Indeed economist Callam Pickering has updated his Australian job postings series, which tracks the level of job postings since the beginning of the pandemic. According to Pickering, Australian job postings are tracking were tracking 45.5% higher than their pre-pandemic level as at 11 June; although the level of postings has stabilised: Despite Victoria’s latest hard
For months we have witnessed Australia’s employer groups lobby the federal government for easier access to foreign workers due to purported crippling labour shortages. However, when it comes to actually paying more to attract Australian workers into their respective industries, they are firmly opposed. In the lead-up to yesterday afternoon’s minimum wage decision by the
The Australian property market continues to rebound hard out of the COVID-19 pandemic. Following a 2.6% decline in dwelling values across the five major capital city markets between 15 March (the unofficial start of the pandemic) and 13 October 2020 (the bottom), values have since risen by 13.1% across the combined five major capital city
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: The Fed Cannot Control Its Easy-Money Monster – NY Times World’s Bubbliest Housing Markets Flash 2008 Style Warnings – Bloomberg Stability of collusion and quality differentiation: a Nash bargaining approach – Bruegel Nobel Prize winning economist Muhammad Yunus says 2050 may be too late to save planet. – Yahoo
The ABC has published another story touting tiny houses as “one way young people can afford real estate”: For Lucy and Jonty, the cost of their tiny house was around $120,000, including solar panels. That compares to the median Hobart dwelling value of $574,543, according to CoreLogic figures from May… It means they’re now committed
In March two key reforms came into effect designed to take the steam out of New Zealand’s fast inflating property market. First, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ) reintroduced loan-to-value ratio (LVR) mortgage restrictions, which from 1 March 2021 required both investors and owner-occupiers to hold bigger deposits: Second, and more importantly, the New Zealand
The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released Overseas Arrivals and Departures data for April 2021, which confirmed that net migration into Australia remains negative. There were 23,290 net permanent & long-term departures in the 13 months since the beginning of the pandemic in March 2020, representing the first time that net arrivals have been
The contract to build Australia’s new submarine fleet is expected to be on the agenda when Prime Minister Scott Morrison holds talks with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris. Independent senator Rex Patrick – who served 11 years as a navy submariner and worked in the defence industry for two decades – has called for
The introduction of the trans-Tasman travel bubble on 18 April 2021 has boosted international travel, according to new provisional travel statistics from the ABS. Arrivals of non-Australian citizens doubled in May to 71,060 from 35,210 in April: This was driven by a 32,000 increase in arrivals from New Zealand: In a similar vein, departures of
By Gareth Aird, head of Australian economics at CBA Key Points The ABS monthly labour force survey excludes overseas residents in Australia and therefore the survey has not accurately captured the impact of the international border closure on the labour market. The ABS quarterly labour account includes all people who contribute to Australian economic activity
SQM Research has released its rental vacancy report for May, which reports a national rental vacancy rate of only 1.8% – the lowest level of vacancies since October 2012. Rental vacancies are zipped tight everywhere except Melbourne and Sydney, which have been hit hardest by the loss of international students, as illustrated clearly in the
The OECD has blamed Australia’s restrictive planning and zoning for driving the fourth sharpest property price increase in the developed world over the past 20 years: Paris-based OECD director of policy studies in the economics department, Luiz de Mello, said low interest rates had contributed to rising house prices. But restrictive regulations were also a
In March the federal government released a 327-page report from the National Agricultural Labour Advisory Committee, which explicitly admitted that the agricultural industry’s overreliance on cheap migrant labour is bad for productivity and unsustainable: Australia’s main competitors in agriculture are either ahead or running very close. In many ways, Australia is at a crossroads. Either its
The ABS yesterday released its property price data for the March quarter, which valued Australia’s dwelling stock owned by households at $7.9 trillion, whereas the total housing stock was valued at $8.3 trillion. As shown below, the ratio of the dwelling stock owned by households against Australian GDP hit a record 4.0 times as at
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: Uneven vaccination rates are creating a new economic divide – The Economist The socio-economic consequences of COVID-19 in the Middle East and North Africa – Bruegel Walton Family, World’s Richest, Raises $2.1 Billion From Walmart Holdings – Yahoo Winners and Losers of the Work-From-Home Revolution – The Atlantic Wall
Roy Morgan’s business confidence survey hit a seven year high in May, increasing 4pts (+3.2%) to 129.3 – the highest reading since January 2014 (131.5). This follows a whopping 39.4pts (+43.8%) increase on May 2020 when Australia was gripped by the coronavirus pandemic: Business Confidence in May 2021 was 15.5pts above the long-term average of
A new report from Knight Frank Research shows that the total value of offshore investment in Australian residential property fell below $500 million in 2020 – the lowest level in seven years. This was a key driver of a 19.6% decline in property developers’ investment in residential sites, which fell to just $4 billion amid
Deloitte Access Economics is upbeat about the outlook for Australian retailers, forecasting that consumer spending will remain strong as the domestic economy continues to rebound and COVID-19 restrictions ease. The firm’s quarterly Retail Forecast report notes that lockdowns and travel restrictions have boosted retailers’ sales, which should result in a “bumper year” for the sector
Earlier this year, the National Farmers Federation (NFF) called for a Dedicated Agriculture Visa program ease purported chronic labour shortages across the sector: To provide a stable and sustainable workforce for agriculture that is fair and equitable for both workers and employers, the NFF supports the introduction of a Dedicated Agriculture Visa program… providing a
Former ALP minister Craig Emerson has penned an article in The AFR calling on the Morrison Government to tackle Australia’s declining productivity growth, which is central to boosting the nation’s living standards: “Productivity growth has contributed 95 per cent of the improvement in Australians’ material living standards since 1901”. “From the turn of the century,
The ABS has released its property price results for the March quarter, which recorded a 5.4% quarterly rise across the combined capital cities – the strongest rise since the December quarter of 2009: According to the ABS: Residential property prices rose 5.4 per cent in the March quarter 2021. This was the strongest quarterly growth
As we know, the NSW Government has announced plans to replace stamp duty with an annual land tax by. On Friday it released a report detailing the reforms. Under the reforms, buyers would be given an alternative to paying stamp duty via: Owner-occupiers: a fixed $400 up-front fee plus an annual 0.3% tax on the
The rise in Sydney’s dwelling values has been extraordinary. Since the beginning of 2021, Sydney dwelling values have risen by an astonishing 13.9%, marking the fastest pace of increase since the late 1980s. According to CoreLogic, the ‘high end’ of Sydney’s property market – i.e. the top 25% of properties – have driven the value
Over the weekend, The AFR reported that the Morrison Government will use the Australian Treasury’s upcoming intergenerational report (IGR) as ammunition to reboot the mass immigration ‘Big Australia’ policy (see yesterday’s post). The IGR will reportedly “show the country is getting older, more indebted and reliant on taxing younger workers, and driving up spending”. Therefore,
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: The Profit Paradox’ Details How Lack Of Competition Warps Economies – Benzinga Will poorer countries benefit from international tax reform? – The Economist BlackRock isn’t to blame for the dumpster fire housing market – VOX Fed balance sheet tops $8 trillion for first time -data – Reuters US Treasuries
CoreLogic’s preliminary report on the weekend’s auctions reported a higher clearance rate as Melbourne reopened. The national preliminary clearance rate rose to 77.4% from 73.5% the prior weekend. However, this was off significantly lower auction volumes, down to 1,426 from the prior weekend’s 2,691, owing to the Queens’s Birthday long weekend. Sydney continued its strong
The Weekend AFR gave its strongest indication yet that the Morrison Government will use Treasury’s upcoming Intergenerational Report (IGR) as ammunition to reopen the mass immigration floodgates: This month’s Intergenerational Report will be “used to reinforce the government’s case to boost immigration once the pandemic ends”. “It will show the country is getting older, more
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: Standard Inflation Theory Leaves Out Social Conflict and Costs – Ineteconomics Will poorer countries benefit from international tax reform? – The Economist BlackRock isn’t to blame for the dumpster fire housing market – VOX Fed balance sheet tops $8 trillion for first time -data – Reuters Global food prices
Global Macro / Markets / Investing: Global food prices rise to highest level in a decade – Yahoo In a world first, El Salvador makes bitcoin legal tender – Reuters Inflation Is Surging. The Price Of A Toyota Pickup Truck Helps Explain Why – NPR The coming productivity boom – Bruegel Banks to Companies: No
Despite the cut in international students, salaries of university vice-chancellors remain bloated, according to new analysis by Fairfax: Unbelievably, some vice chancellors scored pay rises in 2020 at the same time as revenues tanked, rank and file staff were retrenched or had their wages stolen, and students were pushed into sub-standard online teaching. As shown
