Rudd Rhetoric Shift: Recession Fears

[Jovial_Monk]

He can only cut company tax by raising income tax (not likely) or the GST (much more likely) and giving the rich huge tax cuts and the poor to moderately well off pretty much fuck all, The reason? Company tax makes up a large part of the total tax take. Unincorporated businesses will not get the tax cut. Then the smaller businesses will get hit by big companies passing on the PPL levy—business loans will get 10 basis points dearer, for example. The PPL will dwarf the Carbon Price.

If he wants to stimulate the economy—increase NewStart, pensions and the Tax Free Threshold—the people who receive these have little choice but to spend the extra money.

The previous Liberal govt created a huge mess, feeding a credit–fuelled boom that has left us in the present situation. There are still tens of billions of dollars of Howard misspending to take out the Budget and the private sector is still trying to repair balance sheets shattered by the ending of the boom. Then there is all the infrastructure still needing to be built, upgraded and repaired—another Howard/Costello mess.

Every attempt by Swan and now Bowen to cut this gross waste from the Budget is met by ferocious opposition from the idiotic Libs—good luck them getting to a surplus.

The PPL is particularly vicious—working and middleclass women paying towards high flying women to pop out a brat and sit on their arse for six months—then finding there is no childcare and the high flyer will find it hard to resume work. This suits extreme Catholic Abbott to a ‘T.’

Abbott is clueless on economics and is less likely than Rudd to listen to Treasury. Abbott’s team is the most hopeless bunch of deadwood ever gathered together in Parliament. I point to: Bronwyn Bishop, aged, senile but on the front bench! My god! Dutton—won’t see the shadow spokeperson on Health—no questions asked in his portfolios, no policy work done either! And so it goes. Kevin Andrews, past it at the time of Howard and Costello!

[IQS.RLOW]

Monk proves again he knows sweet fuck all about the tax system or economics.

[mantra]

Abbott is clueless on economics and is less likely than Rudd to listen to Treasury. Abbott’s team is the most hopeless bunch of deadwood ever gathered together in Parliament. I point to: Bronwyn Bishop, aged, senile but on the front bench! My god! Dutton—won’t see the shadow spokeperson on Health—no questions asked in his portfolios, no policy work done either! And so it goes. Kevin Andrews, past it at the time of Howard and Costello!

Many of them are deadwood and burnt out under their last stint in Government, but some of the government's current cabinet haven't any common or business sense. Rudd doesn't have to worry about his financial security - he's got a wife who's worth millions and even if he loses the election and leaves politics - he's set for life.

I'm scared for Australia and I'm scared for my children. They're doing it tough as are their peers - the labour market is hard and impersonal now and there is no security. There isn't a bright future for Gen Y and Z and we can thank our short sighted and selfish governments for that. With each passing year - their "on the run" policies are becoming worse and it's been the same for the last couple of decades.

[IQS.RLOW]

If you want security for your children Mantra, you will need to vote for the coalition and put the Greens and ALP last.

[mantra]

If you want security for your children Mantra, you will need to vote for the coalition and put the Greens and ALP last.

Is the Coalition going to stop outsourcing? If the basic wage is lowered which has been intimated by the opposition - how will that help those who are trying to survive on a pittance already. Much of our labour force is casualised and few of them get 40 hours a week. They are blessed if they get 20 hours. Those in permanent work are barely hanging on by their fingernails.

When Abbott gets in - he will no doubt reduce the public service - who are very well paid, but that will come at a huge cost - not only in termination payments, but they will add to the burgeoning unemployment figures.

[Jovial_Monk]

When Abbott gets in WorkChoices will come back. Poor people will get hit by higher taxes and charges and the share of the top 1% will zoom. Their austerity will crash the economy into recession. Our dollar will fall too far meaning inflation and interest rates go up.

We need deficit Budgets for a while yet and with China slowing we need countercyclical spending—TONS of infrastructure neglected by Howard & Costello to spend it on, reducing business costs and increasing productivity.

[kevin457]

Slowdown cuts interest rates to record low

by: David Uren, Economics Editor
From: The Australian
August 07, 2013 12:00AM

LABOR has been forced to defend its stewardship of the economy after the Reserve Bank said weak growth was behind its decision to cut interest rates to their lowest level on record.

Delivering the Reserve Bank's first mid-election campaign rate cut, governor Glenn Stevens said the nation's economy had been growing more slowly than its long-term trend rate over the past year. "This is expected to continue in the near term as the economy adjusts to lower levels of mining investment. The unemployment rate has edged higher," he said.

It just keeps getting better and better.

[IQS.RLOW]

https://theconversation.com/be-prepared ... ions-16778" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

The average standard variable home loans rate in the Howard era was 7.24% compared to 7.29% over the past six years. On average, much of a muchness. Small business has paid more, on average, for overdraft facilities in the Rudd-Gillard era (10.08% v 8.87%) and letting your credit card max out has been a lot more expensive over the past six years (19.26% v 16.27%).

[IQS.RLOW]

He can only cut company tax by raising income tax (not likely) or the GST (much more likely) and giving the rich huge tax cuts and the poor to moderately well off pretty much fuck all,

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That is a bit strange that argument. Right up until last year cutting corporate income tax rates was Labor party policy. It was announced and budgeted in the 2010 budget.

The Government’s tax plan will promote growth across the entire economy. Independent modelling of the plan indicates that it will deliver a reform dividend of a 0.7 per cent increase in GDP long run, which can, over time, be expected to flow through into taxation revenue.

The reduction in the company tax rate is expected to increase GDP by 0.4 per cent in the long run with a further 0.3 per cent increase from the resource tax reforms.

This growth will also include a $94 million increase in GST collections which will flow through to payments to the States and Territories.

[kevin457]

And who's to blame?

Well, senior Labor figures blame their unions, and unions are blaming senior Labor figures.

Unions risk killing mining investment, warn Labor's Martin Ferguson and Simon Crean

by: Ben Packham
From: The Australian
July 02, 2012 4:52PM

TWO of Labor's most senior ministers have accused the current generation of union leaders of ignoring the national interest, saying exorbitant greenfield wage claims risk killing off a massive pipeline of resources investment.

Resources Minister Martin Ferguson and Regional Development Minister Simon Crean - both former ACTU leaders - urged unions to consider the nation's long-term productivity capacity, as they had done when negotiating the 1980s Prices and Incomes Accord.

Mr Ferguson said unions were forcing “unsustainable” deals that risked harming the nation's competitiveness.

“I think there is a message to all of us including some elements of the union movement - if we're not very careful, current members will do exceptionally well, but future members in 10 to 20 years' time will miss out,” he said.

Mr Ferguson said as a union leader he had tried to look at the bigger picture.

“As president of the ACTU I found it as part of my responsibilities to actually chase investment in Australia,” he said.

“We were actually looking to the long haul.”

Mr Crean, a former ACTU vice-president, said unions had to play a broader role in improving the nation's competitiveness.

“When the accord years came along, the fundamental change in that was recognising that wage increases could only be paid through strengthening the productive capacity of the nation - in other words wealth creation - and we had to play our role in wealth creation,” he said.

“Our ability to finish the job with superannuation exists in this growth environment.”

Under current workplace laws, which are under review, unions have the ability to strike lucrative deals with resource companies before projects get underway.

Mr Ferguson said Australia's challenge into the future would be in competing with other commodities giants on the cost of getting resources out of the ground.

“If we are not conscious of the cost of delivering projects in Australia, compared to for example the Gulf, or Indonesian waters......then those further expansion opportunities will disappear,” he said.

“The workers involved in the projects might think they're smart now.

“But the pipeline in the future will disappear and more importantly, the pipeline of PRRT (Petroleum Resource Rent Tax) benefits to the whole Australian community will disappear for decades and decades to come. So that means all of us will lose and Australia as a nation will lose.”

Research by the Australian Mines and Metals Association, obtained by The Australian, found a significant deterioration in the nation's workplace relations climate, with one in five new resources projects stalled because unions are refusing to strike workplace agreements.

The survey found that it is taking longer to strike so-called greenfield agreements which outline working conditions on new projects before workers are hired than other workplace deals in 40 per cent of cases.

Australian Workers Union national secretary Paul Howes, whose union is heavily involved in greenfield agreements, said the high wage outcomes being secured were the result of short labour supply.

He said Australia's industrial relations system had been radically transformed since the accord, which was only possible because of centralised wage fixing, which Mr Ferguson and Mr Crean had helped to dismantle.

“When we moved away from centralised wage fixing it became a supply and demand equation,” Mr Howes said.

“When supply is tight, wage outcomes are good. And the converse is true. I didn't create this system, unlike Martin and Simon. But that's the pitfall of it.”

He rejected Mr Ferguson's view that wage outcomes were unsustainable.

“I've yet to see an agreement signed when the employer didn't have the capacity to pay,” he said.

_______________

On another matter, it seems others are noticing our ABS's rubber unemployment figures in comparison to Roy Morgans.

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2013/08 ... ses-again/

Together Labor and the Greens (GALP) appear to have put our mining industry into recession.

This comes with Kevin Rudds renewed interests in striking another power-share deal with the Greens this coming election.