Australian Economy

By Leith van Onselen With Australia’s population ballooning on the back of mass immigration, and projected to add around 360,000 people a year until 2066, The Economist last week warned that Australia likely to experience a “severe water shortage” by mid-century.

Via the AIG: In my experience this PMI is a much better guide to residential than it is commercial ore engineering work.

Via ANZ, job ads fell again in April, down 0.1% month on month and 5.6% year on year: After five successive steep falls, it is pleasing to see a virtually unchanged result in job ads for April.

Via the AFR: NSW manufacturers say relying on LNG imports or gas from the Northern Territory to satisfy the state’s needs will send them out of business and have stepped up calls for the government to get behind Santos’s Narrabri coal seam gas venture, which secured two prospective customers this week.

By Leith van Onselen The Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) has released its new car sales figures for April, which revealed a heavy 8.1% decline in overall sales relative to April 2018, with the result the worst for April since 2011: Another month, another sales dip.

MTO warns: No more retirement pigs pigs for boomers.

By Leith van Onselen Last year it was revealed that that Australian university vice chancellors have seen their salaries balloon, with the average salary package approaching $1 million: University leaders are picking up major pay rises, taking the annual average salary of vice-chancellors in NSW and Victoria to just below $1 million.

Via AIG: Look at the trend.

By Leith van Onselen The AFR’s Duncan Hughes has penned a disturbing article on how property developers are exploiting a regulatory loophole that excludes property as a financial product to offer massive commissions to accountants, financial advisers and mortgage brokers for recommending property to their clients.

A few charts from UBS tell the tale of what’s to come.

Thanks to Satyajit Das at Nikkei: When Australians go to the polls on May 18, the choice for all intents and purposes is between the center-right (Liberal and National Party coalition) and the center-left (Australian Labour Party).

Better from AIG: New orders better but employment and wages hit: Full report.

Sort of: Car-making is coming back to Australia with one company committed to launching “this year” with an electric city runabout expected to be its debut model.

Via Deloitte: Business investment is set to accelerate in the years ahead, but – partly due to slower economic growth and a softening of investment conditions in the non-mining sector – the recovery will be slower than previously expected.

Via BI: Citibank’s Australian economics and interest rate strategy team believe there’s a third option available to the RBA should the need arise: “helicopter money”, or printing money to be distributed to the public via the government.

By Leith van Onselen Construction in the residential building sector tends to be more labour intensive than that in other areas of the construction sector.

By Leith van Onselen CommSec has released its latest State of the States report, which again ranks Victoria and New South Wales on top due largely to a combination of strong population growth, construction, and debt-fuelled consumption: How are Australia’s states and territories performing?

By Leith van Onselen Following last week’s crashing headline and underlying inflation over the March quarter: Roy Morgan has released its Inflation Expectations Index, which has plunged to levels not seen since late 2016: In March, Australians expected inflation of only 4% per year over the next two years.