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4 weeks ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff |Matt Saunders |David Richardson
The problem of housing affordability is not too many migrants, but too many tax breaks for investors. It looks like in this election there is going to be a lot of talk about how immigration impacts house prices. This topic can very quickly become charged with emotion, so instead let’s look at the facts. Despite what you may have been told, over the past 10 years, housing supply has actually grown faster than the population.
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4 weeks ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff |Adam Gottschalk
Halving the fuel excise is bad for the environment and for most Australians won’t deliver the cost-of-living benefits that are being spruiked. The announcement today that the Liberal Party will halve the fuel tax excise for one year if it wins the election in May is, alas, yet another of the many policies put in place over the years that encourage the use of fossil fuels. At a time when all political parties should be working to reduce emissions, this policy does the exact opposite.
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1 month ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff
The dream of saving for a deposit on a house is now so far beyond most poeple that even if you have a high paying job, you still can never save enough. In 2015 former Treasurer Joe Hockey suggested to buy a house you just needed a “good job that pays good money”Ten years on new research shows that had a person on the average full-time male earnings in each state been saving 15% of their after-tax income, they would still be unable to afford a deposit on a median-priced house.
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1 month ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff |Mark Ogge |Jack Thrower
Over the 10 years to 2023-24 nurses paid $7bn more in tax than did the oil and gas companies. The oil and gas industry loves to tell everyone they pay a lot of tax, but the evidence tells a very different story. The oil and gas industry claim their tax pays for nurses and other public sector services, but new Australia Institute research shows that nurses pay more in income tax than the oil and gas industry pay in company tax and Petroleum Resource Rent Tax (PRRT).
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2 months ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Angus Blackman |Ebony Bennett |Matt Grudnoff
We discuss Trump’s new tariffs on steel and aluminium imports and what they’ll mean for Australia. On this episode of Follow the Money, Senior Economist Matt Grudnoff joins Ebony Bennett to explain how tariffs work, Trump’s 25 per cent levy on steel and aluminium imports, and how big a deal this will be for Australia. This discussion was recorded on Tuesday 11 February 2025 and things may have changed since recording. Order What’s the Big Idea?
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2 months ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |David Richardson |Matt Grudnoff
If housing affordability keeps going the way it has over the past 20 years, an average dwelling in Sydney will be worth 24 years of an average salary. The latest figures from the Bureau of Statistics today reveal that the size of the average home loan over just the past 5 years has increased by more than $198,000 in Western Australia, South Australia, Queensland and New South Wales. Everyone knows Australian house prices are high and putting home ownership out of reach for many new home buyers.
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2 months ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff
Increasing the number of houses is welcome, but unless the government tackles the expensive tax breaks for investors, housing will remain unaffordable for many. The Government has just announced it has signed contracts to build the first 800 social and affordable homes from its $10 billion Housing Australia Future Fund (HAFF). New supply of housing is good but how significant is it? The average number of homes, per month, approved for construction in Australia is 14,058.
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2 months ago | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff
With inflation within the RBA’s target range, interest rates should be cut, but unfortunately Australians will have to wait for the Reserve Bank board to get back from holidays. Today’s inflation figures revealed the official CPI is well within the Reserve Bank’s target range of 2% to 3% and underlying inflation is coming down at a solid pace. These figures will have Australians looking forward to a rate cut, but the RBA is making them wait longer than they should.
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Jan 7, 2025 | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Greg Jericho |Matt Grudnoff
Inflation is under control and the economy is barely staying out of recession. But the Reserve Bank has decided to take more than 2 months off before deciding if a rate cut is needed. The November Consumer Price Index inflation figures out today showed that inflation in the past year rose 2.3%, marginally up from 2.2% in October.
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Dec 8, 2024 | 
australiainstitute.org.au | Matt Grudnoff |Greg Jericho
Will the RBA cut interest rates tomorrow? Probably not. It’s Groundhog Day and they’re locked into repeatedly making to same mistake over and over again. A mistake that the recent RBA review criticised them for making just before the pandemic. Instead of learning from the review they seem determined to repeat it. Meanwhile Australians suffer from an economy with higher interest payments, higher unemployment and more people struggling.
