By Stephen Saunders
At times, Canberra is another world. From its Press Gallery comes this Financial Review bedtime-story of “best performer” Jim Chalmers with his “disdain for” inequality.
The 28 February AFR gushes for the “smartest person” in the room and his enthralling (who among average Australians even cares?) insider skirmishes with the Reserve Bank.
There are only three lines on Jim’s flaky net-zero made-in-Australia policies. There is next to nothing on the energy cartel, rental crisis, world-level housing un-affordability, insidious tax-creep, and the world-beating reversal in real household-incomes.
There is no concern about the unpopular 1.3 million net-migration in a single term, which thrashed the Rudd Labor record by 70%.
Ironically, The AFR itself recently wondered aloud, does Dr Chalmers even live in the same country as the rest of us? Like, are you better off now than three years ago? Chalmers, in Treasury talking points, would still say yes.
He points to his million jobs (mostly for his million migrants) and five quarters of real wage growth (scarcely denting a long decline).
Also in the 28 February AFR, Jim’s Treasury chief Steven Kennedy rather appears to have a public hissy-fit in case PM Dutton might presume to remove him. Kennedy used to be a psych nurse, but I can’t begin to get my head around his insolence.
The bloke’s earning a million dollars annually. He has cruised with Chalmers for three years, doing Treasury’s inward-looking budget-repair and inflation-fighting.
Yet also, he was the previous Coalition Government’s infrastructure chief. His own department formally recommended paying $30 million for land worth maybe $3 million.
But “surprised and concerned” Kennedy must have wagged school that day. His minister implied similar. Welcome to postmodern accountability.
20% versus the rest
Remember the Coalition’s Robodebt? Labor found a savvy Royal Commissioner to sum up the wickedness, though some miscreants remained (remain) in a sealed section.
After the reprehensible deaths of vulnerable Australians, there’d be retribution, right? As if.
Nothing much has happened to naughty ministers and mandarins. The chief of Albanese’s department collaborated with other chiefs to park “Major General” Kathryn Campbell in a lucrative sinecure. The head of Labor’s corruption commission, we later learned, was an army mate of Campbell’s. Wouldn’t we all love to enjoy this masculinised version of one-way accountability? Like loading the dishwasher, anyway you please.
What’s the thread in the Campbell and Kennedy folktales?
The common interests of Australia’s top 20%—including politicians and public service—override political theatrics. Across party lines, the powerful “stakeholders” can diss voters almost as one voice.
Hence my world-weary axioms for Australian party-politics (a) we’re all neoliberals now, (b) we only have eyes for each other and (c) aren’t voters just about the worst?
According to the latest Australian Population Research Institute survey, voters don’t support the elite or neoliberal agenda, nor its “progressive values and immigration policies”. They don’t really care, if or how Dr Chalmers is “curbing inflationary outcomes”. They’re somewhat out of sync with the “economic technocracy” implementing neoliberal dogma.
They even support manufacturing protection or tariffs (67%) plus higher taxes on businesses and the rich. They would like lower or much lower immigration (80%). Lacking refined Treasury sensibilities, they reckon more people = dearer housing.
American sociologist Musa al-Gharbi characterises the economic technocracy as symbolic capitalists. Peel away their self-regarding wokeness and social justice, they’re in it for the top 1%, and themselves. As in, our Bank of Mum and Dad.
It makes some sense. When was the top 20% of any society ever in it for the rest?
According to French economist Thomas Piketty and many other scholars, they kind of were during a few halcyon 20th century decades. After which, according to Piketty’s graphs and charts, wealthy nations have the current system. (At least) one large party for the wealthy, and similar for the educated, and short shrift for the workers.
Denmark we are not
Reviewing al-Gharbi here and here, I whinged a bit.
It seemed to me over the top, to depict Mr Dutton as a fearsome mini-Trump. Differences between him and Mr Albanese were exaggerated. Both cited UN net zero, while backing our energy (export-gas) sellout. Both were comfortable enough with UN open borders, whilst offering expansive gestures to “fix” housing affordability.
In fairness, the Coalition could never have pushed 2022-25 immigration as high as 1.3 million. They wouldn’t have hired the hundreds of extra visa-processing staff, costing $40 million annually. Though they’ve heartily endorsed Albanese’s immigration sellout to sectarian Narendra Modi, would they themselves have initiated it?
In any event, the upcoming election isn’t such a fateful choice for the lower orders.
They can expect excitable media chatter, about the global threat of Mr Trump, maybe the local threat of Fatima Payman, or the competing log-cabin stories of Mr Albanese and Mr Dutton.
After the election dust has settled, there will still be energy sellout, mass immigration, regressive education funding, housing hunger games, extremely generous real estate tax-lurks, and personal taxation creep.
Up in the other hemisphere, here and here and elsewhere, high-end mouthpieces are bowled over by boutique Denmark. Who knew, maybe a leftish democratic party can win and hold government, asserting a degree of nationalism, toning down crazy levels of immigration.
It’s almost like listening to hapless voters a little. How would that work? Isn’t that just a bit racist? Do they not even have a proper Laura Tingle?
At Statistics Denmark, Copenhagen’s so-called “paradigm shift” seems to have pared net migration to the low 30,000s, maybe 0.5% of Denmark’s population. By common sense and European standards, it is still generous and compassionate. It is still very high by Danish historical standards.
Not even the Danish level of “reform” could happen here—we’re too far gone.
Directly after the once-in-a-century COVID immigration-freeze, a mildly perturbed Liberal and Labor fell over themselves to reboot the Down Under real estate narco-state. Who would be greatly surprised if Indians now outnumbered Australians, as buyers in Victoria’s new housing estates? The state government hoax of “better planning” will sooner or later catch up with their service needs. Right down to the Punjabi road-signs.
Liberal and Labor-Green will continue to compete for who can offer the most UN-respectful nirvana. Who can appease specialised requirements of the diasporas concentrating in certain Sydney and Melbourne electorates.
Federal elections can almost turn on such niceties. Ask Bill Shorten (2019) and Scott Morrison (2022).
For Australia’s top 20% then, it’s not even enough to entrench net migration of 235,000-250,000 (probably rather more) as the absolute ground floor.
Nor would it ever be enough for Treasury intellectuals to pump Australia’s population towards 40 million, on their cartoon pathway to “environment repair” and “net zero”.
Nope, the top 20% also need to rewrite history, to further burnish themselves. The government, media, academics, industry, grind out Treasury’s alternate truth that 235,000 is just average. Although, we’d never once topped 200,000 before 2007.
Expect to see this truthy truth reflected by our schools and universities, and absorbed into academic histories, much of these written by the committed left.
Expect Albanese’s social engineering to wrap into the furniture, even if Dutton replaces him.
Social cohesion and living standards won’t improve.
