Australia’s Economy is a House of Cards

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By Matt Bar­rie & Craig Tin­dale.

I recent­ly watched the fed­er­al trea­sur­er, Scott Mor­ri­son, proud­ly pro­claim that Aus­tralia was in “sur­pris­ing­ly good shape”. Indeed, Aus­tralia has just snatched the world record from the Nether­lands, achiev­ing its 104th quar­ter of growth with­out a reces­sion, mak­ing this achieve­ment the longest streak for any OECD coun­try since 1970.

Aus­tralian GDP growth has been trend­ing down for over forty years
Source: 
Trad­ing Eco­nom­ics, ABS

I was pret­ty shocked at the com­pla­cen­cy, because after twen­ty six years of eco­nom­ic expan­sion, the coun­try has very lit­tle to show for it.

$1700 raised for Standish-Minsky so far

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Thanks to all those who have chipped in to help keep Rus­sell Stan­dish avail­able for cod­ing Min­sky. The prover­bial per­son with deep pock­ets has­n’t yet mate­ri­al­ized, but about 25 peo­ple with shal­low­er ones but gen­er­ous souls have chipped in a total of just under $2000.

Keep Rus­sell Stan­dish on the Min­sky Project
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Deflated changes in Wages and Debt: 7.30 Report Data

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Tables like the ones below take my breath away when I see them for the first time–because the sto­ry they tell is worse than any I would have dared make up. As I not­ed in the inter­view with Ker­ry O’Brien on the 7.30 Report, real wages have increased since 1990, and since Aus­trali­a’s last elec­tion in late 2004. How­ev­er, mort­gage debt has increased by far more.