Australian households are among the world’s most indebted when compared with their income. And we’ve spent most of it on real estate.
Politicians are promising, but not delivering
Low wages, job insecurity and a sense the game is rigged tends to quickly follow through to the political arena.
Category: Australian Economy
Is it any wonder the LNP do what ever Newscorp asks they just might print the facts (ODT)
Annual growth in gross domestic product (GDP) in the December quarter was a dismal 2.34%. The quarterly rise was just 0.18%. The latter ranks an appalling 32nd out of the 36 OECD members. It ranks 77th out of the 92 countries worldwide which record growth quarterly. Lowest ranking ever, by far.
With an election looming these numbers should remove any lingering doubt regarding the Coalition’s incompetence in economic management.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg hailed this week’s growth data with the mix of half-truths and blatant falsehoods we now expect from this Government:
‘With the unemployment rate at its lowest level in seven years … our economic foundations are in good shape’
Again, quite false. Australia’s jobless rate is at 5.02% is the same as it was back in 2011, when the whole world was in the worst global financial crisis in eighty years. Australia’s jobless rate then ranked sixth in the OECD. Now, after five years of strong global recovery, Australia ranks 17th.
GDP per capita shrank in the third quarter and on some forecasts it will shrink again in the fourth quarter — which technically would be a recession of sorts.
The maths is pretty simple.
Australia’s population grows at around 0.4 per cent a quarter (1.6 per cent a year). Quarterly GDP growth of 0.4 per cent delivers no growth on a per capita basis.
Population growth may be terrific for the headline aggregate number, but on an individual household level its impact is diluted by, well, the impact of more people.
The consensus call from market economists is for 0.4 per cent growth in the fourth quarter, although many say it could be worse — or “the risks are on the downside”, as they say — after a spate of soft economic data in recent weeks.
Morrison seems to be on a different page to the experts. In 6 years the managed to double our debt that took almost a Century to build. (ODT)
Low wages growth is undermining financial stability, curtailing economic growth, driving people into dangerous indebtedness, deepening inequality and undermining the Australian social compact built on the principle of a “fair go”.
Economic truth the LNP don’t want you to know and Trump hides wit the help of Murdoch. Our current economic reality and comparitive standing in the world today. Just over 5years ago Wayne Swann and Julia Gillard had us place 2nd today the the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison Government has us 20th telling us how ‘grear‘ that is and all Australians have benefited from their boom time.(ODT)
World’s best economy 2018: Iceland by an Arctic fox’s whisker
IF the Government thinks the nation’s credit card can afford $144 billion in personal income tax cuts and $65 billion in business tax cuts, why can’t it afford:
to raise Newstart and unemployment benefits;
to raise Old Age Pension and Aged Care services;
to properly fund Disability and Carer pension and services;
to increase Public Housing;
to fund more homeless shelters and homeless services;
to give tertiary students a break on HECS;
to make TAFE free;
to fund more domestic violence shelters and family violence services;
to fund more public education;
to fund more public health, particularly in areas of need;
to fund proper Veterans’ services (not just memorials for pollies to prance around on ANZAC day);
to fund more public transport; and
…the list goes on, feel free to add yours in the comments below.I say, if we truly do believe in a fair go in this country and our government wants to screech “class warfare”, well, you don’t need to be ALP or Green, just a decent human being to say:
BRING IT ON!
Economic Facts put Australian History into perspective when LNP want to reward the rich with 12.5 bill in tax cuts (ODT)
In 1989, there was one billionaire. In 2002, it reached ten. There were 29 in 2010. Today, it is 76. In 2017, the wealth of the richest 200 grew by about $50 billion or 21% to $282.7 billion. This 21% growth is ten times the growth of wages.
By contrast, between 1989 and 2016 average weekly wages have grown threefold, or thereabouts, over the same period of time.
It is time for workers to reclaim their unions, and to strike for big wage increases and a fair and just society. That and that alone will wipe the smile off the faces of the rich-listers, and begin the process of redistributing the wealth back to those who create it — workers.
via 2018 AFR Rich List: A sad indictment of Australia’s rampant neoliberalism
Australia ranks 12th in the Open Budget Index, and scores 74, much higher than the global average of 42 and the OECD average of 68. But Australia’s budget could still be more transparent if it included more on the budget’s impact on welfare and tax and by gender.
The Open Budget Index is published every two years and ranks countries using a transparency score, which is based on a survey for each country about publishing of budget documents, budget oversight and public participation.
via New Zealand, US and UK outrank Australia in scores on budget transparency
Drawing on a loose interpretation of international data, Treasurer Mathias Cormann is once again trying to convince us that corporate tax cuts are a path to “jobs and growth”. The reality is that our companies already have plenty of funds to invest – funds they are presently handing back to shareholders and to overpaid corporate executives, writes Ian McAuley.
via Cormann’s Tax Cut Con And The Media (Censoring) And Misreporting It – New Matilda
should the rise in prices be driven mostly by essentials such as utility prices, rents, health and education as has been the case for some years now, this lack of a growth in wage rises will also mean that households will continue to feel the effects of cost of living rises, even as overall inflation remains historically low.
ADF spends over $10 billion on US arms in four years
Posted | Updated
Australia spends more than $10 billion every four years on weapons and military equipment from the United States, with high-tech flying bombs and attack helicopter upgrades among the big-money items.
At a time of record low wage growth, when stressed working families struggle to pay the bills, we hear the same old tune – tax cuts for big business will lead to workers getting pay rises.
But a third of big businesses aren’t paying any tax, big business profits have increased massively, and yet workers’ wages remain at record lows while the casualisation of the workforce is accelerating.
via Trickle-down economics is the only song they know, and we’re sick of hearing it
From rooster to featherduster thank you Tony Abbottfor thr push downhill
via World’s best economies: Congratulations Singapore! Commiserations Australia
Ever thought about throwing it all in, selling up and moving overseas?
Source: What Melbourne’s median house price could buy you around the world
How the worm – and the world – turns. When the Abbott government came to power just four years ago, it claimed its arrival signalled the “end of the age of entitlement”. Don’t laugh, it’s happening – but in the opposite way to what treasurer Joe Hockey had in mind.
How about Rt-Wing Commentators at News Corp for whom reason has been Jettisoned. Andrew Bouldn’t bother to listen to this. ( Old Dog)
Essential finds only 12 per cent of respondents (including 14 per cent of Coalition voters) are “bothered a lot” by “the feeling that some poor people don’t pay their fair share”, whereas 53 per cent (40 per cent of Coalition voters) are bothered a lot by “the feeling that some wealthy people don’t pay their fair share”.
Source: The most arrogant people in Australia are business people and we’re sick of them
August 2017 has been atrocious for the wellbeing of most Australians. Treasurer Scott Morrison and his cabinet colleagues must be jubilant that other calamities are drowning out mainstream media reports on the failing economy.
Source: August economic news: Marvellous for the moguls, miserable for the majority
Surveys show most people say they need a little bit more than their getting for a comfortable life. Trouble is, they say that no matter how much their income rises.
Source: Revealed: the minimum income for a healthy life and how the dole falls way short
So, the Australian Bureau of Statistics told us this week, the rate of unemployment fell a click to 5.6 per cent in July. Trouble is, most people know the official unemployment rate understates the extent of the problem.
Source: The truth of the matter about the extent of our unemployment problem
Inequality is rising but we can learn from an earlier, more egalitarian Australia and reclaim the “fair go”.
Under current government policy we are penalising the sector of the economy where there is the largest proportion of existing employment and the best prospects for future growth.
Source: The government is backing the wrong industries, as our economy changes: Productivity Commission
Inequality in wealth had “become more pronounced in the past few years because of the of the rise in assets prices – people that own those assets have seen their wealth go up,” he said.
Source: Inequality increasing, says Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe
Builders are going broke at an alarming rate. And the nation’s net assets are rapidly diminishing, last week’s construction data from the ABS reveal.
Source: Abbott, Turnbull governments also screwed up the construction economy
Changing the rules on debt loading and adopting an alternative royalty scheme would reap billions in tax revenue
ACTU secretary Sally McManus has a surprising ally in one of the world’s most powerful bankers in her fight against pay cuts
Former prime minister Paul Keating has launched a surprise critique of the liberal economic philosophy he once championed.
Source: Paul Keating says neo-liberalism is at ‘a dead end’ after Sally McManus speech
Late last Friday, Australia’s Treasury quietly released a nifty statistic. It revealed that government gross debt is now $483,080,000,000.00. That’s $483.1
Source: Coalition doubles Labor’s debt – in less than four years | The New Daily
Almost everything the Turnbull Government says about the economy, employment and their priorities is refuted by the evidence.
Source: How the latest job figures expose the Turnbull Government’s lies
Mm, it gets hard… I’ve spent several days trying to reconcile the idea that certain people can both admire a leader like Vlad Putin suggesting that Australia needs a leader like him, while arguing that any attempts to persuade people to vaccinate their children is an attempt to impose a dictatorship and we all should…
The boost to the latest GDP figures has come from commodity prices and is not trickling down into wage rises
The family home has eclipsed superannuation as Australia’s biggest tax break.
Tomoe* flew home to Japan in November after a two-year working holiday in Australia. She had six employers in that time. All bar one of them had either underpaid or not paid her, or had avoided tax and other obligations by paying cash. By Tomoe’s account, a Japanese restaurant in the inner-Sydney suburb of Newtown paid her $12 an hour as a waitress. In cash. No payslip. A cafe in Paddington paid her $19 an hour as a pastry chef. In cash. No payslip. Only Fratelli Paradiso restaurant, in Potts Point, paid Tomoe formally.
I sometimes wonder if the real Malcolm Turnbull was kidnapped and replaced by a doppelganger, so different are his actions as Prime Minister to his words before taking on the role. As we bounce from one outsourcing disaster to the next, it is worth reflecting on what Turnbull himself had to say on outsourcing three…
Source: The false economy of decimating the public service – » The Australian Independent Media Network
As the government scrambles to claw back money from the old, the sick, the pregnant, and the unemployed, they put no such austerity on their own spending. In the 2014 budget from hell, Tony Abbott promised to cut off free flights for about 100 former politicians. But while legislation was passed by the House of…
Source: Stop the waste and we can stop attacking the poor – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Turnbull’s “Jobs and Growth” campaign inspired many in Australia to vote for whom they believed were the better economic managers of our economy. Yet in the first quarter of their second term in office, Australia is showing declining growth in the economy and similar decline in full-time jobs, reports John Haly. The slave trade The…
Source: The myth of jobs growth – » The Australian Independent Media Network
VANGUARD – For an independent Australia and Socialism
Source: Betrayal and collaboration as multinationals plunder natural gas reserves
The annual IAREM has been compiled for 2016. IA’s econometrics specialist Alan Austin reveals the winners and losers.
Source: IAREM 2016: Switzerland and Singapore sail ahead leaving Australia adrift
Economists have begun to view underemployment with alarm, with good reason.
Despite 25 years of uninterrupted economic growth, poverty rates continue to soar, writes Michael Clanchy.
Source: Uninterrupted economic growth: Just don’t mention poverty or welfare
A good chunk of Scott Morrison’s budget problems could have vanished, just as they vanished for Peter Costello during mining boom at the start of the century.
Source: Suddenly coal prices are booming. Will the entire country be next?
The IMF says growth has been too low for too long and benefits have reached too few. But that doesn’t mean we need trade barriers or cuts to immigration
By Christian Marx Australia now has its worst unemployment figures since 1942. Contrary to the official (read bogus) government figures of 6%, our real unemployment rate is 11% and rising. Compounding this, a staggering 19% of the workforce is either unemployed or underemployed. (Roy Morgan, 2016). How did Australia get to this ridiculous situation? Below…
Source: Australia`s unemployment crisis looks to be long-term – » The Australian Independent Media Network
If the Turnbull Government is serious about investing in the nation’s future, it needs to abandon its aversion to historically minor public debt and deficits, writes economist Philip Soos.
Source: Australia’s public debt and deficit panic: Lies, damned lies and statistics
Forget the Turnbull Government’s ‘budget repair’ dogma. The real reason the Coalition is trying to cut the dole is to further undermine job security and the power of workers, writes Owen Bennett. The nature of the Australian labour force has changed drastically in a very short time. In the late 1970s, eight in 10 workersMore
Source: A Casual Killing: How Government And Business Make More Money By Ripping Off Yours – New Matilda
