Very sad, really. It's not that bad in California, yet. Even this state has a lot problems, unless you are millionaire CA is not a good place to live.
Opinion The biggest political lie no one will admit at this election Amid the deluge of claimed political porkies, neither Anthony Albanese nor Peter Dutton is prepared to tell the truth about how to revive living standards. Michael Stutchbury Editor-at-large Apr 22, 2025 “Australia, we have a liar in the Lodge,” declared deputy Liberal leader Sussan Ley in her warm-up to Peter Dutton at the party’s election campaign launch. Evidently, an opposition leader can brand the prime minister, in this case Anthony Albanese, a “liar”. Labor can go on and on about Dutton’s “lies”. Yet amid the alliteration of political porkies, neither side wants to canvas its role in Australia’s cost-of-living squeeze. And they won’t fess up to the fix. Peter Dutton offers “aspirational” hopes to index the personal index scales for inflation, yet promises a tax rebate that would erode work incentives and the fiscal bottom line. James Brickwood The Coalition’s liar in the Lodge drumbeat ratcheted up in early 2024 after Albanese broke his election promise not to tinker with its aspirational stage three tax cuts. Such a charge would have been notorious once, like in 1971 when The Australian’s Alan Ramsay called out “you liar” from the old Parliament House press gallery to John Gorton on the floor of the house below. A quick abject apology to the PM averted the journalist’s arrest by the sergeant-at-arms. Language still ruled unsayable in parliament is now normalised outside it – and protected from defamation lawsuits by the High Court’s implied freedom of political speech. If politicians are telling more deliberate falsehoods, could calling a spade a spade be a refreshing repudiation of the bourgeois fetish for “my word is my bond” respectability? Truth is relative, right? Yet, in a world of social media influencers, fake news, Donald Trump and cultural tribalism, it’s more about assassinating political opponents’ character than the merits of their arguments. Julia Gillard was branded a “Juliar” witch after arguably breaking her 2010 election pledge that there would be no carbon tax under any government she led. Labor returned fire on Scott Morrison, whom Jim Chalmers called a “pathological liar”. It used question time to read out leaked Barnaby Joyce texts that called the PM a “hypocrite and a liar” before being cut off by the speaker for using unparliamentary language. Now the Liberal and National campaign puts out an overblown “Albanese live lie tracker” with all-caps headlines such as “56 LIES IN 21 DAYS”. On the other side, Chalmers provided a brief monologue for the evening television news just before joining Australia’s financial regulators to discuss the April 2 Trump tariff madness. “It was Liberal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg who agreed to pump up overall demand during the pandemic with unprecedented slabs of borrowed money.” The message was dominated by “Peter Dutton’s lies”: “Peter Dutton has told a series of egregious lies”; “Peter Dutton’s lies about the budget and the economy are bordering on pathological”; “most egregiously is he lied last night, and he lied again today”; “Peter Dutton has lied about that once again”; and, “he’s been lying in egregious ways”. All this 24/7 news cycle talk devalues the currency of political perjury, confuses voters about who is telling the truth, frustrates centre-ground policy compromise and weakens trust in democracy. Albanese did fall off the back of the stage. Chalmers’ claim to have “almost halved” the budget deficit is misleading at best. Many in Labor do want to wind back negative gearing for housing investors, but so did Morrison. Dutton has backed a Medicare co-payment. But so did Bob Hawke’s left-wing Health Minister Brian Howe. And Dutton offers “aspirational” hopes to index the personal index scales for inflation while promising a tax rebate that would erode work incentives and the fiscal bottom line. At least he concedes the need for structural tax reform. Behind all the normalised political insults sits the big fat lie of the 2025 cost-of-living election. As Treasury secretary Steven Kennedy says, it was Liberal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg who agreed to pump up overall demand during the pandemic with unprecedented slabs of borrowed money. Egged on by Chalmers, it was a deliberate, opportunistic strategy to cut the jobless rate to 50-year lows. But the excess demand behind what Kennedy celebrates as full employment spilled over the economy’s disrupted supply lines to generate the highest price inflation in three decades, smashing Labor’s 2022 promises to boost living standards. In effect, the costs of the pandemic shutdowns were spread widely rather than concentrated in unemployment for 10 per cent or so of voters. But the fairer economic result has not been popular. Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe became the fall guy. As his successor Michele Bullock notes, there is no constituency for the unemployed who never appeared. As a commodity-producing and energy-exporting economy, Australia got the extra cushion of an export and tax revenue boom from the Ukraine war, which produced Chalmers’ two temporary budget surpluses along with more inflation, higher interest rates and a structurally bigger government. “Albanese insists that Australia’s high-cost economy can readily sustain further regulated wage increases even while it is becoming less productive.” With both sides swapping insults, they now both pretend to provide costless cost-of-living relief while putting voters deeper into debt. They won’t say that Australia’s resources wealth has underwritten a complacent entitlement culture that Labor feeds and that the Coalition is too timid or powerless to resist. They won’t admit that unpopular budget spending cuts will be needed to wind back the projected decade of deficits. Nor that defending Australia from China and Russia means that baked-in expectations of more universal social services can’t be met. Nor that genuine tax reform – including a shift from income to consumption along with a lower company rate – is needed to reduce the tax system’s drag on economic growth. They won’t admit that the costs of decarbonising a fossil fuel economy will inevitably show up in energy bills. Albanese insists that Australia’s high-cost economy can readily sustain further regulated wage increases even while it is becoming less productive. The Coalition has done little to suggest otherwise. Is there a bigger political lie than all this?
Its the same everywhere in the West. Voting is a waste of time until an economic collapse comes. Then the progressives will come or even worse a French Revolution like Reign of Terror will come.
Bloomberg has a few interesting articles and a podcast on the housing crunch and upcoming election. The podcast interviewing experts sounded like Vancouver’s or Toronto’s housing struggles in their popular cities.
‘Liar, liar’: PM, Dutton in bitter row over campaign truths in third debate Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton have engaged in a tense exchange over claims of lying and abuse, with the PM describing his rival as desperate and the Opposition Leader accusing his opponent of not being able to ‘lie straight in bed’.
https://archive.is/C4uPb Exclusive ‘Pro-aspiration’ PM shies away from new taxes on investors, super Phillip Coorey Political editor Apr 25, 2025 Anthony Albanese has ruled out restricting negative gearing to help fix Australia’s housing crisis, not only because of his concern that it could limit the supply of rental properties but also because it would signal to voters that Labor is anti-aspiration. In an interview with The Australian Financial Review ahead of the May 3 election, Albanese also downplayed the prospect of further changes to superannuation tax concessions or attempting a rebirth of Labor’s failed franking credits policy as part of the search for revenue to repair the budget. ................ The bottom line, Australian politicians have nothing! Nothing about making Australia more prosperous. Just some yabber about childcare, cheaper petrol, superannuation.....
We heard from the politicians; now economists offer their housing fix Nick LenaghanProperty editor Apr 25, 2025 – 6.12pm https://www.afr.com/property/reside...mists-offer-their-housing-fix-20250425-p5lu7b Removing stamp duty, ramping up modular home construction, clearing the way for foreign tradies, cutting excessive taxes for developers and building regional infrastructure would help deliver the much-needed supply of new homes, say economists and analysts. These are among an array of suggestions from economists and analysts polled in The Australian Financial Review’s latest quarterly property survey, following the major parties’ launch of their signature election policies, including for housing. Boosting the supply of new homes is key to making housing more accessible. Justin McManus Those policies lean heavily on the demand side – Dutton’s mortgage deductibility policy and Labor’s 5 per cent home deposit policy – drawing criticism that such initiatives would drive prices higher, making Australia’s housing affordability problems worse. Instead, the federal government should direct whatever powers and incentives it can muster to encourage new supply rather than stoking buyer demand, survey respondents said. The next federal government should “move in the opposite direction to the current federal policy thrust”, said Maree Kilroy, senior economist at Oxford Economics Australia. “Dial back existing support and concessions and use the receipts of this to fund investment that opens up developable land and drives increased competition from developers,” she said. As well, Canberra should incentivise state and local government planning to meet peak new housing demand rather than average demand. It should also encourage state governments towards more efficient taxation and infrastructure funding models that “dial back upfront costs for new housing”, she said. Planning and zoning constraints Canberra’s limited capacity to directly affect supply, rather than demand, was widely noted by respondents. It is state and local governments which have the most control over planning and zoning constraints that often restrict housing supply, they noted. “However, they do have much greater budgetary capacity than other levels of government and should use this to incentivise state governments to transition from stamp duty regime to a broad-based land tax,” said Knight Frank chief economist Ben Burston. “Stamp duty is a damaging form of taxation which discourages people at all stages of life from moving house.” Nicola Powell, Domain chief of research and economics, said the next federal government could mitigate the overall tax burden of residential development by deploying the lever of GST, exempting house construction from that impost. “New housing is one of the most highly taxed and regulated sectors in the economy, with taxes making 20 per cent to 40 per cent of the cost of every new home built. This considerable tax burden discourages construction, leading to fewer new homes, increased rents, and a decline in homeownership,” she said. Such initiatives could be tackled at a housing summit, convened by the next federal government with the states, to coordinate the phasing out of stamp duty nationally and its replacement with a land tax, said SQM Research founder Louis Christopher. A phase-out of negative gearing over the medium term on existing dwellings – while retained for new dwellings - should also be on the agenda, along with a significant reduction in construction levies and an increased oversight of the building industry “in order to improve buyer confidence in the construction sector”, Christopher said. Proptrack’s executive manager for economic research, Angus Moore, also highlighted the role Canberra could play in managing a transition from stamp duty. “This would help remove a key barrier against people moving home and encourage better utilisation of the houses we already have. Given how significant stamp duty revenue is for the states, federal support is likely necessary to make the transition,” he said. The federal government has a critical role to play through infrastructure investment as well, according to Benjamin Martin-Henry, MSCI’s Pacific research chief. “One of the most effective ways to address housing supply is by unlocking more land in regional areas – but that only works if we invest in the infrastructure to connect people to jobs,” he said. ‘It’s not just about building homes’ “A transformative policy would be committing to high-speed rail between major cities and regional centres. If people can get from places like Newcastle, Wollongong, or the Central Coast to Sydney in under an hour, we instantly expand the feasible housing footprint. It’s not just about building homes – it’s about building access, opportunity, and long-term resilience into our cities.” Survey respondents flagged initiatives to accelerate the construction process itself, not least by boosting the supply of qualified tradies, including from overseas. “Streamlined visa processes for in-demand construction trades could help attract the necessary talent, ensuring that projects are completed on time and on budget,” Domain’s Powell said. Innovation in construction methods – through artificial intelligence, robotics, and prefabrication – is also critical to boosting housing supply, said respondents, including Powell and Ray White chief economist Nerida Conisbee. “Implementation should encourage modular construction methods, less customisation of homes, and alternative building materials to increase efficiency,” Conisbee said. “Additionally, policy should incentivise higher-density development that better aligns with changing household demographics, particularly the growing number of single-person households.” Conisbee also called out the need for foreign capital to help fund the target of 1.2 million over the five years set by federal Labor. “Foreign investment, though politically unpopular, needs serious reconsideration given its critical role in funding end-product purchases,” she said. “The last time Australia came close to delivering 1.2 million homes in five years coincided with record levels of foreign investment, suggesting current targets remain unrealistic without similar capital flows.” Australian National University associate professor Ben Phillips agreed that most levers to boost supply were at the state and local level, while the federal government could help with financial incentives. Jarden chief economist Micaela Fuchila. Louie Douvis “However, ultimately, it’s been the case for decades that the main delivery of new housing stock will be the private sector and for that to happen you need a private sector that is confident in the economy, and perhaps ironically a strong outlook for residential property, which unfortunately translates into higher house prices. “Expectations of house price falls and a weak property market won’t get builders and developers over the line on new developments.” Economists and property market analysts tipped a median price rise of around 5 per cent nationally this calendar year. Stronger demand, fuelled by falling interest rates, would be blunted by the relative unaffordability of homes after several years of strong growth, they said. “Easier monetary policy is the main factor driving price growth in our view – we expect three cuts this year – along with the ongoing mismatch between high demand and low supply,” said Jarden chief economist Micaela Fuchila. Another mitigating factor, noted by several respondents, was the flow-on into household confidence from uncertainty in global markets disrupted by trade wars. “Trump’s tariff shock also risks constraining buyers and so poses a near-term threat of a reversal in prices,” said AMP chief economist Shane Oliver. “We see home prices rising around 3 per cent in 2025. Lower rates and even more generous measures for first home buyers regardless of who wins the federal election should start to drive a more decisive upswing in prices from later this year.”
A tale of two porkies: Why cash splashes won’t save politicians this time around Shane Wright Senior economics correspondent April 27, 2025 It was US Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart who coined the term “I know it when I see it”. In that particular instance, Stewart was ruling on the difference between pornography and art. But I reckon the good judge would struggle to discern the distinctions between bribes, pork barrelling and “rewarding a hardworking community” – all three of which are dominating the federal election campaign (and also dominated the 2022 election). Opposition Leader Peter Dutton and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese.Credit: James Brickwood, Alex Ellinghausen Let’s put it this way: should candidates for federal office be promising money to projects such as a community garden ($165,000 on offer from the Liberal Party for the seat of Eden-Monaro) or a community playground in outer-suburban Perth ($67,000 from Labor in the newly created seat of Bullwinkel)? That $67,000 commitment seems a steal when compared to the $1 million playground upgrade the LNP is promising on the Cairns foreshore, which just happens to be in the marginal seat of Leichhardt. But why stop at $1 million for a new swing set? How about $5 million for some basketball courts in Tasmania, which you can then link to the property market, as shadow treasurer Angus Taylor did. “If you want more housing supply, you’ve got to have the infrastructure being built alongside it. Transport infrastructure, community infrastructure, sporting infrastructure,” he claimed, while standing in the marginal Liberal-held seat of Bass. Meanwhile, Labor is promising $750,000 for a skate park in the seat of Bendigo, $744,000 for the Kokoda Memorial Walking Track in the Sydney electorate of Reid, and $10 million for some new traffic lights in the Melbourne seat of Aston. What a coincidence, Deidre Chambers – all three of those electorates currently have ALP local members. And the National Party, which has a long and rich history of finding ways to throw money at regional communities, has gone on a binge with promises that include roofing livestock sale yards, renovating an old railway trestle bridge, and committing $21,295 for a machine that flings clay targets into the air for trap shooters. Before the 2007 election, then-Labor leader Kevin Rudd declared that “this sort of reckless spending must stop”. In the 18 years since, not only has it not slowed down, the accelerator has been pumped. In fact, it’s accelerated into areas well beyond the normal remits of a federal government. At the 2022 election, for example, Labor promised two dog parks while the Coalition promised one. All three were earmarked for marginal electorates. Ultimately, those dog parks, playgrounds and trap-flinging machines – and all the other election commitments that get over the line – will be paid for with our taxes. And in the 2023-24 financial year, taxes collected by federal, state and local governments reached a record 30 per cent of GDP – or a lazy $801 billion. It’s not just the major parties, though. The Greens have a swag of redistributive tax policies that would “raise” hundreds of billions of dollars in extra revenue, but they’ve no idea how these would interact with each other, nor how they would affect the economy. On the far right, Clive Palmer reckons he can build fast train lines from the CBDs of major capital cities to satellite cities, halve the cost of housing construction, and forgive all university and TAFE debts. Not one mention of how to pay for it. Pauline Hanson, as part of her plan to “make Australia great”, wants to axe excise on alcohol and “abolish, cut, kill” the Department of Climate Change as part of her plan to save $90 billion in what she claims is duplication and waste across the public sector. It’s Elon Musk without the trip to Mars. What’s clearly missing from all this blatant pork barrelling is a simple equation. If both sides of politics focused on ideas that would enable the economy to grow faster, that helped our society as a whole become richer, there would be more cash available to community groups to buy what they want, rather than relying on taxpayers to foot the bill. But putting in place the policies that would give us that stronger economy – even if there is pain for some – is a much harder sell than just standing on a netball court or next to some goal posts with a promise of “vote for us and this is what you’ll get”. It doesn’t require the mental bandwidth to explain the trade-offs between relative policy positions. Maybe it’s partly due to how society has evolved and the increasing complexity of the issues we’re facing. John Curtin and Robert Menzies faced a binary world, where the economic ground rules were largely agreed upon. That evolved under Bob Hawke and then John Howard, who rode waves of economic reform, the rise of the Baby Boomers (a demographic tsunami), and the emergence of China, which underpinned their approach to governing and budgeting. But the world handed to Rudd, Julia Gillard, Tony Abbott, Malcolm Turnbull, Scott Morrison and now Anthony Albanese has many more problems – relating to climate change and demographics – where solutions may require huge changes to long-standing traditions. The lingering mess of the Global Financial Crisis, the mass retirement of Boomers, changes in the media landscape and greater understanding of climate change have weighed on the past 15 years. That, however, is not an excuse for Labor and the Coalition to try to buy our votes with ideas seemingly taken from a local council meeting of angry ratepayers instead of selling difficult but desperately needed reform. Justice Stewart was right to say pornography, or art, was in the eye of the beholder. In the case of Australian election campaigns, what’s on offer would make an OnlyFans star blush. Shane Wright is a senior economics correspondent for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald.