The Albanese government’s fairy-tale target of building 1.2 million homes over five years, or 60,000 homes per quarter, keeps getting crushed. Dwelling approvals data for March, released on Thursday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), revealed that dwelling approvals fell by another 1.1% in March in trend terms to their lowest monthly level since
The Queensland Government has announced a $1000 energy bill discount under a $2.5 billion government package to ease the cost of living relief. Premier Steven Miles said it was the biggest contribution a state has ever made to help households with their energy bills. The rebate will apply to bills from July, with many Queenslanders
Australian gas producers are calling for an immediate policy reset due to Labor’s market interventions and regulatory uncertainties, which are undermining investor confidence and delaying new supplies. They are also calling for the Energy Minister to support further gas investment and boost supplies via the north-south pipeline, despite the possibility of extending the mandatory gas
I argued last week that Australia’s universities had turned into greedy profit-maximising corporations. To cut a long story short, the federal government and Australian universities devised a framework to encourage huge volumes of full fee paying overseas students by: The Australian government offered the carrot of generous student visa work opportunities and permanent residency chances.
The situation facing working Australian households is bleak. Australian real per capita household incomes collapsed by 6.0% in 2023, the sharpest decline in the world: The world’s sharpest increase in mortgage and tax payments was the primary cause of this decline in Australian household incomes: Tenant households across the major Australian capital cities are also
Since the pandemic started, Australia’s rents have experienced extreme growth as a result of record net overseas migration. The surge in rents has pushed PropTrack’s rental affordability index to a record low: It has also pushed the share of household income spent on renting to a record high of 32.2%: Recent research from the Australian
Victoria, Australia’s most indebted state, is projected to have $247.2 billion of debt by 2027, up from $55.2 billion in 2019: The state’s poor budgetary position is attributed to wasteful “Big Build” infrastructure projects, such as the North-East Link and the Suburban Rail Loop, alongside excessive spending on bureaucrats. Victoria’s public sector has grown by
You will struggle to find a more China-biased bank than HSBC, but here is its wrap of the Politburo meeting. Facts The April Politburo concluded on 30 April, with policymakers agreeing to hold the Third Plenum of the 20th NPC in July. The Third Plenum typically sets longer-term economic policy. The tone around the economy
Anxiety and fear over what could or could not happen at last night’s FOMC meeting was met with relief as the Fed didn’t really change signalling on its interest rate trajectory. Bond markets pulled back slightly and the USD also gave up a lot of its recent gains in the aftermath, helped by the lack
If Liberal Party senator Andrew Bragg had his way, he would pump the biggest housing bubble in history. Bragg has already lobbied for Australians to use their super to buy a home while still working rather than waiting until they reach the super preservation age to pay off a mortgage. Bragg also suggested that people