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In the US we are seeing lots of debate about the new COVID support package, an attempt to enliven the gun debate and continued pokes at China which is not at all pleased!
In the UK the passing of Prince Philip has dominated the news cycle as we see vaccination going on apace and a gradual economic recovery. The UK is also doing some China poking!
In Australia the wheels have come off the vaccination program and some major corrective action is needed and fast – as the whole issue is sadly becoming increasingly political. Elsewhere we see the count down to the budget and increasing uncertainty with the economic outlook unless we can get international borders open!
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Major Issues.
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The new women’s movement should be wary of activists, zealots and ideologues
Columnist and communications adviser
April 4, 2021 — 5.30am
I am no Machiavelli, but having spent the bulk of my career in communications, I have developed a couple of princely rules. One of these is to choose your allies wisely. The wrong ally will bring your cause more thoroughly undone than the most vicious opponent. Zealots, ideologues and activists are exciting to have on side, because they fizz with energy and enthusiasm. They’re great to make a noise and get things started. But if you’re in the business of shifting community attitudes, beware entanglement. Their absolutism will inevitably become a liability and their agendas will override the wider project.
The women’s movement inspired by the stories of Brittany Higgins and Grace Tame is at risk of succumbing to the control of such an agenda. Since I have a stake in gender equality, as well as a deep-seated belief in equal opportunity as a principle, this is a plea to avoid being co-opted.
There are a lot of similarities between the women’s movement now and the climate action movement before the last federal election. In both cases, the political response will affect every single Australian.
Just in case it needs to be said, both these causes should be above politics. In order for either to succeed, both movements need a broad base of support which reaches beyond the third of the population that gives its primary voice to either of the major political parties. So when the cause is hijacked to effect a change of government, it takes a wrong turn.
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The search for meaning doesn’t lead to wealth and happiness
Ross Gittins
Economics Editor
April 4, 2021 — 11.01pm
Easter Monday’s a good a time to reflect on what we’re doing with our lives and why we’re doing it. I’ve been banging on about all things economic for more than 40 years, but if I’ve left you with the impression economics and economic growth is the be-all and end-all, let me apologise for misleading you.
The more I’ve learnt about economics, the more aware I’ve become of its limitations. Economics is the study of production and consumption, getting and spending. But as someone connected with Easter – not the Easter Bunny – once said, there’s more to life than bread alone.
Unfortunately, the conventional way of thinking about the economy has pretty much taken for granted the natural environment in which our economic activity occurs, and the use of natural resources and ecosystem services on which that activity depends.
We’re learning the hard way that this insouciance can’t continue. We’re damaging our environment in ways that can’t continue. I keep writing about the need for economic growth because, as the economy is presently organised, it’s pretty much the only way to provide sufficient jobs for our growing population.
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Canberra has no place in superannuation investments
Eva Scheerlinck
Why would any government want to give the minister of the day the power to ban specific superannuation fund investments, regardless of whether that investment is in members’ best interests?
Such an intervention is not only heavy-handed, interventionist and unprecedented in this country, but it would also create investment uncertainty that would harm returns for members.
Yet such unfettered power is precisely what the Morrison government is seeking as part of its Your Future Your Super reform package, which is now the subject of a Senate Committee inquiry and due for debate in parliament.
The legislation, which has the well-intentioned aim of addressing underperformance and reducing future multiple super accounts, is disturbingly light on substance leaving significant issues, such as what investments might be subject to a ban, currently to be decided later by regulation that is not subject to parliamentary scrutiny.
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Neglected tools in your diversification kit
Investors with a solid investment plan that includes asset allocation can ride out shifts in markets, and avoid reactive responses to regular market crises.
Michael McCarthy Contributor
Apr 5, 2021 – 12.09pm
Diversification is one of the most powerful risk management tools available to all investors. Many investors are well diversified in a particular area (for example, shares) yet fail to recognise the opportunities that other asset classes represent.
Discussions often zero in on spreading risk within asset classes, but studies show that it is the diversification across asset classes that is the biggest single contributor to returns.
This is not an issue for professional investors. Their asset allocation parameters are incorporated in their mandate – whether they are a traditional long-only fund or a hedge fund. All a professional must do is stay true to label, respecting the asset guidelines put in place. Investors may then decide if that fund represents the best choice for them.
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Ignore the abuse and remember the main game
Alexander Downer Columnist
Apr 5, 2021 – 12.28pm
When I was first an MP in the mid 1980s the Liberal Party was bitterly split between what in those days were called the wets and the dries.
These were terms stolen from the UK: Margaret Thatcher, the great patriot and champion of liberal economics, was the standard bearer of the dries.
The wets were the people she dismissively derided as those who saw government as a management task and not much more: it was a battle between warriors and managers.
In Australia, John Howard was the leader of the dries. He wanted to reform the tax system and make it more competitive, he believed in balanced budgets, he wanted to free up the labour market and he was a champion of global free trade.
Beyond economics, Howard was a traditional conservative believing in Christian virtues, traditional families and constitutional stability. His ideas were not universally popular in the Liberal Party and were fiercely resisted by the political Left.
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Credit Suisse senior execs leave after Archegos, Greensill losses
Owen Walker and James Fontanella-Khan
Updated Apr 6, 2021 – 9.32am, first published at 8.44am
London/New York | Two senior Credit Suisse executives are leaving the bank as it deals with the fallout from twin crises involving Archegos Capital and Greensill Capital.
Lara Warner, the group’s chief risk and compliance officer, and Brian Chin, head of the investment bank, are set to depart, according to people with knowledge of the moves.
Early estimates suggested Credit Suisse stands to lose up to $US4 billion ($5.2 billion) from the collapse of its client Archegos, a family office run by former hedge fund manager Bill Hwang. The Swiss bank was one of several lenders that acted as prime broker to Hwang.
The Archegos losses follow the suspension last month of a series of supply-chain finance funds Credit Suisse offered to its clients that were run by Greensill Capital. Credit Suisse has calculated its clients could lose up to $US3 billion from those funds.
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Restrictions ease but remote learning still the norm at universities
By Adam Carey, Farrah Tomazin and Royce Millar
April 5, 2021 — 6.37pm
Universities have made online teaching the new normal, even as COVID-19 restrictions on public gatherings ease and despite evidence many students dislike the virtual education experience.
A survey of universities by The Age has found they are continuing to lecture online in many of the lessons that were remote last year, with on-campus classes mostly limited to small tutorials.
Swinburne University, for example, has confirmed all lectures in 2021 will remain online, with all tutorials and labs to switch back to in-person in semester two.
The Australian Catholic University has told students who do not want a virtual education this year to consider deferring their studies or even seek a refund.
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Newspoll: Coalition in election peril after hit in resources states
The Coalition has lost significant electoral ground across its traditionally strongest states of Western Australia and Queensland and is facing collapse in South Australia, amid a war of words with the premiers over the vaccine rollout and the aftermath of the sexual assault allegations that have rocked the federal government.
While the Coalition has managed to improve slightly in Victoria and remain relatively stable in NSW, demographic and state-based analysis of Newspoll data, suggests the Coalition would need to restore support in the resource states to retain government.
The analysis has also revealed that the Coalition has suffered a flight of male voters rather than female over the past three months despite the Liberal Party’s perceived failures in dealing with the mistreatment of women in politics.
Averaged approval ratings for Scott Morrison since late last year show the Prime Minister remains at historical highs, almost double his rival Anthony Albanese, and is the preferred prime minister by a substantial margin across all mainland states.
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Is inflation coming? Let’s start with a cup of coffee
The story for 2021 will remain one of inflation concerns globally. As the humble coffee proves, fears of a medium-term inflation breakout must centre on labour and rental costs, not the temporary swings we are likely to see this year in supply chains.
Vimal Gor
Apr 7, 2021 – 12.01am
There are two questions I am being asked a lot these days. First, should I invest in bitcoin? My answer is that you definitely need some digital assets in your portfolio and quick smart, but which ones and how much are harder questions. However, I have opined enough recently about that.
So today I am focusing on the second question I keep getting asked: is inflation coming? To answer that I will turn to the simple morning cup of coffee.
One of my favourite websites, visualcapitalist.com, had a rundown late last year on the economics of a cup of coffee. The study was done for the US but I think the concepts apply in Australia. The study works off what the US calls a 16 ounce brewed coffee, something we all have far too much class to order.
The equivalent here might be a large long black. Let’s call it a $4 coffee. The study by the Specialty Coffee Association gave the following breakdown per cup, which I have adjusted for Australia: growers of the coffee get a miserly 10¢, exporters 23¢, roasters 50¢. So the actual coffee makes up about 20 per cent of the cost.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/rate-rise-a-risk-to-asset-prices-imf-warns-20210406-p57gq7
Rate rise a risk to asset prices, IMF warns
John Kehoe Economics editor
Apr 6, 2021 – 10.30pm
The International Monetary Fund warns that a rebound in interest rates in the United States could cause a “disorderly” unwinding of inflated global asset prices – such as Australian housing.
The IMF said there was a disconnect between pandemic-hit economies and asset markets “powering ahead” around the world, while central banks anchored borrowing costs at record lows.
To tackle the vulnerabilities lurking in asset markets across the world, financial authorities should prepare to deploy non-interest-rate regulatory tools to cool asset prices and reduce financial risks, the IMF advised in its latest World Economic Outlook.
The warning came soon after Reserve Bank of Australia governor Philip Lowe said that housing markets had strengthened, partly due to strong demand from first-home buyers.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/inflation-harder-to-gauge-with-quarterly-data-20210331-p57foq
Inflation harder to gauge with quarterly data
Australia’s releasing of inflation data on a quarterly, rather than monthly, basis puts it out of step with other advanced economies and makes it difficult to get a timely inflation picture.
Sarah Turner Reporter
Apr 7, 2021 – 12.00am
When it comes to the path of inflation, Australian economists are just as divided as everyone else. But the question over a temporary spike or a sustained uplift could be harder to answer here.
Australia’s penchant for releasing inflation data on a quarterly, rather than a monthly, basis puts it out of step with countries such as the US, Britain, Europe and many other advanced economies.
Economist Rob Carnell at ING took issue with quarterly inflation reporting in The Australian Financial Review’s March quarter economist survey. “It’s a real pity that Australian inflation is only quarterly,” the Singapore-based economist says.
Timely data matters now more than ever as markets, central bankers and economists fixate on whether prices will rise sharply and how persistent any prices rises will be, along with appropriate policy responses.
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‘Crucial but not beyond reproach’: Labor joins calls for review of RBA
By Shane Wright
April 7, 2021
The Reserve Bank, its operations and its key policy objective of holding inflation between 2 and 3 per cent would be the focus of a review under a Labor government amid warnings the institution is being left behind by overseas central banks.
Oppositions and critics often call for reviews of particular policies, but demanding a review of a cornerstone of economic policy such as the Reserve Bank is highly unusual.
But in a sign of how much economic policy is in flux in the wake of both the global financial crisis and the coronavirus recession, the step by Labor to promise its own review of the bank is one that has some support within the government and the broader economic community.
Shadow Treasurer Jim Chalmers says the bank should acknowledge its contribution towards the persistent weakness in the economy between the end of the global financial crisis and the coronavirus recession. A review would also look at how monetary and fiscal policy were working together.
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ASFA says most retirees exhaust their super savings
By John Collett
April 6, 2021 — 10.00pm
Retirees exhaust their retirement savings at a much faster rate than is generally believed, with 80 per cent of those over the age of 60 who died between 2014 and 2018 having no super left for up to four years before their death.
The research by the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia (ASFA), using data from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey, also found that for those aged 80-plus, more than 90 per cent had no super in the four-year period before their death.
“We don’t have a systemic problem with retirees underspending or bequeathing their super – quite the opposite,” says Martin Fahy, ASFA’s chief executive. “The majority of Australian retirees run out of super well before the end of their lives,” he says.
The research runs counter to the belief that many seniors are dying with a large amount of super assets intact that are being inherited by their children.
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Regulator’s ‘fanciful’ SMSF estimates buried at last
It’s taken nearly two years but one of the most silly and downright misleading lines ever put out about running your own super fund has been officially buried. The consumer regulator has finally completed its U-turn on the costs of running a self-managed super fund.
Who knows how much damage the Australian Securities and Investments Commission unleashed with its infamous 2019 “fact sheet” which told investors it costs $13,900 and takes a 100 hours a year to manage your own fund.
The outgoing chair of ASIC, James Shipton, has finally fessed up before the House of Representatives, suggesting: “We regret failing to seek a median cost figure before distributing the fact sheet.”
Shipton’s partial mea culpa came just before Easter and was reported in the specialist publication SMSF Adviser.
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Overhaul to make it easier to fire workplace sex pests
Andrew Tillett Political correspondent
Apr 8, 2021 – 10.16am
Bosses will be empowered to fire employees who sexually harass colleagues, as Prime Minister Scott Morrison vows to outlaw “despicable” behaviour that leaves women feeling unsafe in the workplace.
A loophole exempting federal MPs and judges from sexual discrimination complaints being lodged against them will also be closed as part of the Morrison government’s long-awaited response to Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins’ landmark Respect@Work report.
“Everyone has a right to be safe at work. Sexual harassment must be prohibited in the workplace,” Mr Morrison said.
Mr Morrison said the government accepted all 55 recommendations of Ms Jenkins’ report. He said the government had responded last year to nine of the 20 recommendations that went directly to federal responsibilities, and completed the remaining ones today.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/cheap-money-has-a-high-hidden-price-for-society-20210406-p57gq5
Cheap money has a high hidden price for society
The Reserve Bank hopes that low rates will see economic growth lift off. But it has already blasted the price of a home into a dangerous new orbit.
John Kehoe Economics editor
Apr 7, 2021 – 3.06pm
The great Australian dream is in danger of falling victim to the ‘bystander effect’.
House prices surged at their fastest monthly pace in 32 years in March, equal to annualised growth of 33 per cent.
Property prices are virtually certain to continue their upward ascent, cementing Australian houses as among the most expensive in the world.
Ultra-low interest rates, government home buyer grants and increased demand for larger detached houses during COVID-19 are pushing up prices.
In an economic crisis, America props up Wall Street, while Australia underwrites the housing market.
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Fixing childcare would be a start on PM’s women problem
Senior economics writer
April 7, 2021 — 3.50pm
If Scott Morrison is serious about both boosting jobs and helping women in this upcoming budget, it’s obvious what he should do: make childcare free. Or, at least, increase subsidies to such an extent that it is effectively free for the vast bulk of working parents.
Morrison faced criticism that his last budget in October failed women with its focus on “hard-hat” heavy infrastructure projects and across the board income tax cuts.
In reality, that stimulus provided crucial support for Australia’s COVID-ravaged economy.
But we are far from out of the woods and there is plenty more to do. And if we are really looking to boost livelihoods, a massive injection of funding into childcare is the way to do it.
Economic modelling by Janine Dixon of Victoria University’s Centre of Policy Studies has shown that if you spend a dollar on childcare, it will boost jobs by about 25 times as much as giving that dollar back as a tax cut. Get that? Childcare is better than tax cuts at boosting jobs.
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The cash conundrum: There’s more money around, but it changes hands less often
Stephen Bartholomeusz
Senior business columnist
April 8, 2021 — 12.43pm
There is a divergence between the inflation expectations in financial markets and those of central bankers. Which side is right might depend on whether there is a break from a perplexing long-term trend.
For the moment, central bankers are sanguine about the outlook for inflation despite the enormous monetary and fiscal policy responses to the pandemic that are seeing many trillions of dollars of relief and stimulus spending and liquidity being pumped into the global financial system.
The minutes of the March meeting of the US Federal Reserve’s Open Market Committee meeting released overnight confirmed that the Fed expects to keep its benchmark lending rate at or near zero until 2024.
Futures markets, however, are pricing in at least one rate rise next year and another three by early 2024. The yield on US 10-year government bonds has risen 85 per cent since the start of this year to just under 1.7 per cent.
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Oh the humanities, critically wounded in the culture wars
By Judith Brett
April 8, 2021 — 12.15am
Today’s Australian universities promise their students a world-class education, but what they offer is much less.
Though they do remarkably well in world rankings, these can be seriously misleading. World-class research perhaps, but this rarely translates into a world-class undergraduate curriculum in the humanities and social sciences. There simply aren’t enough teaching staff to deliver one.
In the QS World University Rankings, English language and literature studies at the University of Melbourne are ranked 18th in the world, between Canada’s University of British Columbia and Cornell in the United States.
Drill down and you find that English and theatre studies at Melbourne lists 15 faculty members (excluding those in Australian Research Council-funded research-only positions), most of them professors doing little or no teaching. By contrast, English at UBC has 49 faculty listed on its web page, Cornell has 51, and in both theatre studies are in another department.
Across the country, many of Australia’s humanities and social science departments are imploding: minimal language teaching; faculties without philosophy; English departments with no subject on Shakespeare, let alone Australian literature; visual art departments studying no art history prior to 1900; politics departments with nothing on America and barely anything on Australia; and so on.
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Bond market squeeze to hit balanced super funds
7:26PM April 7, 2021
For millions of Australians balanced super funds have paid off handsomely, the old formula of balancing shares and other risky assets against safer bonds and cash has stood for decades.
In fact it’s so successful that when we talk of the returns of “your super fund” we only have to refer to balanced funds because that is where the vast majority of people have their money.
But in a season of superlatives where artificially low rates are prompting extremes in all markets, bonds have broken a record of their own — and it’s not a good sign.
As shares surge higher and house prices rise at their fastest in decades, bonds have just managed one of the worst quarters in nearly three decades.
In fact, the key benchmark for bonds — the AusBond Total Composite Index — fell by 3.6 per cent over February, its worst month ever according to bond traders.
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Government shies away from major sex harassment fixes
David Marin-Guzman Workplace correspondent
Apr 8, 2021 – 1.24pm
The Morrison government has not agreed to all the Respect@Work recommendations to address sexual harassment despite statements to the contrary and has left major ones for further review, including broad powers to investigate workplaces rife with harassment and expressly requiring employers to eliminate sexual misconduct.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison told reporters on Thursday that the government had agreed “in whole, in part or in principle” with all 55 recommendations made by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins.
But the government’s full response shows that it has merely “noted” many of the major proposals and even questioned their necessity, including an explicit positive duty for employers to take reasonable steps to eliminate sexual harassment in the workplace.
The government also wants to further assess a recommendation to give the Sex Discrimination Commissioner broad powers to investigate systemic sexual harassment in workplaces, including powers to produce documents and examine witnesses.
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theatre designed to convince the world that Xinjiang is indeed a wonderful land.
https://www.afr.com/policy/foreign-affairs/australia-needs-a-bomb-in-the-basement-20210329-p57eya
Australia needs a bomb in the basement
Patrick Porter
Apr 9, 2021 – 12.00am
As its neighbourhood gets more dangerous and volatile, Australia has choices to make about nuclear weapons. One day, the prospect of a sovereign nuclear arsenal may be compelling.
This is not necessarily because Australia will lose faith in America and the credibility of its extended deterrence. It is not necessarily because the United States, its ally, might quit the region, as Hugh White warns. It’s worse than that. Even if America stays in Asia to wage its power struggle with China, Australia may find itself alone, unshielded, and needing options.
Consider a scenario. In the decades ahead, or sooner, the US and China may fight a war, a major war, over Taiwan. The ambiguous bargain that has kept the issue dormant is withering. If China moved on Taiwan and the United States decided to defend it, Washington would try to form a posse, asking its allies to take part in the conflict. Australia’s senior ally would expect it to take part in a clash, against a nuclear power, over an issue Beijing cares about existentially.
Suddenly, Australia might find itself entrapped. It would face a hard choice: to join in and risk China’s retaliation, to support Taiwan’s sovereignty but above all to maintain its alliance with Washington. Or to stand aside.
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Government’s respect road map still has a way to go
By Jane Madden and Sally Moyle
April 9, 2021 — 10.28am
For more than 30 years, the National Foundation for Australian Women (NFAW) has been dedicated to promoting and protecting the interests of Australian women, including intellectual, cultural, political, social, economic, legal, industrial and domestic spheres.
Yet, rarely has there been a greater focus in Australia on gender equity. There is overwhelming national demand for equality and for cultivating a greater culture of respect. It is a pity that this interest has been generated by such flagrant breaches of the principles of equality and respect, but experience shows us that real action is often driven by attempts to clean up after massive failures.
So, interest in this week’s first meeting of the cabinet’s Women’s Taskforce was high, not just in Canberra but across the country.
On the agenda was delivering the government’s response to the Respect@Work report. Delivered by Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins more than one year ago, the report delivers recommendations for preventing and addressing sexual harassment. NFAW, along with many others, had written to the government to highlight the need to implement the 55 recommendations in full.
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After weeks of scandal, the government seeks cultural change
In the wake of a series of political disgraces of the worst kind, much-needed change is being driven by the work of Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins.
Tom McIlroy Political reporter
Apr 10, 2021 – 12.00am
Long before most Australians had ever heard of Brittany Higgins or the notorious “Big Swinging Dicks” of federal Parliament, Sex Discrimination Commissioner Kate Jenkins understood the power of a crisis.
“It is often said that change comes through leadership or scandal,” she told this newspaper in March 2018. “But often leadership comes after scandal.”
Commissioned by then minister for women, Kelly O’Dwyer, to lead what would become the landmark Respect@Work report, Jenkins was seeing long overdue change sweeping the world through the #MeToo movement.
Fast-forward two years and two weeks and it’s her own work driving the change, much closer to home. This comes in the wake of scandals of the worst kind – allegations of rape, lewd behaviour and a powerful reckoning for powerful men.
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Watch out - four-year fixed rates are on the march
The Reserve Bank of Australia does not expect to raise rates until 2024, so why are some fixed-rate home loans moving now?
James Frost Financial services writer
Apr 10, 2021 – 12.00am
Commonwealth Bank’s decision to raise the interest rate on its fixed four-year home loan by 20 basis points last month sent a shudder through any borrower who has yet to take advantage of some of the lowest rates in history.
Viewed in isolation, the move from 1.99 per cent to 2.19 per cent was not a big deal. Four-year fixed terms aren’t the most popular fixed-rate product and this was just one lender.
At the same time, it is Australia’s biggest lender and it had decided it wasn’t going to make enough money over the life of the loan, repricing it after less than six months in the market.
Was this the beginning of the end? Would record low rates for fixed terms start edging higher across the board? Have borrowers missed a once-in-a-lifetime chance to get one over the banks by locking in a sub 2 per cent loan for one of their biggest expenses?
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Fraud, force and genocide: An extraordinary day in the annals of Australia’s national life
Peter Hartcher
Political and international editor
April 10, 2021 — 6.00am
Genocidal? Who, us? It was an extraordinary day in the annals of Australia’s national life. China’s representative in Australia opened his home to reporters on Wednesday to persuade them that the Beijing government wanted only the best for its Uighur ethnic minority in the northwestern province of Xinjiang.
The government of the US, the parliaments of Canada and the Netherlands and Britain’s House of Lords have damned China’s treatment of its Uighur people as the gravest possible crime against humanity – genocide. Neither Australia’s government nor Parliament has done so. Yet.
Momentum is building worldwide. The Biden administration said this week that it was considering whether to declare a boycott on China’s hosting of the winter Olympics next year. The president of Britain’s Jewish Board of Deputies, Marie van der Zyl, has written to China’s ambassador to London: “Nobody can fail to notice the similarities between what is alleged to be happening in the People’s Republic of China today and what happened in Nazi Germany – people being forcibly loaded on to trains, beards of religious men being trimmed, women being sterilised and the grim spectre of concentration camps.”
Momentum is building in Australia, too. The House of Representatives in Canberra three weeks ago debated a motion that called on the House to record its “abhorrence that the Chinese Government continues to engage in serious and systematic breaches of the human rights of its peoples” and called on the UN to investigate.
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Peter Carey: ‘I don’t think we’re going to lose great literature because Philip Roth acted like an arsehole’
April 10, 2021 — 1.28pm
“I’ve said a lot of stupid things but that’s the one stupid thing I won’t say,” Peter Carey replies when asked the question all writers hate to be asked: when will you finish your book?
The Australian writer, who has won the Booker prize twice and has a trio of Miles Franklin awards, has been working on a novel while in lockdown in what was the epicentre of America’s coronavirus crisis, New York. This week marked the first time in a year Carey, 77, now vaccinated, had been out with friends.
Carey will release his 20th book into a very different world from his debut, the short story collection War Crimes, published in 1979 when the boy from Bacchus Marsh worked at a Sydney advertising agency.
The profound social changes driven by the #MeToo and Black Lives Matter movements have disrupted the world of literature, which is grappling with debates about who can tell what stories, whether we should separate the art from the artist, the need for diverse representation and how to deal with older books that don’t meet current standards of acceptability.
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How to make electric cars affordable for everyone
The result of letting the market determine how many electric vehicles we drive is that our roads are packed with vehicles much larger and more powerful than necessary.
Tony Davis Motoring Writer
Apr 10, 2021 – 12.00am
Almost all our governments, state and federal, say they are in favour of electric cars. But where there are policies to encourage uptake, they tend to avoid articulating the desired endpoint, or to ask the simple question “What are we trying to achieve?”
If the aim is to decarbonise our cars, then how, and when? And do we accept there will be some pain? No, too hard, let’s just announce a few more fast-charging stations.
If we were to set some hard targets, how might we do it? Let’s say we want zero emission cars only by 2035. That’s five years after the UK and Germany have vowed to stop the sale of new petrol and diesel vehicles, but we’re already well behind.
Some argue we should leave it to the market. We’ve largely done that until now and, instead of showcasing the latest fuel-efficient models, our roads are packed with mobile McMansions, most of them vastly larger, heavier and more powerful than they need be.
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China’s African iron ore strategy spells danger for Australia
The Simandou iron ore deposit in West Africa has the potential to change the dynamics of the global iron ore market and put China in the driver’s seat.
Apr 9, 2021 – 6.58pm
With the iron ore price hovering around $US160 a tonne and Australia exporting about 20 million tonnes of ore from the Pilbara every week, the country is earning about $585 million a day from China.
Thanks to rising demand from Chinese steel mills, the revenue from each tonne of high-grade iron ore has risen 80 per cent in the year to date and is up 100 per cent on a year ago.
This trend has been fantastic for the bigger economic picture, especially considering the disruption caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. In the December quarter, Australia’s current account was $14.5 billion or about 2.9 per cent of gross domestic product (GDP).
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Coronavirus And Impacts.
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Our vaccine rollout is a disaster – here’s how to fix it
By Steven Hamilton and Richard Holden
April 5, 2021 — 5.00am
Australia’s vaccine rollout has so far been an unmitigated disaster. It’s simply untenable for the federal government to continue to pretend it’s going well. We started months after the United States, Britain, the European Union and many others. And now that our long-overdue program has finally begun, we’ve only administered half as many shots per head of population as other countries at the six-week mark.
If the first step in solving any problem is recognising there is one, the second is having a concrete plan on how to proceed. The cold, hard reality is that we’ve delivered a jab to only about 2 per cent of Australians, while Britain and the US are at 46 per cent and 30 per cent, respectively. There’s simply no time left to waste.
This week, a war of words erupted between the federal government and the states over who is to blame. The feds say they’ve given the states thousands of doses they haven’t administered. The states say they haven’t been given enough doses with enough notice, nor sufficient guidance on how the rollout is to proceed. To fix our rollout, we need to end the blame game. That fix comes in four parts.
First, the states need to be given full autonomy over how their rollout proceeds. It beggars belief that the level of government that runs our public hospitals hasn’t played a bigger role to date. One of the most basic principles of economics is that to achieve good outcomes, the party with control over an outcome should be accountable for it. The federal government should be ready and willing to supply any number of vaccines the states should require. Once delivered, the states should have full discretion as to how they’re administered – and wear the public consequences for underperformance.
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Australia paid a high price for unsatisfying report into global tragedy
Peter Hartcher
Political and international editor
April 6, 2021 — 5.30am
Probably no country has paid as high a price as Australia did for the international inquiry into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. By becoming the first in the world publicly to call for an independent investigation, Australia made itself a target of the Chinese Communist Party.
We know the price we had to pay – punitive Chinese government sanctions on Australian trade worth over $20 billion a year.
But what have we gained? The first report by the scientific investigation was published last week, almost a full year since Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne went on TV to propose the probe.
You need to know that the investigation was put together by the World Health Organisation under terms negotiated with China’s government. There were 17 scientists from China and 17 from other nations, including Australia, Britain, Denmark, Germany, Japan, the Netherlands, Russia, Vietnam and US.
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Scientists divided on whether AstraZeneca clotting can be treated
Some say yes, some are unsure, but all agree there is work ahead to help people recognise symptoms and act fast.
Jill Margo Health editor
Apr 8, 2021 – 5.19pm
The key question about the very rare, but dangerous, blood-clotting syndrome now increasingly associated with the AstraZeneca jab is whether everyone who develops it can be successfully treated.
While some experts in the field say everyone can be treated, if diagnosed in time, others are less certain. To be diagnosed in time, people need to be aware of the signs and act on them quickly.
This clotting issue is moving fast, with new evidence emerging and new decisions being made by authorities almost daily. It is now understood that Australian and international authorities are in consultation and that this may lead to new guidelines very soon.
Unlike routine clotting problems that cause a standard stroke or a heart attack, this new clotting problem is immune driven. Something goes awry with the immune system and antibodies activate platelets (clotting cells), deplete them in the bloodstream and cause clotting in unusual places.
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Blood clots spark overhaul of AstraZeneca vaccine rollout
Tom McIlroy Political reporter
Updated Apr 8, 2021 – 8.42pm, first published at 6.31pm
Key Points
- The government will recommend the AstraZeneca vaccine only for people aged over 50 after concerns about a rare blood clotting syndrome.
- Younger Australians will be advised to take the Pfizer vaccine but can still have the AstraZeneca shot if required.
- The risk of blood clots after having the AstraZeneca vaccine is about four in 1 million and the vaccine is still considered safe.
The Morrison government has been forced to overhaul Australia’s COVID-19 vaccine rollout, after experts said the AstraZeneca drug was not advisable for people younger than 50 because of fears of blood clots.
Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced changes to the vaccine rollout on Thursday night after European health authorities warned of the risk of rare but serious side effects from the drug which is the centrepiece of Australia’s vaccination effort.
The Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation (ATAGI) said the use of the Pfizer drug is preferable for adults under 50, based on the increased risk of complications. The Oxford University-developed AstraZeneca drug should only be given to people under 50 where the benefits outweigh any risk.
But Australians who have had their first dose of AstraZeneca without serious adverse reactions are cleared to receive a second dose. Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly said the clotting events were rare but serious and could cause a death rate of up to 25 per cent when recorded.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/health-and-education/paying-for-lack-of-vaccine-insurance-20210408-p57hhk
Paying for lack of vaccine insurance
The government may have found another 20 million Pfizer shots as it limits use of AstraZeneca. But there have been too many unforced errors as well.
Steven Hamilton and Richard Holden
Apr 9, 2021 – 1.17pm
What a difference 24 hours makes. No sooner had the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation struck a seemingly mortal blow to our vaccine rollout by cautioning the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine for those under 50, than Scott Morrison revealed the ace up his sleeve in the form of 20 million additional doses of Pfizer to be delivered this year. While the outcome is welcome, the crisis preceding it is just the latest in a series of unanticipated failures, exposing the haphazard nature of our vaccine strategy.
We’ve seen the failure of the locally developed UQ vaccine, which caused false-positive HIV test results in some recipients. The European Union then blocked exports of millions of doses of our next-leading contender, the AstraZeneca vaccine.
There has since been a series of delays in our domestic production of that vaccine. And there were widespread concerns over its efficacy relative to the Pfizer, Moderna, and Novavax vaccines long before this latest mishap.
At every point, policymakers have deflected blame, pointing the finger at “supply”, which they say is beyond their control. But if you have a car crash without insurance, blaming the other driver doesn’t always get you very far.
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https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/morrison-s-pandemic-credentials-turn-to-dust-20210408-p57hhl
Morrison’s pandemic credentials turn to dust
From sexual harassment to the Holgate affair and the escalating debacle of the vaccine rollout, government policies that are not well thought through keep backfiring on the Morrison government.
Laura Tingle Columnist
Apr 9, 2021 – 4.45pm
Let’s start with the one thing Scott Morrison has definitely got right in the past couple of weeks, and then move on from there.
Well, actually he didn’t actually get his facts right. But, accidentally, he rather nailed an issue, even if it was a nail hammered through his own boot.
It was his “mea culpa” press conference on March 23, following the revelation of a now notorious masturbatory offence against a piece of Parliament House furniture where, when challenged about his lack of control over government staff, he threatened a journalist from Sky News about people in glass houses not throwing stones.
Unfortunately for the Prime Minister, his claim that a person “in your own organisation” was under investigation “by your own HR department” about the “harassment of a woman in a women’s toilet” was wrong.
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https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/the-astrazeneca-decision-is-a-political-debacle-20210409-p57hrp
The AstraZeneca decision is a political debacle
The Astra Zeneca decision shows the same level of risk aversion that meant borders were shut on a whim and will now govern the road out.
Phillip Coorey Political editor
Apr 9, 2021 – 3.41pm
Anyone who thought Scott Morrison might have been bluffing when he insisted the election would not be held until next year, should now disabuse themselves of that notion.
Thursday night’s decision to recommend people under 50 not to get the AstraZeneca vaccine has killed off the latest target that every Australian would have at least had one injection by the end of October.
Now, that may not even be the case by the end of the year. Most likely, the vaccine program will run into early next year. The potential political consequences are far-reaching.
The longer it takes to vaccinate the population, the longer we have to put up with ad hoc border closures, snap lock downs, sclerotic international travel and long quarantine periods. All of which impedes people’s lives and prosperity and the ability of the economy to recover.
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The long shot: delays, uncertainty and confusion in Australia’s vaccine rollout
By Rachel Clun
April 10, 2021 — 5.00am
At 7.20pm on Thursday, a stony-faced Prime Minister walked into the blue room at Parliament House flanked by the Health Minister and the country’s top health officials. AstraZeneca, long touted as the workhorse of the vaccine rollout, was no longer the preferred choice for those aged under 50.
Just 15 minutes before facing the handful of journalists still in Parliament, the government had received advice from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation that the vaccine rollout plan would have to be drastically changed.
Chief Medical Officer Professor Paul Kelly outlined the rare but serious blood-clotting side effect — venous thromboembolism — that has been seen in Europe, the UK and in one person in Australia after receiving the AstraZeneca vaccine.
“This is a very rare event. At the moment, it seems to be around 4 to 6 per million doses of vaccine. It’s only been found in the first dose of the AstraZeneca vaccine, usually within four to 10 days after that vaccine. But it is serious, and it can cause up to a 25 per cent death rate,” he said.
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Climate Change.
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No entries in this section.
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Royal Commissions And The Like.
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No entries in this section.
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National Budget Issues.
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IMF says copy Abbott’s budget repair levy, warns against big spending cuts
By Shane Wright
April 4, 2021 — 8.01pm
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has urged nations to consider using the Abbott government’s temporary budget repair levy to overcome the huge deficits left by the coronavirus recession, warning deep cuts to spending could lead to political instability.
Amid predictions the budget deficit facing the Morrison government could be up to $50 billion less than feared, the IMF has also suggested taxes on “excess” profits such as the abandoned mining resource rent tax.
Governments around the world have all been forced to run huge deficits to deal with last year’s COVID-19 outbreak, with collective deficits approaching 13 per cent of global GDP. Australia’s deficit, forecast to reach $197.9 billion this financial year, is close to 10 per cent of national GDP.
The IMF, in its fiscal monitor report ahead of this week’s world economic outlook, said while governments had been forced to run large deficits, there had also been an increase in income and wealth inequality because of the coronavirus outbreak.
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Heat comes out of fixed rate mortgage options
10:57PM April 4, 2021
A raft of lenders including the Commonwealth Bank and Bendigo Bank are quietly ditching their ultra-low four-year fixed rate offers, pushing borrowers into shorter-term financing options in the face of a hot property market.
The move comes as Australians have been rushing into fixed loans at a record rate, as homeowners seek to lock in cheap financing for the long term. Confidence among homeowners has been boosted by the Reserve Bank of Australia repeatedly saying it has no plans to raise the official cash rate until 2024.
But money markets are pricing in cash rate rises before then, prompting some banks to move away from deeply discounted long-term fixed loans.
Ten lenders hiked their four-year fixed rate last month, while many more cut their shorter fixed rates, according to figures compiled by comparison website RateCity.com.au.
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Where did reserve banks come from – and what’s monetary policy?
How did the RBA evolve? What is monetary policy? And what’s jawboning?
By Shane Wright
April 5, 2021
It is Australia’s most important bank but it doesn’t have any customers. You can’t open an account with this bank, it’s unlikely you’ll ever meet the manager and it doesn’t even have ATMs.
But the Reserve Bank of Australia is pivotal to the national economy. From house prices to wages, the Reserve (RBA) influences even the smallest financial transaction in the country. It does this through monetary policy – the interest rate set by the bank once a month that affects the cost of money.
Anyone with a note or two in their wallet also has a reminder of the Reserve Bank’s other key function. The signature of the bank’s governor is on every note – it is the RBA that prints our colourful collection of currency.
Over the past year, the bank has been forced into lowering interest rates to an all-time low of just 0.1 per cent. It has also started buying government debt, creating close to $200 billion (with more to come) as it tries to strengthen the economy (see the section on jawboning, below).
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https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/what-is-quantitative-easing-20190925-p52unt.html
What is quantitative easing? What is helicopter money?
It's not for the faint-hearted but it's now being used around the world. What is unconventional monetary policy, and what is "QE"?
By Shane Wright
November 4, 2020
As the world moves deeper into the coronavirus pandemic, an already flailing world economy is being pushed to its very limits. But before anyone had learnt about a new disease in the Chinese city of Wuhan, the concept of quantitative easing was being floated as a possibility.
Reserve Bank governor Philip Lowe, in the immediate wake of last year's May election, had signalled his desire to see the economy grow much faster so as to drive down unemployment and lift wages.
In June, official interest rates were cut to 1.25 per cent. By the end of 2019, they were at 0.75 per cent with Dr Lowe revealing the RBA was starting to war-game other policies to get the economy moving. On Melbourne Cup Day, the bank took official interest rates to 0.1 per cent and cut another rate it offers commercial banks to zero while it embarked on plans to buy $100 billion of federal and state government debt.
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The central bank under fire: Has the RBA failed Australians?
By Shane Wright
April 6, 2021
Struck in bronze and attached to a dominating piece of stone in the foyer of the Reserve Bank’s headquarters in Sydney’s Martin Place is the bank’s charter.
Every day, as bank staff enter the building, they are reminded of the central bank’s critical functions.
Those functions are to direct bank policy to the “greatest advantage of the people of Australia”. It is to do that through three key actions: maintaining the stability of the currency, ensuring full employment and furthering the “economic prosperity and welfare of the people of Australia”.
Upholding these objectives has a tremendous impact on the economy, from a family trying to afford their mortgage, to a business considering a pay rise for their staff.
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‘Last kick of the can’: Property market reckoning coming
By Shane Wright
April 8, 2021
The Reserve Bank’s charter requires it to work towards the economic prosperity and welfare of all Australians, but for most people that can be narrowed down to one issue – house prices.
Since the advent of non-bank lenders in the mortgage market in the 1990s, property prices have grown faster than wages and inflation, generating an ongoing debate about who is to blame for a situation that leaves one of the world’s most sparsely populated nations with some of the globe’s most expensive housing.
It’s an issue of which the RBA is acutely aware. And the sharp lift in house prices through the past 12 months, as interest rates have fallen to their lowest levels in history while governments have thrown billions of dollars at housing stimulus packages, has amplified the focus on the RBA and its role.
Commonwealth Bank’s head of Australian economics, Gareth Aird, says falling interest rates have been a major economic tailwind for the past 30 years.
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Australia leads world with $590bn Covid debt spike
Australia’s public debt is on track to rise by more than any other developed nation over the three years to 2022, according to the International Monetary Fund’s latest global debt outlook that weighs the impact of a combined US$16 trillion ($20.9 trillion) in pandemic budget support.
Australia’s combined state and federal government debts are expected to rise from the equivalent of 47.5 per cent of GDP in 2019 to 77 per cent of GDP in 2022, a bigger increase as a share of national output than any of the 35 major developed nations the IMF tracks.
For Australia, with an annual GDP of about $2 trillion, a 29.5 per cent rise equates to about $590 billion.
“Average public debt worldwide reached an unprecedented 97 per cent of GDP in 2020 and is projected to stabilise at around 99 per cent of GDP in 2021,” the IMF said in its latest Fiscal Monitor, calling on governments to consider increased wealth, property and make income tax more progressive to stabilise budgets into the future.
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The RBA unveils its financial risk score
Meet the Australian Financial Conditions Index, which in time may be a useful addition to a monetary policy dashboard.
Jonathan Shapiro Senior reporter
Apr 8, 2021 – 10.06am
Like clockwork, the end of the month seems to bring with it some chaotic market event. In January, we had GameStop’s epic short squeeze, in February, the bond market fell out of bed, and in March, Archegos Capital imploded as prime brokers margin-called their adventurous client.
The three incidents could not be more varied involving retail punters, bond traders and a highly leveraged hedge fund. But if a common link exists it could be in the withdrawal of leverage by the banking system so that the monthly snapshot of risk and activity appears more palatable than it actually was in the intermittent period.
So far, global markets have managed to absorb these incidences with limited spillover. But the size and importance of financial markets have policymakers fretting about systemic risk, and regulators have been quick to explore the cause and effect of these conniptions.
How brokers and central banks think about the risks of financial markets are very different. But a paper published last week by the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) shows there are also similarities.
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https://www.afr.com/policy/economy/the-rba-is-on-alert-for-rise-in-risky-home-buyers-20210409-p57hro
The RBA is on alert for rise in risky home buyers
Jonathan Shapiro and John Kehoe
Apr 9, 2021 – 11.41am
The Reserve Bank says increased risk taking by optimistic borrowers could lead to a build-up of risks in the housing market, even if the banks maintained lending discipline.
In the semi-annual health check of the financial system, the Reserve Bank downplayed the threat of rapidly rising house prices to financial stability, saying it had not been accompanied by a build-up in debt.
But it was monitoring the housing market and the potential for excessive “risk-taking by the financial sector” which could take the form of looser lending standards or a relaxation of internal limits of the share of riskier loans they make.
“Even if lenders do not weaken their own settings, increased risk-taking by optimistic borrowers could see deterioration in the average quality of new lending,” the Reserve Bank said in its April financial stability review published on Friday.
“This would weaken the resilience of businesses and households, and so the financial system, to future shocks.
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Vaccine setback won’t derail budget or recovery, says Frydenberg
Apr 10, 2021 – 12.00am
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg says the economy is in a strong position to overcome the vaccine-rollout setback and the government will not be deterred from withdrawing emergency spending to prepare for a post-pandemic world.
Economists warn that the vaccine delay would slightly impede the economic recovery because any virus breakouts could trigger snap lockdowns, state border closures and longer waits to get international tourists and students back to Australia.
Less than five weeks from the May 11 federal budget, Mr Frydenberg told AFR Weekend in a pre-budget interview that the AstraZeneca vaccine advice for under-50s “was another reminder we’re still in the middle of a pandemic”, though he declined to specify the potential economic impact.
Jobs, hiring intentions, consumer spending and business confidence were all high and the positive economic momentum could continue because Australia had “successfully suppressed the virus”, he said.
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RBA warns against ‘over-exuberance’ as house prices rise
By Clancy Yeates
April 9, 2021 — 12.04pm
The Reserve Bank has warned that a debt-fuelled surge in house prices could leave households more exposed to financial shocks, as it urged banks not to let their lending standards slip.
With house prices soaring at their fastest pace since the late 1980s, the RBA on Friday said it was closely watching the property market and the risk that ultra-low interest rates led to “over-exuberence”.
The RBA said that so far, Australian banks’ lending standards remained prudent and credit growth had only lifted slightly. But it warned that even if banks did not change their risk settings, a spurt of borrowing by optimistic home buyers could leave households and the wider financial system in greater danger in a future shock.
Despite highlighting the dangers of property overheating, however, the RBA made no mention of any need to dampen the market’s red-hot growth, and said households, businesses and banks were well-placed to deal with any weakening economic conditions.
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House prices threaten debt blowout
The Reserve Bank has warned that the financial system could be rocked if any blowout in debt is accompanied by a correction in surging asset prices, such as property.
In its biannual financial stability review, released on Friday, the RBA canvassed the downside of the boom in property prices if conditions were to change.
While the growth in asset prices, including property and equities, had not been associated with a significant increase in debt, it could lead to “over-exuberance”, increased risk-taking and higher debt.
“In this situation lending standards could weaken, with asset prices being pushed above their fundamental values,” the review said. “A correction in asset prices, if borrowers’ income were to fall and so they defaulted on debt repayments, would expose lenders to large losses on the increased debt, particularly if the quality of that debt had been eroded.”
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Health Issues.
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Paracetamol may be no better than a placebo in many cases
By Harriet Alexander
April 5, 2021 — 12.01am
Paracetamol medication such as Panadol may be no better than a placebo in most common pain conditions, according to the largest review of the evidence to support its use.
Researchers from the University of Sydney looked at systemic reviews which evaluated the trial data for paracetamol for pain relief in 44 conditions and found that it was only proved to be effective in knee and hip osteoarthritis, craniotomy, tension headache and perineal pain after childbirth.
But for other conditions where paracetamol is commonly used – including migraine, post-operative pain, dental procedures, childhood middle ear infections, back pain, abdominal pain and common cold-related headaches – the evidence to support its use was low quality or inconclusive.
Paracetamol is the most commonly used painkiller in Australia. Sales have increased by 75 per cent since the government rescheduled codeine medication in 2018 to make it available only by prescription, to give it a 60.1 per cent market share of over-the-counter analgesics.
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International Issues.
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In show of Pharaonic heritage, Egypt parades royal mummies
By Samy Magdy
April 4, 2021 — 10.26am
Cairo: Egypt has held a gala parade celebrating the transport of 22 of its prized royal mummies from central Cairo to their new resting place in a massive new museum further south in the capital.
The ceremony, designed to showcase the country’s rich heritage, snaked along the Nile corniche from the Egyptian Museum overlooking Tahrir Square to the newly opened National Museum of Egyptian Civilisation in the Fustat neighbourhood, where Egypt’s first Islamic capital was located.
The mummies were being transported on Saturday (Egypt time) in climate-controlled cases loaded onto trucks decorated with wings and pharaonic design for the hour-long journey from their previous home in the older Egyptian Museum. The vehicles were designed to appear like the ancient boats used to carry deceased pharaohs to their tombs.
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https://www.afr.com/world/north-america/trump-s-grip-on-republicans-is-still-growing-20210405-p57gin
Trump’s grip on Republicans is still growing
It is all too easy to forget former US President Donald Trump’s nightmarish closing days and proclaim America’s return to democratic health. But that would be premature.
Edward Luce Columnist
Apr 5, 2021 – 9.27am
One-term US presidents almost never get another bite at the apple. That is because they acknowledge their defeat at the ballot box. Donald Trump, on the other hand, has been telling supporters that he will be tempted to beat Democrats “for a third time”.
Most Republican voters still think last year’s election was stolen. It is difficult to imagine Trump would face a serious conservative rival, should he run again in 2024.
To some extent he should thank Joe Biden for that. Having championed popular spending bills in his first two months, Biden has deprived Republicans of a populist economic critique. Trump showed in 2016 that embracing big government was no obstacle to becoming his party’s nominee.
The libertarian impulse is barely perceptible among today’s Republican voters, many of whom are happy with Bidenomics. The party’s energy is thus increasingly spent on cultural resentment.
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Jordan shaken by split between King and ex-crown prince
The crisis over the weekend prompted the US and other Jordanian allies, which view King Abdullah as a crucial partner in countering terrorism in the Middle East, to express support for him.
Rana Sweis, Adam Rasgon and Patrick Kingsley
Apr 5, 2021 – 11.52am
Amman | The kingdom of Jordan has long been considered an oasis of relative stability in the Middle East. While wars and insurgencies flared in neighbouring Syria and Iraq, Jordan was for decades considered a secure and dependable ally of the United States, a buffer against attacks on Israel, and a key interlocutor with Palestinians.
But at the weekend, that placid image was upended as a long-simmering rift between the king, Abdullah II, and a former crown prince, Hamzah bin Hussein, burst into the public eye.
On Sunday (Monday AEDT), the government accused Prince Hamzah, the king’s younger half-brother, of “destabilising Jordan’s security”, making far more explicit claims about his alleged involvement than it did the evening before, when it first divulged the supposed conspiracy.
In a speech on Sunday afternoon, the Jordanian foreign minister, Ayman Safadi, directly accused Prince Hamzah of working with a former finance minister, Bassem Awadallah, and a junior member of the royal family, Sharif Hassan bin Zaid, to target “the security and stability of the nation.”
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Biden’s $US7 trillion punt on US growth and economic supremacy
Stephen Bartholomeusz
Senior business columnist
April 5, 2021 — 1.48pm
For the first time in two decades the US economy seems likely to grow faster and contribute more to global growth this year than China’s. Whether that’s a good thing is in the eye of the beholder.
Since 2000 China has been the major contributor to global growth. That position was enhanced by its response to the 2008 financial crisis, when its massive stimulus programs powered its growth rate even as other large economies floundered and then stagnated.
It has emerged from the pandemic with an economy less damaged and recovering faster than any other major economy. While its GDP growth of 2.3 per cent last year was its lowest for 45 years it was still the only large economy to record positive growth. The US economy shrank 3.5 per cent in 2020 and the European Union’s 6.2 per cent.
Yet its target for 2021 – above six per cent – surprised economists with its apparent modesty, given the economy is still rebounding from the pandemic amid a global recovery.
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Yellen argues for global minimum corporate tax rate
Timothy Moore Online editor
Apr 6, 2021 – 5.18am
US Treasury secretary Janet Yellen said the time has arrived for a rethink on global corporate tax rates, though at least one economist said countries should not necessarily heed the call.
One “consequence of an interconnected world has been a thirty-year race to the bottom on corporate tax rates,” Dr Yellen said in the text of a speech for The Chicago Council on Global Affairs.
Dr Yellen said competitiveness is about more than how US-headquartered companies fare against other companies in global merger and acquisition bids.
“It is about making sure that governments have stable tax systems that raise sufficient revenue to invest in essential public goods and respond to crises, and that all citizens fairly share the burden of financing government.”
President Joe Biden last week detailed a plan to lift the US corporate tax rate to 28 per cent to help pay for $3 trillion in spending on roads, bridges as well as home care for seniors and manufacturing.
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Putin signs law that would allow him to stay in power until 2036
By Vladimir Isachenkov
April 6, 2021 — 3.48am
Moscow: Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed a law allowing him to potentially hold onto power until 2036, a move that formalises constitutional changes endorsed in a vote last year.
The July 1 constitutional vote included a provision that reset Putin’s previous term limits, allowing him to run for president two more times. The change was rubber-stamped by the Kremlin-controlled legislature and the relevant law signed by Putin was posted on Monday, local time, on an official portal of legal information.
The 68-year-old Russian President, who has been in power for more than two decades –longer than any other Kremlin leader since Soviet dictator Josef Stalin – said he would decide later whether to run again in 2024 when his current six-year term ends.
He has argued that resetting the term count was necessary to keep his lieutenants focused on their work instead of “darting their eyes in search for possible successors”.
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A possible QAnon slip-up suggests the truth of Q’s identity was right there all along
By Drew Harwell and Craig Timberg
April 6, 2021 — 2.17am
The identity of Q, the supposed top-secret government operative and prophet of the extremist ideology QAnon, has for years been a fiercely debated mystery. But a possible slip-up in a new documentary suggests the answer was always the most obvious one: Ron Watkins, the long-time administrator of the message board 8kun, the conspiratorial movement’s online home.
Most major QAnon researchers have long speculated that Watkins had written many of the false and cryptic posts alleging that former president Donald Trump was waging war against an elite international cabal of Satan-worshipping paedophiles. Watkins has long denied his involvement, saying he was merely a neutral backroom operator of the site and never a participant.
But in the Sunday finale for the HBO series Q: Into the Storm, filmmaker Cullen Hoback points to what he argues is a key piece of evidence that Watkins had lied about his role in the more than 4000 messages Q had posted since 2017.
In a final scene, after Watkins talked about how he had shared voter-fraud conspiracy theories after Trump’s loss in the 2020 elections, he told Hoback: “It was basically three years of intelligence training, teaching normies how to do intelligence work. It was basically what I was doing anonymously before, but never as Q.”
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If Myanmar crisis is not resolved, all of Asia will suffer
By Jemilah Mahmood
April 5, 2021 — 1.00pm
Since February, when Myanmar’s generals toppled democratically elected leaders in a coup d’etat, at least 500 civilians have been killed. As the coup turns into daily tales of bloodshed, the time for global action has never been more urgent. If nations, specifically Association of South-East Asian Nations member states, cannot address Myanmar’s flagrant breach of the ASEAN charter then instability and violence will bleed into Asia and world.
Ever since the Tatmadaw junta – Myanmar’s self-appointed military leaders – unilaterally overthrew Aung San Suu Kyi’s democratically elected party, multiple atrocities have been perpetuated. The is increasing evidence of arbitrary arrests, detention without access to due process, allegations of torture and extremely serious allegations of organ harvesting.
This has the potential to cause instability, not only in Myanmar, but across the entire ASEAN region and beyond in the near neighbourhood: outflows of Myanmar citizens into China, Thailand, Bangladesh, India and beyond, renewed conflict on the border with China, and a return to military rule of people who have, for the last 10 years, had a taste of greater freedoms.
Already the evidence points to sharp escalation in violence and instability. It is only a matter of time before peaceful protesters take up arms in a fresh civil war, or neighbouring countries are forced to make hard decisions to protect their borders.
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China creates its own digital currency, a first for major economy
· The Wall Street Journal
A thousand years ago, when money meant coins, China invented paper currency. Now the Chinese government is minting cash digitally, in a re-imagination of money that could shake a pillar of American power.
It might seem money is already virtual, as credit cards and payment apps such as Apple Pay in the US and WeChat in China eliminate the need for bills or coins. But those are just ways to move money electronically. China is turning legal tender itself into computer code.
Cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin have foreshadowed a potential digital future for money, though they exist outside the traditional global financial system and aren’t legal tender like cash issued by governments.
China’s version of a digital currency is controlled by its central bank, which will issue the new electronic money. It is expected to give China’s government vast new tools to monitor both its economy and its people. By design, the digital yuan will negate one of bitcoin’s major draws: anonymity for the user.
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Joe Biden casts the die on a progressive revolution
1:00AM April 7, 2021
President Joe Biden now prosecutes the most progressive revolution in American policy for a half-century. Invoking the pandemic crisis, Biden seeks not just to rebuild but to transform America, inviting parallels with Franklin Roosevelt in the 1930s after the Depression.
During the campaign Donald Trump mocked Biden as “Sleepy Joe”, but the joke is on Trump. Biden asserts the idea of a historical turning point in his rapid response — his mission is to “rebuild the middle class” post-pandemic and prove that democratic America can out-compete autocratic China in what he sees as a global ideological confrontation.
The liberal Washington Post says Biden’s agenda “represents an unapologetic commitment to bigger federal government with bigger responsibilities for the foreseeable future”. But that’s only half the story — Biden’s spending will be financed largely by corporate America with a lift in the corporate tax rate from 21 per cent to 28 per cent.
The Wall Street Journal warns that Biden is using the crisis as cover for a huge progressive agenda; it says the economy will soar this year anyway and Biden’s new $4 trillion spending plan is “a case of needless excess”. The Journal says Biden “wants to pass an FDR agenda on a Donald Trump mandate” and “we hope he gets the furious resistance he’s inviting”.
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Why UK value stocks will prove to be the ‘trade of the decade’
A once-in-a-decade opportunity has emerged in UK equities where value stocks will double in price during the post-COVID-19 recovery period.
Mike Aked Contributor
Apr 7, 2021 – 11.55am
Last year the world economy crashed into the most co-ordinated global recession of the post-war period. This time Australia’s remoteness and robust housing market was not enough to protect us. Luckily, from this tragedy a once-in-a-decade opportunity has emerged in the UK in the form of value stocks.
A recession is tough on these companies and many usually go bankrupt. And the market pricing of these unloved companies looked like 2020 was going to be a corporate bloodbath. But this did not come to pass.
Most investors ask for investments that are cheap, performing well, and in a trend supported by the global governments and central banks. We are firmly in a global economic recovery. Value has been unloved and is therefore cheap; value has strong recent performance, and globally we wish this recovery to persist.
The brave will see the opportunity – and the best money is to be had in the laggards in the UK.
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https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/05/opinion/enlightenment-islam-robinson-crusoe.html
The Muslims Who Inspired Spinoza, Locke and Defoe
A novel written by a 12th-century Arab writer about a boy alone on an island influenced the Daniel Defoe classic ‘Robinson Crusoe.’
Mr. Akyol is a contributing Op-Ed writer.
April 5, 2021
In this age of anxiety, anger and contestations between the West and the Islamic world, many epoch-shaping stories of intellectual exchanges between our cultures are often forgotten.
A powerful example comes from literature. Millions of Christian, Jewish and Muslim readers across the world have read that famed tale of the man stranded alone on an island: “Robinson Crusoe” by Daniel Defoe, the 18th-century British pamphleteer, political activist and novelist.
Few know that in 1708, 11 years before Defoe wrote his celebrated novel, Simon Ockley, an Orientalist scholar at Cambridge University, translated and published a 12th-century Arabic novel, “Hayy ibn Yaqzan,” or “Alive, the Son of Awake,” by Abu Bakr Muhammad ibn Tufayl, an Andalusian-Arab polymath. Writing about the influence of Ibn Tufayl’s novel on Defoe’s “Robinson Crusoe,” Martin Wainwright, a former Guardian editor, remarked, “Tufayl’s footprints mark the great classic.”
Ibn Tufayl’s novel tells the tale of Hayy, a boy growing up alone on a deserted island, with animals. As he grows up, Hayy uses his senses and reason to understand the workings of the natural world. He explores the laws of nature, devises a rational theology and entertains theories about the origin of the universe. He develops a sense of ethics: Out of mercy for animals, he turns vegetarian, and out of care for plants, he preserves their seeds.
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https://www.afr.com/chanticleer/why-you-should-heed-jamie-dimon-house-price-warning-20210408-p57hh8
Why you should heed Jamie Dimon’s house price warning
The JPMorgan boss says poor housing affordability is contributing to the inequality tearing the US apart. Australia can learn from his message.
Apr 8, 2021 – 11.52am
JPMorgan chief executive Jamie Dimon could have predicted the reaction to his annual letter to shareholders, released in New York on Wednesday night.
Inevitably, most readers rushed to his comments on the economic outlook and the share market, which paint a rosy picture of a world rebounding rapidly from the biggest crisis in 70 years.
“I have little doubt that with excess savings, new stimulus savings, huge deficit spending, more QE, a new potential infrastructure bill, a successful vaccine and euphoria around the end of the pandemic, the US economy will likely boom,” Dimon writes.
“This boom could easily run into 2023 because all the spending could extend well into 2023.”
While there is “some froth and speculation” in equity markets that look “quite high” Dimon says the combination of low rates and these huge economic tailwinds might justify the big valuations.
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China uses old tricks in new Xinjiang propaganda campaign
Under renewed pressure from around the world, the Beijing PR machine is deploying enormous resources to depict a positive image of Uighurs in Xinjiang - but the West is not buying it.
Michael Smith China correspondent
Apr 8, 2021 – 5.22pm
China this week subjected the Canberra press gallery to a two-hour propaganda blitz designed to counter the backlash against its treatment of ethnic Uighur Muslims.
It was an uncomfortable reminder of my trip two years ago to Xinjiang, where I witnessed a nine-day parade of non-stop smiling, singing and dancing Uighurs prepared with scripted narratives about how good life was under the Chinese Communist Party.
The video, titled Xinjiang is a Wonderful Land, screened in Canberra is just a snapshot of the extraordinary amount of resources at the Chinese government’s disposal when it is determined to deliver a message.
In July 2019, I was part of a group of international journalists invited by the state to tour Xinjiang on what was billed as a “fact-finding mission”. We were closely supervised at all the times and could only speak to the Uighurs our government minders introduced us to.
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Federal Reserve’s Powell vows to restore ‘great’ economy
Craig Torres, Laura Davison and Eric Martin
Apr 9, 2021 – 8.31am
Washington | Jerome Powell pledged to get the US back to a “great economy” and invoked a homeless encampment in downtown Washington to make the point that the recovery remains incomplete.
Playing down the risk that inflation could get out of control as the pandemic recedes, the Federal Reserve chair told a virtual panel on Thursday (Friday AEST) that his commute home takes him past a “substantial tent city”, and that he thought of the millions of Americans who are still trying to get back to work.
“So we just need to keep reminding ourselves that even though some parts of the economy are just doing great, there’s a very large group of people who are not,” he said during the International Monetary Fund panel. “I really want to finish the job and get back to a great economy.”
Fed officials have repeatedly stressed that the US economy continues to need aggressive monetary policy support as it recovers from the pandemic, even as the outlook brightens amid widening vaccinations.
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Myanmar’s bloodshed reveals a world that has changed, and hasn’t
How the country became primed for a sort of violence, and a sort of dictatorship, that had grown rare.
Max Fisher
Apr 9, 2021 – 12.00am
Myanmar’s rulers have crossed a threshold few governments breach anymore: They have killed, by most estimates, more than 500 unarmed citizens of their own country.
Such massacres by government forces have, even in a time of rising nationalism and authoritarianism, been declining worldwide. This is the seventh in the past decade, compared with 23 in the 1990s, according to data from Uppsala University in Sweden.
And the violence in Myanmar was carried out by a sort of government that has grown rarer still: outright military rule.
Myanmar does not signify a return to an earlier era, experts believe, so much as an echo. Its violence hints at the ways in which the world has changed and has not.
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Leaders call for calm after fourth night of rioting in Belfast
April 8, 2021 — 6.12pm
London: Rioters set a hijacked bus on fire and hurled petrol bombs at police in Belfast in the fourth night of violence in a week in Northern Ireland, where Brexit has unsettled an uneasy political balance.
Youths threw projectiles and petrol bombs at police on Wednesday night, UK time, in the Protestant Shankill Road area, while rioters hurled objects in both directions over the concrete “peace wall” separating the Shankill Road from a neighbouring Irish nationalist area.
The police had to close roads into the nearby Protestant area as crowds from each divide attacked each other.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the unrest, and Northern Ireland’s Belfast-based government was due to hold an emergency meeting Thursday on the riots.
Johnson appealed for calm, saying “the way to resolve differences is through dialogue, not violence or criminality.” Northern Ireland First Minister Arlene Foster, of the pro-British Democratic Unionist Party, and Deputy First Minister Michelle O’Neill of Irish nationalists Sinn Fein both condemned the disorder and attacks on police.
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‘Deep sorrow’: Prince Philip dies in Windsor Castle aged 99
Updated April 9, 2021 — 10.21pmfirst published at 9.02pm
London: Prince Philip, the Queen’s husband of more than seven decades and a towering figure in British public life, has died. He was 99.
The Duke of Edinburgh died at Windsor Castle, a little over three weeks after he was discharged from a London hospital for treatment for an infection and to have a heart procedure.
The cause of his death has not been disclosed.
A former naval officer renowned for his sometimes brusque manner and humour, the duke married into the royal family in 1947, five years before the Queen ascended to the throne. He was the longest-serving consort of any British monarch.
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Mind blown: modern brains evolved later
Modern brains are younger than originally thought, possibly developing as recently as 1.5 million years ago, well after the earliest humans had already begun walking on two feet and had even started fanning out from Africa, a study shows.
Our first ancestors from the genus Homo emerged on the continent about 2.5 million years ago with primitive ape-like brains about half the size of those seen in today’s humans.
Study authors Chrisoph Zollikofer and Marcia Ponce de Leon examined skull fossils from Africa, Georgia and Java, and discovered the evolution actually took place between 1.7 million and 1.5 million years ago. Their study was published in the journal Science.
Since brains do not fossilise, the only way to observe their evolution is to study the marks they leave inside the skull.
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Ukraine fears attack as Putin masses tanks close to border
· The Times
Russia has moved troops, tanks and heavy artillery to a new base about 240km from the Ukrainian border, stoking fears of a military offensive.
Moscow has also sent short-range ballistic missiles, according to the Janes defence intelligence group.
It is thought to be Russia’s biggest show of force in the area since 2015, when Ukraine and Kremlin-backed separatists signed a peace deal to end fighting in the eastern Donbas region. At least 10 Ukrainian personnel have died during a recent rise in hostilities.
Ruslan Khomchak, the Ukrainian commander-in-chief, said last week that Russia had amassed 25,000 troops in the border regions of Bryansk, Rostov and Voronezh, as well as in Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014.
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China’s dilemma: Growing old before it becomes rich and powerful
North Asia correspondent
April 10, 2021 — 5.00am
For all countries, a lot depends on the dependency ratio. That is, the number of people aged under 14 and over 65, compared with the rest of the population.
In Australia, that figure is hovering close to 55 per cent, meaning there are more young and old people who are less likely to be working than there are those who are employed and paying taxes that fund healthcare, pensions, nursing homes and education.
The ratio will rise as the baby boomer generation retires, driving up the number of people aged 65 or more per 100 working-age people from 21 to 30 by 2031.
“In real dollar terms, this equates to an annual cost to the budget of around $36 billion by 2028–29,” the Parliamentary Budget Office found in 2019.
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I look forward to comments on all this!
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David.
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