Because a banker said it, the AFR reckons it must be true! National Australia Bank chief executive Andrew Irvine has warned that the nation has hit “peak Australia” and will not grow unless productivity improves, as data revealed real wages have gone backwards for the first time in two years, intensifying the economic challenge facing
Soaring energy costs have contributed to Australia’s declining manufacturing sector, which is the smallest in the OECD as a share of GDP. Alex Joiner, chief economist at IFM Investors, illustrated the manufacturing sector’s energy problem in the following chart: Natural gas input costs in manufacturing have increased by 186% since 2000, while electricity prices have
In a social media post late last year, Housing Minister Clare O’Neil claimed: “Why is housing so tough right now? Because for 40 years our country hasn’t been building enough homes.” But is that actually true? Today’s Numbers It’s certainly correct that Australia is currently not building enough homes and hasn’t been for quite some
On Wednesday, I wrote an article explaining how both China and India—the world’s largest and third-largest carbon emitters (combined share of 40.1% of global emissions in 2024)—planned to aggressively expand their coal production and generation. China currently produces around 10 times more coal than Australia, and India over two times more: Both nations also import
DXY was strong last night, likely because the situation with Iran is coming to a head. It refuses to break down technically. AUD was quite weak, chasing JPY and CNY. Oil popped with gold. AI metals rose, but there is an almighty peak behind it. Big miners, too. EM stocks are at the highs. Remember,
It’s a lot of motherhood statements so far, but they are good ones, at least. “Tiny” Tim Wilson has given us a sort of philosophy. Mr Wilson flagged plans for a two-tier system of company taxes and regulations that provided a more generous environment for small business owners. “I’m looking exclusively at how it is
I was interviewed via email earlier this week by Harrison Christian, a senior reporter at News.com.au, asking why the US economy is performing so much better than Australia’s. In particular: US real GDP growth is 4.4%, compared with Australia’s 2.1%. US CPI inflation is 2.4% compared with Australia’s 3.8%. The US is still cutting interest
By Salvatore Babones, Associate Professor at Sydney University and author of the book “Australia’s Universities, Can They Reform” Universities Australia (UA) has published its pre-budget submission, and it opens with the claim that its members educate “1.5 million Australians every year”. That is incorrect. They educate roughly 1.5 million people every year—of whom only about
The Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) revised its forecasts on CPI inflation and wage growth in the February Statement of Monetary Policy (SoMP), as summarised below: The key takeaway was that the RBA does not anticipate that real wages will recover over the forward estimates, as illustrated below: By the June quarter of 2028, Australia’s real
The six-month annualized growth rate of the Westpac–Melbourne Institute Leading Index, which shows how much economic activity is expected to change in relation to trend three to nine months from now, went down from +0.44% in December to +0.02% in January. Westpac argues, as I do, that the most recent data shows that the momentum