Australian Economy

Via Damien Boey at Credit Suisse: The Westpac consumer confidence report for November registered more improvement.

Check out the below chart from yesterday’s June quarter wage data from the ABS: As you can see, Victoria is way out in front on wage growth, recording wage rises of 2.8% over the year to September.

Yesterday’s labour price index for the September quarter, released by the ABS, confirmed that the public sector is driving wage growth across the Australian economy: As shown above, public sector wages grew by 2.5% in the year to September, versus a 2.2% increase across the private sector.

With Murdoch University under siege over its poor handling of international student enrolments and its lawsuit against whistle-blower Dr Gerd Schroeder-Turk, an enterprising individual going by the avatar of Murdoch Maven has published the above hilarious parody: “Murdoch Downfall”.

Australia is littered with examples of so-called ‘skilled’ migrants gaining visas only to then work in unskilled areas for low pay (e.g. here, here and here).

It’s so very rare these days to see an Aussie with balls but Drew Pavlou has ’em.

It looked a bit overdone last month, via Westpac: The Westpac-Melbourne Institute Index of Consumer Sentiment rose 4.5% to 97.0 in November from 92.8 in October.

Via the always bullish Deloitte: According to Deloitte’s Retailers’ Christmas Survey 2019, positive sentiment is down, in strong contrast to 2018, when retailers were approaching the season with a strong sense of optimism.

Evidence of Australia’s stuttering economy continues to mount, with the number of Australians turning to payday loans booming: Payday loans targeting the financially vulnerable are being taken out at the rate of more than 30,000 a week, with the amount borrowed in Australia on track to be worth $1.7bn by year’s end.

Via Peter Hartcher today: Yet Australia itself, where sane and centrist politics has largely prevailed, isn’t immune to the danger of a xenophobic populism in future.

Via NAB: Key messages from the Survey: This month’s survey results continue to point to only modest outcomes in the business sector, though forward-looking indicators have improved slightly and may be pointing to a stabilisation in conditions.

Via Nine today: Great to see them suffering.

The post-election bounce is well and truly over, with Roy Morgan reporting that business confidence has crashed, with forward indicators driving the decline: Roy Morgan Business Confidence dropped 4.6pts (-4.2%) to 106.0 in October, putting it at its lowest level since the Federal Election in mid-May.

The “paradox of thrift” was a theory made famous by renowned economist John Maynard Keynes.

Anthony Forsyth, Professor of Workplace Law at RMIT University, has roasted claims by employer groups that Australia’s “complex” industrial relations system is behind the rise in wage theft cases: Is Australia’s award system so complex major corporations capable of handling millions of customers and billions of dollars can’t manage to pay employees properly?

The Australian Bureau of Statistics yesterday published its overseas short-term arrivals figures for September, with Chinese visitors hitting fresh all-time highs.