Kevin Rudd cares deeply for his historical legacy, but it’s not yet time to pen History of Rudd the Great. Refugee policy, preventative health and tax changes will all mark his prime ministership, says Josh Gordon.
Ken Henry
Colebatch: Stop tooting your own horn Ken Henry, the economy ain’t that good
If the Australian economy passed the GFC test as Ken Henry claims, then we should expect government guarantees whenever financial markets cut off funds to Aussie lenders. This isn’t something to be proud of, writes Tim Colebatch.
Australia’s golden age extends to 2050
Don’t hide away your tuxedo yet, because Treasury Chief Ken Henry is declaring that Australia’s economic prosperity can stretch to at least 2050, as long as we use the population boom to our advantage.
You don’t have to be a roads scholar to work out congestion
Urban road transport is a vast public policy failure by governments that costs us billions of dollars a year, but it will go on being tolerated, chiefly because voters won’t accept the solution.
Milne: Leave Ken Henry alone!
“Public servant, private citizen”? Not anymore. The Coalition has made the national economic debate all about Treasury Secretary Ken Henry, says Glenn Milne.
Cut stimulus, cut 100,000 jobs, says Henry
Ken Henry has warned that the withdrawal of stimulus spending would cost 100,000 jobs and 1.5 percentage points in GDP growth in 2010.
Crikey Says: Stimulus is doing its job
The benefits of the stimulus package are being examined right now by the Economics Committee. But it’s the jobs saved or supported by the stimuli that are the only important economic indicators at the moment.
Henry: Stimulus cut will kill jobs
The removal of the governments fiscal stimulus now would cost Australia 100,000 more jobs, Treasury Secretary Ken Henry has told the Senate Economics Committee this morning.
Political economy: the jobs challenge
The good news is that the US downturn is in the process of bottoming, though jobs are still falling, with around 15 million workers unemployed, writes Henry Thornton.
A hard, tough and brutal tax debate is brewing
Tax reform shouldn’t be easy. Yet it is not clear that any reform will actually flow from the Henry Review, writes Sinclair Davidson.
Time to shut off the stimulus tap?
Know-it-alls Malcolm Turnbull, Joe Hockey and Barnaby Joyce reckon we should shut off the stimulus tap and start cutting back — but the debate is far from over. Perhaps they should do a bit of reading from the minutes of the latest RBA meeting.
The PM v Chris Mitchell: the feud hots up
The personal feud between PM Kevin Rudd and The Oz editor-in-chief, Chris Mitchell is getting messy. It’s clear that The Oz’s campaign against the Government isn’t slowing.
Circumspection please, Ken Henry is not the bunyip
Ken Henry has become a new bogeyman for conservatives; obviously his years of loyal service to the Howard Government have been forgotten.
A tax rort is a tax rort, unless the AFR says it isn’t
Everyone loves economic reform until it affects them, at which point the excuses and justifications for the status quo — the claims that sounded so hollow when made by others — start coming out.
Koukoulas: don’t mess with Treasury forecasts
It’s a mug’s game to quibble with the Treasury forecasts that underpin the Budget revenue and outlays estimates.
Berg: Never mind the deficit, look at the spending
There’s a weird - almost creepy - sense of confidence surrounding Wayne Swan’s second budget, writes Chris Berg.
Why bras should be tax deductible (and more)
Women face a brutal choice: which would you prefer to see shrivel - your ovaries or your super nest egg? It’s time for tax policy to help make things easier for women, argues Jessica Irvine.
Telstra turns from gorilla to pussycat
All it took was one announcement to turn Telstra into Kevin Rudd’s lapdog.
Gloves off — it’s time to tax Australia’s banking cartel
The failure of the banks to pass on much, if anything, of this week’s interest rate cut is little more than arrogant bastardry.
The ugliest Budget in decades way behind schedule
The Budget process is significantly behind schedule, according to sources in the Canberra bureaucracy, delayed by the continuing collapse in revenue projections and the need to find all possible savings, writes Bernard Keane.
Ken Henry missing while the rest of us wait for a package
The government is keeping tight lipped, but it beggars belief that it doesn’t have a stimulus package ready for the sitting week, writes Bernard Keane.
Real economy 2: Truth is we’re treading water
The economy is lukewarm to tepid, but not dead. At worst, the national economy appears to be treading water, writes Possum Comitatus.
Real economy part 1: The big picture
It’s an intangible thing, the real economy, because it’s a composite of millions of individual decisions a day, writes Bernard Keane.
Gruen: Tax reform we can believe in? Count me in
Ken Henry’s speech yesterday contained some worthy ideas, writes Dr Nicholas Gruen.
