The government should make the current petrol tax rate permanent and abandon the tax increase. If they are unwilling to do that, they should at least delay the petrol tax increase until inflation is under control.
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Ebony Graveur | Spectator Australia
When one human being is trying to convey an idea to another, clarity is the goal and navigating language can be a treacherous undertaking.
Read MoreOrdinary Australians are struggling under the dual pressures of high inflation and rising interest rates. There’s no simple solution, though there are some commentators out there offering simplistic and dangerous suggestions that will make the problem worse.
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Barclay McGain | Spectator Australia
Is an increase to the minimum wage really the solution to low-income earners feeling the pinch of runaway inflation? Not even close.
Read MoreThere is no silver bullet when it comes to housing availability and affordability, but one part of the puzzle is to improve the incentives faced by local councils so that they get the benefits or costs associated with their planning and development policies.
Read MoreWhile small business and ordinary people suffer under high inflation, the government is able to avoid most of the costs while secretly increasing taxes and avoiding responsibility for their irresponsible borrowing. They can’t be trusted.
Read MoreTrying to navigate this absurd maze of rules, regulations, committees, commissions, councils, funds, targets, agreements, operators, and regulators is near-impossible for most people.
Read MoreHigh income taxes punish people for being productive. This is both morally dubious and economically inefficient, as it encourages people to shift into less productive activity.
Read MoreThe market system is politically neutral and so it doesn’t guarantee any particular mix of technologies. This is good news for people who want cheap and reliable energy, but it’s bad news for energy bureaucrats who want to centrally plan our energy future.
Read MoreThe RBA should act decisively now to get cost of living pressures under control.
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Standing just outside leafy Toowoomba, the Wellcamp quarantine facility is almost brand new but already effectively defunct. Though it sleeps 1000, the facility currently houses just seven people - a figure that seems of especially poor taste as the housing crisis grips families across the country. READ MORE>>>
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Brian Marlow
Like clockwork, the moderate faction are decrying the only reason the election was lost was due to the LNP not being green enough and not putting more resources into costly renewables. They point to losing key moderate strongholds as evidence of this, while ignoring the swings in the rest of the country that tell a different story.
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Labor's plan will leave first home buyers owning just a fraction of their homes, while the government claims the rest. It is a sly scheme poised to hurt the very voters it is designed to appeal to.
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John Humphreys
From diversity of trade to competition-fueled innovation: Free trade is a powerful force for economic growth. A shift toward freer international trade during Australia’s productivity reforms in the 1980s led to a golden period of economic prosperity that we continue to benefit from 30 years on. But trade deals and free trade are two very different ball games
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Our plan going into this budget was to rank the top three positive outcomes and three negative outcomes but sadly, due to reasons beyond our control, the budget sucked.
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For something so openly talked about across social and mainstream media, the astronomical price of fuel—and the costing behind it—is widely misunderstood. A good chunk of the price of petrol comes down to nothing other than good old taxes.
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Samuel Chamberlain | Tim Andrews Essay Prize winner
On one hand, polls shows an ever decreasing trust in our government and media institutions. On the other, any suggestion that pandemic health measures had gone too far were labelled ‘conspiracy theory’. This paradox reflects nearly every defect in Australia’s Covid response.
Read MoreBy Barclay McGain | Quadrant
A top-secret email chain is the latest twist in the saga involving an ABC journalist, a defamatory tweet and a hefty legal bill. It poses the question: What good is a public broadcaster if it can’t be trusted to meet the baseline standard of integrity—transparency?
Increased unemployment and even more small business closures are in store if governments stick to plans to delay reopening until states hit an 80% full vaccination rate.
Read MoreGood health means different things to different people and achieving it involves a more sophisticated approach than simply avoiding all risk, at all costs.
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