Blogotariat

University of Melbourne associate professor Milad Haghani argues that utes and SUVs should pay higher registration fees to account for the damage they do to roads because of their weight. “Bigger cars mean bigger costs for everyone else – it’s only fair those costs are reflected in how we price their use of public roads”,

The post Electric vehicles must pay higher registration fees appeared first on MacroBusiness.

We are still waiting for the final 2PP figures – they’ve finished in 149 seats and have even started the 2PP count in Bradfield now – but we now have basically all of the two-candidate-preferred figures in. We may not know the final Bradfield outcome, but for the purposes of today’s post it is close enough.

The latest data from the Department of Education shows that there were a record 1,095,298 international students enrolled in Australia at the end of 2024, an annual increase of 13%. There were also a record 571,986 new enrolments at the end of 2024. Julie Hare from The AFR reports that university tuition fees from international

The post Australia becomes dumping ground for international students appeared first on MacroBusiness.

CBA senior economist Stephen Wu created the following chart showing the divergence between various population measures: According to Wu: Next week’s National Accounts release (4/6) will contain an updated estimate of population growth, which is driven by net overseas migration (NOM). The already-released retail trade data show estimates of population growth will be downwardly revised

Westpac is reading the economy right as examines Q1 GDP. Domestic demand is expected to have slowed, lifting only 0.3%qtr in Q1. As growth in new public demand moderates, private demand remains patchy and at this stage, unable to pick up the slack left by the public sector. The impacts of the natural disasters which

The post RBA should have cut 50bps appeared first on MacroBusiness.

Friday night was a mixed one for risk markets and will be compounded again with a lot of weekend news, let alone the big strike on Russia by the Ukrainians, but also Chinese PMI prints and what looks like another round of tariffs from the Trump regime coupled with a lot of whining about China.

The post Macro Morning appeared first on MacroBusiness.

Five years after setting a world first target of 100 per cent net renewables by 2030, South Australia's state Liberals now want to throw 2050 net zero targets out the door.

The Albanese government’s fantastical target to build 1.2 million homes over five years is centred on delivering a boom in high-rise towers. However, the April dwelling approvals data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showed that high-density approvals have collapsed. Overall dwelling approvals fell by 5.7% in April in seasonally adjusted terms, which followed

The post Australia’s hidden high-rise housing crash appeared first on MacroBusiness.

DXY and EUR both look like they are consolidating for more. AUD at bottom of rising channel. Brent will crash Monday after OPEC lifted output again. The child president is making everyone except the US “drill, baby, drill”. Metals no bueno. Miners yuk. EM meh. Junk all good. Yields helping. Stocks on hold. Is the

The post Is the Australian dollar still going to 50 cents? appeared first on MacroBusiness.

Yesterday’s final result in New South Wales was a bit of a surprise, with One Nation closing a primary vote margin of 0.21 quotas. Even after One Nation won another senator in Western Australia on Thursday afternoon, the gain they had made in WA wouldn’t have been another to do the same in NSW.

Antony Green previously produced a table showing how the switch from group voting tickets had meant that nearly all Senate elections resulted in the candidate leading on the primary vote ended up winning. I’ve now extended this table to show the 2025 results.

Cotality (formerly CoreLogic) has published its daily dwelling value index for 31 May, which covers Australia’s five major city housing markets. Dwelling values rose by 0.5% in May at the aggregate 5-city level, with all major markets recording solid increases: Over the May quarter, dwelling values rose by 1.2%, with Brisbane (1.6%) leading the way,

The post Australian housing poised for new price boom appeared first on MacroBusiness.

International Reading: Elon Musk wants to rollout robotaxi in Austin in two weeks – Fortune America has a billionaire problem — we need a wealth tax to fix it – The Hill The Republican budget is an attack on the American economy – Public Notice Tariffs, and Trump’s entire economic agenda, were just thrown into

The post Weekend reading and media appearances appeared first on MacroBusiness.