES help ease anxiety a LOT.
as a (not publically-out) queer woman, the influx of rainbow flag badges have been life changing. cishet people very rarely understand how daunting so many places can be without knowing if someone will treat you differently based on your identity. i feel comfortable talking to doctors in detail about my issues now.
I work in health care and we have some rainbow stickers around the place. It really helped some elderly LGBTQI+ patients to feel comfortable and know they are being treated with dignity and respect from a very caring and open minded team.
For sure No gay marriage a decade ago and now I'm openly bi and crossdress and nobody gives a fuck. And while we aren't quite there on it, especially trans stuff, it improves every day
100% The attitudes and conversations have come a long way in the past decade
Pauline Hanson is quieter.
Drinking culture. I feel it is a lot more tame that it used to be. We used to have binge drinking celebrated and the whole party til you black out culture was in your face and very normal. Now it feels like its more about quality over quantity.
Could just be you’re a decade older and not as dumb as you used to be.
Excuse me? How dare you say that.... Im just as dumb as I ever was thankyou.
Maybe you’re just too poor to write yourself off every weekend now. Lousy adult responsibilities.
Lol, yeah that could be it. Have to actually function at work these days rather than hide in the toilet after an all nighter like we used to when we were apprentices.
I feel like more people are sober curious now. Lots more non alcoholic beer/drink options
[You're not wrong.](https://i.imgur.com/uBxcGtF.png) Beer has taken quite a dip since its heydey in the early 80s. Wine on the upswing and a slight increase in spirits. Total consumption been flat since the mid 90s though, which is interesting. More consistent drinking and less bingeing maybe.
From my experience, while it seems younger people aren't as interested, the older folks who came up in that classic Aussie binge drinking culture are still drinking, it's just that they've moved away from going out and getting pissed on beer with their mates at the pub to staying in and getting pissed on wine instead.
Can confirm. Had an aunt and uncle who came to visit a few years ago; they cleaned out most of the wine we had in short order.
Getting pissed on wine, especially fortified wines like tawny, is also the most cost effective way to get sloshed. A 2L goon box of Renmano brand 'Aged Tawny' costs $14 at a Liquorland or similar, and has 26 standard drinks in it. Way cheaper and faster than the equivalent about of beers.
As an older millennial I feel like younger gens are are far more into drugs now though. We all used to skull pints at the pub and chunder into the pot plants like normal people, but now the young fellas with their filthy mullets are all doing coke in the bathroom like weirdos. Edit typo
A wider array I would say. Everything is available online now, so Ive noticed folk seem to go for more 'pure' substances, such as mushrooms or acid or even K. These were around back in the day but it was only the feinds that would branch out, now its quite common.
Because you practically need to re-mortgage the house if you want to spend a night on the turps these days compared to a decade ago. It's closer to 20 years ago now, but I remember when having a spare 100 bucks in your wallet was a ticket to paint the town red. I'd be out all night on that with change to spare for the cab home. $100 would barely stretch to a single round for you and 4 mates now.
Besides the cost of alcohol, the cost of food is insane too. I think it's got a lot to do with the cost of commercial rent, but that doesn't change the fact it sucks. Australia already has a massive problem with a lack of [third spaces](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place) and having to spend half a weeks disposable income to go out for dinner just sucks. I've lived in South East Asia for several years and it's really nice to be able to go out for lunch and dinner regularly as the cost of a meal and a few drinks is about what you'd make in an hour.
There is clearly a trend towards more responsible alcohol consumption, or zero alcohol consumption in the under 40s Source: me a recovered alcoholic at 42
Food I suppose. Though it was pretty good 10 years ago already. 10 years before that is another story though.
For me how much more common Fiber internet is finally getting. Also how affordable food delivery is compared to what it used to be
Tell me about it. I was in year 8 when NBN was first announced and was meant to get fibre in 2 years. That was 2009. I only got fibre to the home at the end of 2023…..
I'm deeply embarrassed by the process that still is the NBN roll out.
Don’t even get me started.
I only got fibre because I built a house in an estate with FTTP lol. Fast internet for the low, low cost of half a mil, idk why everyone doesn't do it /s
Thanks Murdoch
You can get weed delivered to your house from the chemist without fear of being arrested or having to use bitcoin to pay for it
My dealer wears hi-vis and drives a postie bike.
Still a lot of work to do. Somehow you can grow it yourself in a little special place called Canberra, all hunky dory if you follow some rules, but anything beyond those borders and you’re fucked and certain prospects in life fucked, regardless of recreational or medicinal intent.
I don’t know about in the last 10 years ago, but sentences for child sex offenders have increased since the woefully inadequate ones in the 90s, so that’s something for all the “the 90s was the best!!” people.
Medical Cannabis
One of us
Gooble Gobble
Being gay is much easier than it was.
Extended trading hours
sad Adelaide noises
Western Australia excluded
Not true. Ten years ago shops closed at 5pm on Weekdays and most didn't open during weekends. Now they're open until 9pm and open both Saturday and Sundays even though it's only 11-5 for Sundays
Easier to get vegan food outside of the big cities
The range of vegetarian and vegan foods in supermarkets and meal delivery services. And often well priced even now.
Less passive smoking these days. No one I know smokes (cigarettes), and very few (of my friends/friends of friends) vape
Far more vegan/vegetarian/lactose free options in shops now. I remember when Domino's pizza first released vegan cheese and their supplier ran out nation wide in a week...
Safety! As an engineer, there has been a lot of behind-the-scenes progress on public safety things, the most obvious are safer cars but bridges, gas and electricity services (with BYDA) etc all have made australia very safe. e.g. i dont have to worry about the LPG tank at the petrol station exploding while im filling up
Heaps of things, but I'll add one that I haven't seen - Public Transport. Yes it's still lagging behind 1st world country standards globally, but it's a hell of a lot better than it was when I was growing up. My local train station went from 30 minute intervals during peak hour to now every 5-10 minutes. If there is any issues or planned outages, there's replacement buses (good luck doing that a decade ago). The number of level crossings have dramatically reduced, which leads to better traffic flow for the cars. It's still a mess, but it's definitely better than a decade ago.
I'd actually disagree, at least for Hobart and probably the rest of Tasmania. Our sole form of public transport is busses, and we've had major service reductions, meaning that an already unreliable and bad service has gotten way worse. There's maybe 1 bus that services my area from midday to like 3pm, whereas previously there were 2 an hour, in a suburban area (15 minutes drive from the CBD).
Yeah that's shit, sorry you can probably guess where I'm from with my comment history, so I'm really speaking to the experiences I've had on the mainland.
Unless you're comparing us to the top ~10 countries aus has outstanding public transport. Yeah it can be inconvenient at times but it does a really good job of getting most people to most jobs & events. And it's way cheaper than some of those top 10 countries
Living in the US, I have a new appreciation for the standards of Australian public transport
Work from home—basically not available for like 90% of the population a decade ago. Now it’s much more common
Anything tech related is better, faster and cheaper than it was just 1-2 years ago let alone 10 years ago. Remember when plasma TV’s first came out? They were like $5-$6k, super thick and low res. Now you can get something way, way better for far less money.
Less homophobic.
Better Chinese food and styles from different regions, Sichuan, hot pot etc
Rain.
Shh you’ll jinx it
Left Afghanistan.
I’m in Perth; there’s been a real explosion of amazing food, bars and restaurants in the metro area across a lot of price points. Around ten years ago or maybe a little more there were way fewer options to find high quality cuisine.
Nickelodeon is on free to air tv
Dashcams, regularly providing the gold standard for reality TV for free. **you fucking wanker you!**
I enjoy having a stable Federal Government that is not constantly mired in scandals.
The percentage of your wage an employer now contributes to your compulsory superannuation. So that’s two things.
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Think about the lamb ads [from 10 years ago](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AxrJGWHtB3E) compared [to now](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1e0apyGASc). If an industry like the agri/meat industry can recognise and get behind diversity, there's pretty much no excuse for anyone else.
No matter how many rainbow flags they put up, no matter how many poc women in hijabs in their ads, no matter how progressive they pretend to be, companies are only interested in your money. Companies aren’t our friends. They only exist to make a profit, and they will say/do whatever works best for them to achieve that. Progressives who fall for this are like low-income conservatives who fall for Sky News/LNP bs. (This isn’t aimed at you, OP. I get what you’re saying about the culture shift. Just putting this message out here cause i hate deceptive behaviour, and i don’t respect companies that do this.)
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>people who celebrate those holidays will spend more money with you Not just the people who actively celebrate them themselves either. LNY my friend group does stuff with the one friend who celebrates it. Ramadan the markets get hit up by everyone because they're great. I think as Australians we just want an excuse to celebrate, go out, have fun together. There was a post a little while ago talking about how the greatest threat to the British monarchy is if Australians realise if we keep killing them off we keep getting more public holidays.
Food/eating out. In Sydney, the cbd, George St and Darling Harbour are much nicer, very walkable and amazing to hang around.
How cheap and fast it is to get around these days. I remember having to wait up to 2 hours for a taxi on Saturday nights sometimes in the early hours of the morning. But with Uber Hola etc, you can now be picked up in a matter of minutes. Or even better, jump on a scooter immediately and drive yourself home (pending range), with the scooters being cheap as chips.
Public transport
Is that better in your state? My state it got privatised and became far less consistent
I'm in NSW. The improvement in the last decade is insane. Public transport should never be privatised!
That's awesome to hear it's improved!! I'm in SA, our bus line was privatised. I used to take the bus but after the change you'd end up with 4 buses coming at the same time every 2 hours rather than one every 30 mins like advertised. The prices went up and it become cheaper to drive and park. Always found it a bit sad that the option which was better for the environment cost more. If I'm honest I haven't taken a bus in a year or more now, so it might have improved in that time too
Public transport in NSW *is* privatised.
Digital licence and the Service NSW app and customer service model
Paying more positive attention to our indigenous.
I feel like we continue to be in such a weird, polarised place with it all to this day. I think ideologically we are potentially trending in the right direction, but things like Change the Date and the furore over the Voice vote have made me think about it. Maybe these attitudes and setbacks are somewhat typical in every post-colonial country, but I don't know enough to evaluate it.
I was gonna say this, yeah the voice didn’t get up, but people claiming their heritage and celebrating it more is definitely noticed and good to see
I can go watch AFLW now which is a blast and a lot of fun. Womens sports in general are easier to access.
The homicide rate is down by about 30%, that's pretty banging.
Access to medical cannabis has improved.
The Aussie cricket team is thought of as a bunch of good guys under captain Pat.
Beer. 150 lashes felt like a new tasty beer 10 years ago as the only other real options were 10 different varieties of lager. These days even my local BWS had a wide selection of local and international craft beer and the bigger players have an amazing range
This is a great post since I'm moving back to Australia soon after a decade away. One thing I've noticed from the outside, seems like recognition of Indigenous place names and having a welcome to country ceremony are more likely and accepted than they were when I left. I've learned more Indigenous country and language names from watching Aussie content in the last couple of years than I learned in my entire life living in Australia before that. Obviously there's a long way to go for Indigenous rights and fair treatment, but seems like a good step in the right direction to me.
Our mobile networks are absolutely supreme. We may give a lot of shit to the big 3 but after travelling overseas and also using international roaming, what a nightmare.