Thread: Crudds Gone

To the vast majority who have commented on this topic...

LABOR.

Notice the lack of the letter U.

Originally Posted by UncleHo

Interesting thread this one, one thing that a lot of people miss is that any political party in power is only as good as the bureaucracy behind it.

... ... ... ... ...

So what I always suspected is true then, "Yes Minister", "Yes Prime Minister" and the Australian TV series "The Hollowmen" were documentaries.

Originally Posted by CraigE

Interesting concepts, but you conveniently forget that the mining industry is pretty much all that has kept our economy buoyant for the last few years and why we weathered the GFC. We have the resources but not a lot of down stream processing and this is not the fault of the miners, but the fault of the governments and world economies that make it uneconomic to process and produce items in Australia.
In all honesty would you be prepared to pay $5000 for a fridge that is currently $1400? Or maybe you would be happy to work for a few $ a day so it can happen.
The point of the Minerals Council and the Chamber of Minerals and Energy is to promote mining and at present that is mainly exporting.

I will give you until tomorrow for you to get some understanding of how Australian economics weathered the GEC so well

Originally Posted by clean32

I will give you until tomorrow for you to get some understanding of how Australian economics weathered the GEC so well

And then what happens Dr. Evil? Global thermonuclear war or a comprehensive lecture?

Originally Posted by seano87

To the vast majority who have commented on this topic...

LABOR.

Notice the lack of the letter U.

Typical,,,

Ron announces his retirement and some upstart jumps in his place.

Originally Posted by abaddonxi

And then what happens Dr. Evil? Global thermonuclear war or a comprehensive lecture?

Originally Posted by feral

Typical,,,

Ron announces his retirement and some upstart jumps in his place.

I don't know which post made me laugh louder

Originally Posted by clean32

I will give you until tomorrow for you to get some understanding of how Australian economics weathered the GEC so well

KRudd (and to some extent the Reserve Bank) made a fundamental mistake in dealing with the GFC.

The IMF instructed countries to engage in massive expenditure/incentive programmes to mitigate the worst effects. KRudd listened and obeyed blindly.

Australia, unlike the majority of the western world, had relatively high interest rates at the time (some would now argue that they were too high, but that's another argument).

The rest of the world had to engage in spending because they had virtually no room to lower rates. Australia on the other hand had plenty of room. We should have lowered rates substantially before looking at expenditure and handouts. They were lowered, but nowhere near far enough.

Yes, on the surface Krudd did get us through the GFC, but at what cost? We now have massive debt. The immediate effects of the GFC may have been mitigated, but the resultant debt will cause some very serious aftershocks.

Originally Posted by Jamo

KRudd (and to some extent the Reserve Bank) made a fundamental mistake in dealing with the GFC.

The IMF instructed countries to engage in massive expenditure/incentive programmes to mitigate the worst effects. KRudd listened and obeyed blindly.

Australia, unlike the majority of the western world, had relatively high interest rates at the time (some would now argue that they were too high, but that's another argument).

The rest of the world had to engage in spending because they had virtually no room to lower rates. Australia on the other hand had plenty of room. We should have lowered rates substantially before looking at expenditure and handouts. They were lowered, but nowhere near far enough.

Yes, on the surface Krudd did get us through the GFC, but at what cost? We now have massive debt. The immediate effects of the GFC may have been mitigated, but the resultant debt will cause some very serious aftershocks.

Monetary policy and Fiscal policy are two totally different things.

The Reserve Bank controls interest rates and is totally independent of the Federal Govt.
Its primary concern is inflation and the control thereof.

The Federal Govt contols Fiscal policy, its primary way of influencing that is income and expenditure, or taxation and spending.
Treasury can only influence interest rates in a very abstract manner, the markets are the major influence on the Reserve.

In a nutshell private spending dried up so the Feds spend up, it's a classic response to a recession as I've already posted earlier in this thread, although the manner in which the money was distributed could have been a done a lot better, but hindsight is always 20/20

As I said earlier it has been argued by some economists that had Costello and Howard actually banked the surpluses that should have been banked way back whenever rather than buying elections with cash handouts in a very cavalier manner, the country could have been in a much better position.

It all comes down to everyone's biases and how we view things