Missed this earlier in the week. In defiance of Treasury and the RBA, the alternative economic eggheads at the Melbourne Institute have stuck with their forecasts of zombie growth for the Australian economy over the next year:
We expect 0.6 per cent for December, and 0.5 and 0.7 per cent growth in real GDP for the March, June and September quarters. This translates into year-on-year growth of 2.3 for December 2011 and 3.4, 2.7 and 2.5 per cent for the March, June and September quarters.
Interestingly, despite this, they see the unemployment rate remaining at 5.3% through the first half of the year and no need for imminent further rate cuts. My own view of course is that unemployment is going up faster than that and rate cuts are therefore inevitable, especially so given they’re not going to be passed on in full. Still, despite these differences, the MI eggheads have the feet much closer to the ground than the Canberra Humpties.
