Melanie Macfarlane, founding member of the International Student Education Agents Association and member of the Migration Institute of Australia, has penned an article highlighting how the international education industry is the key feeder of the ‘Big Australia’ mass immigration policy. Macfarlane explicitly admits that Australia’s international education industry has only grown so big because studying
The commodity boom continues to rain riches down on Australia with Australia’s trade surplus soaring to a new record high $10.1 billion after increasing by $3.0 billion in January, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The increase in Australia’s trade surplus was driven by a strong lift in exports, which rose $2.3 billion in
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The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released retail sales data for January, with sales turnover rising 0.5% month-on-month to be up 10.6% compared with January 2020. The next chart shows the strong rebound after April’s record 17.7% monthly decline caused by the national coronavirus lockdown: Food retailing (+1.6%) and Other retailing (+1.4%) drove the
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MB Fund’s Chief Economist Leith van Onselen, Head of Investments Damien Klassen, Head of Advice Tim Fuller and Economist Dr Cameron Murray discuss the drivers behind Australian Housing’s recent upwards roar. You can find Cameron at Fresh Economic Thinking On the agenda: Strongest growth in property prices since 2003 Mortgage & Auction markets are booming
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Some interesting tweets from various financial mavericks overnight on the ongoing gold versus Bitcoin debate. Pater Schiff versus Mark Cuban: Congratulations to those who bought Bitcoin early, pumped up the price, and who’ve been dumping into the hype. You succeeded in getting Wall Street to buy into the mania. When I first learned about #Bitcoin
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Around $27 billion was spent on Australia’s aged care system in the 2018-19 financial year, of which the federal government contributed around $20 billion. Economists warn that implementing the minimum recommendations of the aged-care royal commission would require annual expenditure on the sector to be increased by up to $9 billion. However, this could rise
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Yesterday’s national accounts data for the December quarter showed that that household spending rose by 4.3% in the December quarter, with household consumption accounting for 2.3% of the nation’s 3.1% growth in GDP. The economy’s rebound from the COVID-induced recession is proving to be a boon for listed retailers, with many enjoying strong growth in
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Key points from the UK’s COVID Symptom Study: No vaccines contain COVID-19. Pfizer better than AZ in infection risk reduction after one shot but both good: 90% reduction in hospitalisations. “Definite immunity” still a work in progress. Variants are “clobbered” by the second dose of vaccines. South African version definitely and probably Brazilian. Single-dose still
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Yesterday’s national accounts release from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed that households continue to accumulate an immense savings war chest on the back of record government stimulus. While the household savings rate fell to 12.0% from a record 22.0% in the June quarter of 2020, it remained at elevated levels, as illustrated in
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At various times over the past 20 years we witnessed desperate home buyers camp-out at developers’ offices to secure new land releases. Former home builder and MP, Bob Day, explained this phenomenon in his maiden Parliamentary speech in 2014: “To buy a block of land on which to build their first home, young couples are
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