Feminist activist Gloria Steinem has died aged 92.

Known almost as much for her trademark mid-parted hair and large aviator sunglasses as for her acute intelligence, courage and wit, she will long be known for setting feminist torches alight globally over her six-decade career as a journalist, activist and feminist icon.

Growing up too quickly

Steinem has always been candid about the impact her early life had on the decisions she later made.

Ten years after she was born in Toledo, Ohio (March 25 1934), her parents divorced. Following the departure of her travelling salesman father, young Gloria was left taking care of her mentally ill mother until she graduated from high school and her sister took over.

Years later she reflected that she “became a grown-up too early, from ten to 17, a small person responsible for a big person”.

Rejecting marriage, she said she did not want to end up taking care of someone else (although much later, in 2000 at the age of 66, she did marry entrepreneur and activist David Bale, who died of lymphoma four years later).

Studying government at Smith College, Massachusetts, she graduated with distinction, then spent two years studying and researching in India thanks to a Charles Bowles Fellowship, an experience she credited with inspiring her interest in grassroots activism.

Toe to toe with Hugh Hefner

Like many female journalists starting out in the 1950s and 60s, Steinem’s initial assignments were limited to “women’s pages”. These typically reported on “women’s issues”, such as health and fashion.

When she suggested writing political stories to her editor at The New York Times Sunday Magazine, he “just said something like, ‘I don’t think of you that way’”.

She came to national attention as a journalist in 1963 with her expose, I Was a Playboy Bunny, based on the 11 days she worked undercover at Hugh Hefner’s Playboy Club.

Although she still wasn’t taken seriously as a reporter, the publicity raised by this experience showcased the sharp and uncompromising intelligence for which she would later become known. In an exchange between the two published a few years later, Hefner declared he was “all in favour of women being able to vote, own property, and all that. But I want women to be attractive to men”.

Steinem responded to this long overdue endorsement of rights that had been afforded to at least white women as far back as the late 19th and early 20th century, that she wanted “men to be attractive to women. But I don’t want their whole identity to rest on that”. She concluded: “what Playboy doesn’t know about women could fill a book.”

Going her own way

In 1971, frustrated by the mainstream press’s stymieing of feminist reporting, Steinem and fellow journalists established Ms. Magazine as an insert in New York magazine.

By 1972, Ms. Magazine had established itself as an independent paper, with which she maintained a close association throughout her life.

While Ms. became an influential platform for contemporary women’s politics, it also brought feminist history to life. In its series Lost Women, it introduced Women’s Liberation era readers to pioneering feminists from around the world whose achievements had gone unrecognised.

Steinem also authored books and memoirs including An Unexpected Life, The Truth Will Set You Free, But First It Will Piss You Off, and Outrageous Acts and Everyday Rebellions, among others.

Her lifetime of writing has been recognised with a multitude of awards.

A lifetime of grassroots activism

But Steinem was not one to report from behind a desk. She became an iconic face of feminism, gracing magazine covers and TV screens, interviewing, speaking, marching, and advocating for girls’ and women’s rights for more than six decades.

In 1969, she addressed a crowd in New York State about legalising abortion. She told them about the abortion that she had had in London when she was 22.

Indeed, so dedicated was she to women gaining and retaining control over their bodies and reproductive choices that she dedicated her book, My Life On The Road, to the London physician John Sharpe, “who carried out her abortion back when it was illegal to do so”.

In 2017, she spoke at the Women’s March on Washington, galvanising anti-Trump demonstrators and urging younger generations to keep up the fight.

Steinem also believed in structural pathways to reform, helping fellow feminists to establish, among other activist organisations, the National Women’s Political Caucus (that works for gender equality in public office), the Women’s Action Alliance, (which promotes non-sexist, multi-racial children’s education), the Women’s Media Center (to promote positive images of women in media) and the Ms. Foundation for Women.

‘We’ve been too nice’

There is no doubt Gloria Steinem will be remembered for all of these remarkable achievements. Her life was one of seemingly boundless energy and enthusiasm, passion and frustration, action and activism.

After all, these accomplishments have been marked by high profile acknowledgements, from the Presidential Medal of Freedom that President Barack Obama presented to her in 2013, to the establishment in 2017 of The Gloria Steinem Endowed Chair in Media, Culture, and Feminist Studies at Rutgers University.

However, those closest to her, or even those just fortunate enough to have encountered her, say it is her ethos of connecting across groups, regions and time that will define her legacy.

Illinois Lieutenant Governor Juliana Stratton, the sixth Black woman senator in the US, got Gloria Steinem’s endorsement. Stratton said she would remember the iconic feminist for her inspirational work behind the scenes:

she made the case for intersectional feminism and for the fight for racial equality in New York magazine in 1969, in a popular article headlined ‘After Black Power, Women’s Liberation’ and continued that work throughout her life.

This was an essay in which Steinem declared that if the women’s movement could form alliances with the less radical middle classes, then it should be easy for them to do the same with “poor women of all colours”.

She also adopted a mixed approach to the emotional dimensions of feminism.

She embraced warmth and connection, viewing the women’s movement “like a big chosen family” and feeling “excited by young women now”.

But she wasn’t afraid to teach or correct those younger women.

The #MeToo movement, she said, was not an unprecedented event. It was the continuation of a long campaign that had begun in the early 1970s, “when women college students first coined the term ‘sexual harassment’ to describe what happened to them on summer jobs”. She highlighted the contributions of the Black women who had brought cases before the courts, thereby educating the nation.

At a packed Town Hall meeting in Melbourne in 2016, she told the young woman who asked her what the women’s movement had done wrong: “I think we’ve been too nice.”

Nice or not, Steinem believed the women’s movement would only survive and thrive if her generation was to prepare the next. While alive, she said she was not passing the baton:

I’m keeping my torch, thank you very much – and I’m using it to light the torches of others.

Sharon Crozier-De Rosa, Professor in History, University of Wollongong

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Mortgage holders know interest rates have risen over the past year, as the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) lifted the cash rate to fight inflation. But mortgage holders are not alone: governments and business borrowers are facing the same pressure.

Australia’s government now has to offer investors more than 5% on its 10-year bonds, which hit a 15-year high on Tuesday after a long period of low interest rates since the global financial crisis in 2008.

In the United States, 10-year interest rates sit around 4.7%, surging nearly half a per cent just this year, while the benchmark 30-year bond is near a two-decade high. In the UK, 10-year bond rates on Tuesday hit the highest level since the global financial crisis.

Higher rates mean higher interest payments for governments too, leaving less room for other spending or for tax cuts.

This applies not just to the federal government here but to the states, whose borrowing costs have also jumped. For example, Victoria’s 10-year bonds now pay an interest rate of 5.55%.

So what’s actually driving market interest rates higher?

Supply and demand

Governments issue bonds to raise money and finance spending that isn’t covered by tax revenue.

Like any asset, the price of a government bond depends on supply and demand. Less bond supply means issuers (governments or companies) don’t need to offer higher rates to attract buyers; more supply pushes rates up.

Bond issuance comes from three main sources:

1. households – borrowing for mortgages, which the banks can then repackage into bonds and sell to investors.

2. businesses – issuing bonds to fund operations. In the US, AI-sector firms such as Amazon and Microsoft have issued about US$240 billion in debt to fund data centres. Even in Australia, Google owner Alphabet launched a huge A$5.5 billion bond last month.

3. governments – governments often have large debts they have built up because of their past budget deficits. Like anyone, if you spend more than you earn, you need to borrow.

The main driver is government debt

The larger a government’s debt, the more bonds it must issue – and the higher the interest rates needed to attract investors.

US national debt has grown to more than US$40 trillion – more than 20 times the size of Australia’s entire economy – while Australia’s federal government debt recently passed A$1 trillion.

Funding debts of this size is pushing up interest rates worldwide. At the same time, some bond investors are getting concerned by the high levels of US government debt and the lack of plans to curb spending, so they are demanding higher interest rates on government bonds.

What central banks can do

The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) manages interest rates through the “cash market” – short-term borrowing of less than a day – using the cash rate to influence demand for borrowing. Raising interest rates ultimately dampens economic demand and reduces inflation.

The RBA cash rate affects borrowing costs across the economy for all other forms of debt – car loans and credit cards as well as mortgages, and corporate debt.

But the RBA can’t directly influence longer-term interest rates such as 10-year bonds, which are market rates and fluctuate constantly based on investors’ demand.

If the RBA cut rates sharply right now, for instance, bond investors would likely read this as inflationary – pushing up inflation expectations and, in turn, the interest rates demanded on longer-term bonds. The RBA’s action would end up being counterproductive.

America’s ‘exorbitant privilege’ – and its limits

The US has long enjoyed a unique position in global markets: it can issue growing volumes of government bonds without needing to offer higher rates to attract buyers.

This “exorbitant privilege” stems from the US dollar’s dominance in global trade and financial transactions, and the widespread trust that central banks and private investors place in US government debt.

US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has tried to capitalise on this by intervening in the bond market, aiming to shrink supply and push market interest rates lower. That would reduce the interest bill for the US government.

The US Treasury increased the amount of debt it is buying back, but the buybacks only had a brief impact on the market.

Investors concluded the buybacks don’t change the underlying picture: increasing US government financing needs, fears of rising inflation, as well as growing corporate bond issuance to fund AI and data centres. All these forces tend to push interest rates higher over the medium to long term, and no financial engineering can undo this reality.

Rates are rising around the world

Across many countries, bond market rates are rising because higher inflation is eroding the real returns for investors. They are demanding more compensation to protect their spending power.

This is compounded by rising bond issuance from both governments and companies. No amount of financial engineering from the US Treasury can reverse these forces.

Central banks and governments can influence short-term interest rates to some degree.

But longer-term debt such as 10-year bonds are ultimately priced on three things:

• expected inflation
• the scale of government debt and financing needs
• and the level of corporate and household borrowing.

The best thing any central bank can do to keep market interest rates low is set policy so inflation remains low.

That’s the purpose of the RBA’s inflation target of 2–3%. As well as keeping a lid on consumer inflation expectations, it lets bond investors know inflation should return to that level in the medium term, and so market interest rates don’t get too high.

Mark Crosby, Professor of Economics, Monash University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Businesses and local councils around Australia are increasingly bringing in their own restrictions on “smart glasses”, responding to customers’ concerns about being covertly recorded in public places.

An Adelaide cafe recently banned smart glasses, citing safety concerns for vulnerable customers. Last week, Brisbane City Council banned the non-consensual use of all camera-enabled devices, including wearable technology, phones and cameras, from 21 public swimming pools.

But businesses need to be careful about how they clamp down on smart glasses on their premises, because being too strict could break the law.

Business rules come with limits

If a private business has their terms of entry at their door, when you enter you are bound by those terms. Similarly, if you sign up to membership with them – such as joining a gym – that contract governs you.

Australian businesses can impose whatever terms they like upon consumers, provided those terms are lawful.

For example, a pub can refuse you entry if their rules prohibit torn or soiled clothing, and you are wearing ripped or dirty jeans. A library can eject you if you are being disorderly and disturbing the quiet for other patrons.

But business terms that break the law are not enforceable.

Why outright bans are legally risky

An outright ban on patrons using smart glasses, whether recording or not, threatens to violate anti-discrimination laws.

Smart glasses – including the best-known Ray Ban Meta glasses – can be fitted with prescription lenses. Alternatively, someone might simply require smart glasses to support their vision. In both cases, a blanket ban might constitute unlawful discrimination under Australia’s Disability Discrimination Act 1992.

Smart glasses can also support people with mobility issues. Ray Ban Meta glasses offer “Be My Eyes” functionality, enabling hands-free calls and live captioning for phone calls.

Other emerging models of smart glasses can apply augmented reality technology to float captions into the wearer’s line of sight, aiding people with hearing issues.

Some can even capture conversations and produce transcripts. This could help people with visual, hearing or cognitive impairments.

Businesses that discriminate against someone with a disability can face penalties such as fines or compensation orders, or the risk of having to redress any loss or damage caused.

Following state and territory rules

The Brisbane City Council’s approach – updating its terms of entry to public pools to restrict smart device recordings without people’s consent – is a safer model to follow.

Prohibiting non-consensual recordings not only protects other customers, but is consistent with surveillance device laws in New South Wales,Victoria, Western Australia, South Australia, and the Northern Territory.

These laws are fairly similar. They prohibit intentional use of “listening” or “optical surveillance” devices to listen to or record others’ private conversations, or to record your own private conversation with another person without consent.

Queensland prohibits unauthorised use of listening devices under its privacy laws.

Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory are outliers. Their listening device laws don’t currently apply to optical surveillance devices.

What if you’re the customer?

If your gym, sporting club, or another organisation you belong to suddenly restricts or bans smart glasses, what can you do?

If a business imposes lawful terms and you sign your name to them, they legally bind you, even if you have not read or understood them.

If the terms say the business can change its rules, and one of those rules now covers smart glasses, you’ll be required to conform. Be sure to check if there’s a notice requirement (that is, if you needed to be told in advance).

For businesses without memberships, such as a cafe or bar, any such terms must be visible at the point of entry. By entering, you’ve agreed to the displayed terms.

Any term permitting a business to temporarily confiscate smart glasses could potentially be legally challenged.

If a business cancels your membership for possession or use of smart glasses, check its terms of entry permit this. If they don’t – or you have a valid reason to use smart glasses – the business could be challenged under contract, discrimination and consumer laws.

Clear terms of entry are needed

This week, the federal Attorney-General Michelle Rowland said the government is not currently considering a ban on importing smart glasses.

With cheaper options such as Kmart’s $89 glasses now available, it’s likely we’ll see more smart glasses, with even more functions, appearing in cafes and shops.

Restricting unauthorised or non-consensual recordings is a safer alternative to an outright ban. It’s consistent with surveillance device legislation and sets a friendlier tone for patrons.

This will still be difficult to police, as it can be hard to tell when a patron is recording with smart glasses. (Though Meta just announced an upcoming update will stop its glasses working if the recording light is covered.)

Clearer business terms of entry can help protect Australians’ privacy and safety in public spaces, without affecting people with legitimate reasons to wear smart glasses.

Mark Giancaspro, Senior Lecturer in Law, Adelaide University

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.