In last night’s budget reply, Tony Abbott crowed he will “put the house back in order” and that the “budget will be in better hands under a Coalition government than under Labor”. It was a very measured…
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It is not that this budget was a bad one. It’s that, according to most people on both sides of politics, voters aren’t listening anymore. Budget week seemed not a big economic moment, but principally another…
More than a decade ago the federal treasury produced the first Intergenerational Report (IGR), warning of the challenges facing the Australian economy due to demographic change. The IGR warned that the…
With the legislation now through both houses of parliament, The National Disability Insurance Scheme, or DisabilityCare, is law, and will quickly become a defining feature of Australia’s social policy…
It has been pretty difficult to get too excited about the latest budget – it is a lame Swan effort from a dying government. It will mostly be remembered as a monument to fiscal irresponsibility. The budget…
When it comes to welfare spending in the budget, the federal government has given with one hand and taken with another. Funding for support of disability services (NDIS) and schools the (Gonski reforms…
Budget night has come and gone again. For those sad folks (I count myself among them) who follow tax and fiscal policy obsessively, it’s the most glamorous night of the year. But the budget does matter…
Regardless of the result of the next election, the ALP will hold an inquiry into what went wrong. How on earth, they will ask, could a government presiding over low unemployment, low inflation, low levels…
When assessing some of the assumptions underpinning Wayne Swan’s 2013 federal budget, two things spring to mind: the Henry Tax Review and the notorious inaccuracy of forward estimates. History shows it…
As a recent Grattan Institute report showed, Australian governments face a decade of deficits unless governments make tough decisions to both reduce expenditure and increase taxes. How does the 2013-14…
What is almost certainly the Gillard government’s last budget delays the attack on the deficit and concentrates on entrenching “legacy” programs, for which Labor hopes to be remembered. Dealt a difficult…
Australian Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan has handed down his sixth budget, facing an almost impossible task: how to reconcile an enormous revenue shortfall with big spending promises, all while keeping…
How did the Australian economy, which boasts the best performance of the major advanced economies, end up with an estimated budget deficit of A$19 billion this year and an estimated debt of $178 billion…
More than jobs, inflation, security or disputation, the Coalition’s just-released policy on industrial relations claims to be about productivity. The policy is replete with over 30 references to “productivity…
Softening up voters for harsh measures, Julia Gillard observed a fortnight ago that “Tuesday 14 May will be no old-fashioned pre-election budget night”. The budget would not be a “political pamphlet” but…
Few taxes have been as politically fraught as the GST. The deal, brokered by the-then Prime Minister John Howard and the Democrats in 2000, was not only controversial for its political ramifications, but…
Liberal Senator Cory Bernadi has called on the federal Coalition to oppose the referendum to recognise local government in the constitution, which will be held with the September 14 election. Senator Bernadi…
How will we know whether or not Treasurer Wayne Swan’s federal budget is a good one? The popular test used to be pretty simple: deliver jobs for all or face the axe. Even when the old Keynesian-style full-employment…
Tony Abbott’s industrial relations strategy has received a less than rapturous response from both business and trade unions. The Business Council of Australia and the Australian Industry Group have criticised…
The government is facing two options to tackle its budget deficit: significant cuts in government expenditures or increasing taxes to close the gap with spending. Prime Minister Julia Gillard has already…
Welcome to the second in our new series of video collaborations with SBS. In this episode, Dr Rico Merkert, Senior Lecturer in Aviation Management at the University of Sydney, gives his view on the Australian…
Industrial relations is the one area of public policy that traditionally marks a major fault line between the Coalition parties and Labor. It is also one area of policy where neither side finds it easy…
Unions’ power would be curbed under an Abbott government, with more restrictions put on their right of entry to workplaces and a time limit imposed for concluding “greenfield agreements” for new projects…
The debate about long-term public finance and the role of government is one that is most definitely needed. However, there are two aspects to this debate that are often conflated. First, there is the issue…
Property pundits are hoping the Reserve Bank of Australia’s latest cut to interest rates will help stoke the country’s flat property sector into life. But Australia’s housing remains highly over-valued…