Archive for October 31st, 2009

The Post-War Housing Shortage

The Post-War Housing Boom}

Sometimes described in the post-war years as `the housing shortage’, the national effort to address a very troubling problem has over the years come to be called `the housing boom’. Undoubtedly it was a boom in demand and building. There was also a marked increase in home ownership, achieved in many cases through heroic individual effort and years of sacrifice.

Changing social conditions offered new opportunities, but also narrowed the choices. Emphasis in government housing schemes was at first on rental accommodation; later there was a swing toward the ownership of affordable houses. At a time when various influencers had cut the availability of rental dwellings, governments, banks, finance companies, building societies and housing co-operatives were offering more opportunities for home ownership. Ironically this was at a time of a jump in building input costs.

High on the list of factors linked to rising building costs were the introduction in 1948 of the 40-hour working week, and drastic increases in the cost of construction materials. By 1948 an employer had to pay an unskilled building worker a higher wage than a tradesman had received in early 1946.

To keep both labourer and tradie rationally employed the builder needed a continuous flow of materials which was a rare event in those times. A shortage of skilled workers also meant poor quality building and further loss of time.

Contract prices were loaded with an increasing profit margin as an insurance against unseen problems. Under commonwealth price control, builders were entitled to a 10 per cent `profit’ on the contract price. Above award payments were not recognised in price control and yet builders often found a need to pay above award salaries to ensure house completion.

Unexpected costs could happen when, for example, hardwood flooring was suddenly out of stock, and a higher price would then have to be paid for imported timber for flooring.

With local cement taking forever to turn up, a batch from across the border was sometimes purchased at nearly three times the price. When compared to 1939 prices hardwood flooring had, by 1948, doubled in price. Cement had risen by almost 20 per cent and clay roofing tiles by more than 25 per cent. A gallon of first-grade paint costing around 30s ($3) in 1939 had risen some 40 per cent by 1948.

When added to rising costs and shortages of materials the government restrictions, limiting the area of a new dwelling to 1200 square feet (111.48 square metres) for a timber house and 1250 square feet (116.12 square metres) for a brick house, completed the recipe for an imposed economy.

The economical floor plan was necessary; cost-saving and limitations on area made large single-purpose rooms a luxury. Verandahs and spacious porches disappeared, reducing the shelter at the front entrance to the absolute minimum. Ceiling heights had been slowly reduced from the turn of the century and were now usually nine feet (2745 mm). Until the government construction restrictions were lifted in 1952 the acceptance of no-nonsense functionalism was as much a mandated state as it was a fashionable philosophy. This was the era of the great Australian Dream.

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Having trouble finding a Ridgeback puppy breeder?

initiating the steps of choosing a new pup begins way before the new one comes into the world. Each and every man or woman should do their own study on the breed, to make certain that a Rhodesian Ridgeback, since it is a pretty big and sensitive canine, is the appropriate match for them. If it happens that this is the case then the next step is to make contact with a quantity of reputable Rhodesian Ridgeback breeders

Championship Dog Shows, which now days occur virtually all year long and virtually all around the land, are a good place to meet up with the most important breeders. Many now have excellent web sites with a lot of data on their dogs and their breeding. These breeders will need to develop a special relationship with all prospective potential puppy buyers and they would never show the poor attitude of “simply bring the cash and you’ll have a pup”! By the same token as potential owners, it is in your interests to form a jointly comfortable and amicable association with the breeder.

It’s important that you’re in a position to openly discuss anything to try to to with owning a Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy with your breeder. You should be ready to work out the breeders dogs in their home atmosphere, specifically the dam of the litter, and if residing with the breeder the sire also. The Orthopedic Foundation for animals Certificate of hip scores for each oldsters ought to be offered for inspection (if the sire lives somewhere else a copy should be readily accessible). A reputable breeder will necessarily help you to decide on a puppy depending on your expertise with dogs and your current circumstances. However, if you’re feeling within the slightest method uncomfortable with the breeder – say no many thanks!

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Step By Step Guitar Lessons for Beginner

When you begin learning the guitar properly, the boring thought of taking simple guitar lessons for beginners is no match for the excitement of impressing yourself and others by playing something that everyone knows. When you tell a guitarist that you are learning to play, he or she may show you some chords to a famous song and you get a buzz from being able to do something and it feels great. However, this can mess things up for you later on, because you might now be thinking:

I’ve just learned a song, so I probably don’t even need to go back to basics anymore, or this is so much more enjoyable than learning the basics, so I’ll just keep on doing this. It’s easy to get lured into learning bits of songs from friends and instead of just spending a little time on learning the basics. By basics, I’m talking about things as simple as holding the guitar properly or what to look out for in hand positions etc.   The more ‘bitty’ the way you learn, the less likely it is that you’ll see it through because you’ll end up glossing over all the early lessons and learning how everything fits together. It’s a bit like learning that 2 x 2 is 4, but without knowing how to count; it will catch up with you at some point. 

Whether you’re starting out, or if you feel that what I’ve mentioned is about to happen to you, try to reign yourself back a little and remember that the simple guitar lessons for beginners set you up for the long term – don’t be tempted to skip over them.  They shouldn’t take long to get through and everything else will slot into place a lot easier so you will be able improve your guitar skills quickly – play the long game!

I’m going to sound like a school teacher saying this but you shouldn’t overlook those simple guitar lessons for beginners that sometimes look as if they’re going to be too easy. I admit that there’s no comparison between them and cranking up the volume of an electric guitar and straight away belting out a few riffs. That’s why so many new guitarists don’t give learning the basics much thought.

Your guitarist friends are only too keen to show you how to half-play a few songs and it feels good to make noises that you can recognize. When you get into this trend, there are a couple of issues that pop up, because:

  • You’ve skipped the basics and gone straight to the good stuff
  • You don’t know what you’ve missed out on and what effect they would have had

When you miss out the first steps to becoming a guitarist and start a little further along, you won’t notice any problems to begin with, but when the honeymoon period ends, it will be quite difficult to find things that you can play and learn quickly.  With a set structure to get you through the ‘dull’ early stages quickly, you will know how good you are supposed to be at each stage and what you should be playing.   When you learn as you go, progression is usually slower and less thorough meaning, that you are:

  • In danger of hitting ‘the wall’
  • Easily frustrated by what you can’t do
  • Much more likely to give up
  • Going to sell yourself short

Something which heavily influences whether someone will stick with the guitar is how you start learning.  These ‘dull’ and simple guitar lessons for beginners do so much more than you realise, so please use them. They help set you up to become a decent guitarist much faster, instead of becoming one of the many that lose interest and in a year or so probably won’t touch a guitar again.

Vintage Comics For Sale: A Part Of History

It may not seem like it, but comic books are a huge part of the history of many nations. You can go to any country in the world and find comic books for sale. Such as the U.S., which has been the largest comic book producer in the world since it produced its first comic book in 1934.

Comics go much farther back than 1934 in the form of comic strips commonly seen in the newspaper. But, if you’ve ever read a comic book or comic strip you’re probably wondering why the word “comic” is in the title. The reason is, when comic strips first came out, their main focus was humor, so naturally the first comic books were focused on humor. But in today’s modern comic books, humor isn’t the focal point.

There are many other genres of comic books, as seen in Japan and Europe. However in America, the superhero genre leaves the others in the dust. But what makes comic books so popular? Well generally, it’s the thrilling adventures of superheroes like Superman, Spiderman and Batman, which are known as some of the best comic books around. However, a big factor behind the popularity of comic books in today’s world is rare comic books.

If you could take a survey of all the comic book collectors in the world on what type of comics they collected, the most common answer you would hear would be the rare ones. Whether we collect them or not it’s always fun to have something rare in our possession.

But despite all the exciting things we hear about comic books, they have definitely had their share of ups and downs, which is how the Gold, Silver, and Bronze ages of comic books were created. Each one of these ages has brought something new and unique to comic books which has revolutionized comics into the marvelous books they are today.

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