Blogotariat

Census data to be released Tuesday shows Australia changing rapidly before COVID, gaining an extra one million residents from overseas in the past five years, almost all of them in the three years before borders were closed.

For the first time since the question has been asked in the census, more than half of Australia’s residents (51.5%) report being either born overseas or having an overseas-born parent.

More than one quarter of the one million new arrivals have come from India or Nepal.

By lifting its cash rate by 0.5 points, from 0.35% to 0.85%, the Reserve Bank has added about another $120 per month in payments for a A$500,000 mortgage.

If financial markets are to be believed, by the end of this year it will have added a total of $800 per month – and, by the end of next year, a total approaching $1,000 per month.

The Victorian Labor government has done some fantastic work, but principles have to count for something.

Just for the record, I canceled my membership to the Victorian Labor Party on the 13th May.

Those of you who know me well will know that this hasn’t been a decision I’ve taken lightly, however under the circumstances, it’s a decision that was easy to make.

Stand by for something “reckless and dangerous”.

That’s what former prime minister Scott Morrison said Prime Minister Anthony Albanese would be if he asked the Fair Work Commission to grant a wage rise big enough to cover inflation. It would make Albanese a “loose unit” on the economy.

The last week of campaigns used to be frantic, behind the scenes. In public, right up until the final week, the leaders would make all sorts of promises, many of them expensive, with nary a mention of the spending cuts or tax increases that would be needed to pay for them.

One of the stranger things about the Reserve Bank’s announcement of why it’s lifting interest rates by 0.25 percentage points is that it suggests inflation will come down by itself.

“A further rise in inflation is expected in the near term,” the RBA says, “but as supply-side disruptions are resolved, inflation is expected to decline back towards the target range of 2-3%.