Lately I’ve been thinking about all sorts of things and I find that just thinking about things is sometimes enough to make you feel like you should be in charge and you’d give those politicians a jolly good talking to. Of course, that doesn’t mean they’d listen. They tend to listen more to people who don’t think about things, like Alan Jones.
Anyway, while I was thinking about how Covid had reduced the number of people travelling to the CBD, leading to a bit of a crisis, I suddenly had an epiphany which is not as rude as it sounds. For years, we’ve had the problem of too much traffic during peak hour and overcrowded public transport going to the city and nobody’s been able to solve it. Maybe if, instead of seeing this working from home leas and to less people going into the city as the problem, we looked at the problem of businesses in the city facing economic ruin because of the lack of people as a new problem, we’d be able to solve the new problem without seeing the solution as just going back to the old problem which nobody ever managed to solve, no matter how many new freeways they built nor how many times they tried to fix public transport.
We may not have an answer to the new problem, but it’s worth trying to solve that one before asserting blindly that the solution is to replace it with the old one.
And so, having decided to write to the various state governments to suggest that my epiphany makes me worth hiring as a consultant, I turned my attention to the whole debt and deficit thing. You must remember the debt crisis we had when the country’s debt was about a third what it now and about a quarter what it’s projected to be. The Liberals were elected to solve this, not make excuses. I distinctly remember Tony Abbott saying that they’d be a “no excuses” government, and one of his promises in his Contract With Australia was “3. END THE WASTE AND DEBT”!
Yes, I know it’s unfair to hold the Liberals accountable for the promises they made so many Prime Ministers ago, but I do think that people are sort of expecting something more than a shrug of the shoulders to the prediction of ten more years of deficits, “Ah, Covid, what can you do? Vaccines are so hard to come by and we can’t afford a quarantine station because we have an election to buy.”
Ok, I’m not an expert because I don’t have an economics degree but that merely means that I’m the best person to write the “… for Dummies” economic handbook.
Sometimes it’s only by being completely ignorant of any knowledge that enables one to see the situation clearly… just look at One Nation!
Anyway, I thought I’d do some thinking about this whole debt and deficit thing and try to solve it in the same way that I’ve solved just about every problem known to man… Like the Federal Government, I’m not so sure about solving the problems known to women but I figure the fact that I mention them here should go a long way and I intend to Budget some women’s things like a present for my son because his mother is a woman. He’s too old for childcare so I don’t know how else to support women.
It was only when I realised the whole thing about debt compared to budgets that I realised that – even with my limited One Nation understanding of economics – the current narrative is so absurd that we need to go back to the household analogy and credit cards to make any sense of it. Of course, people who’ve read my past stuff would know that I totally reject the “We can’t keep putting things on the credit card!” analogy when it refers to governments because there’s an enormous difference between borrowing money at a couple of percent and your average credit card interest bill. But even though it’s a little hypocritical I’m going to use that as a metaphor, even though I’m running a real risk that I”ll be approached to become a speechwriter for a Liberal politician.
Household analogy: Storm hits! Tree falls down and knocks hole in roof which leads to lots of rain getting in causing damage. While this is covered by insurance. We didn’t QUARANTINE the damage into one room and the resulting flood isn’t. While the house is being repaired, family book into the Hilton and spend a large amount of money. These things can’t be helped and their balanced budget it wrecked for that year.
Now, stick with this. Does it make sense for the family to argue that they can’t deliver a balanced budget for ten years because well, this was such a bad year.
I mean, next year, all going well, there’ll be no trees, no replacement of damage in the other rooms, no stay at the Hilton. To argue that just because the budget didn’t balance this year means that they can’t be expected to do it any time soon.
This is not paying off the debt. This is making sure that you don’t spend more than you earn in any given year. Living within your means, which used to be the mantra of the Liberals.
Until #Scottyfrommarketing took over and reminded them that there was almost no limit to the money they could move from the government to almost anyone once they took off the brakes. Good for the economy if you define the economy as anyone who donates Liberal.
I believe that someone was sacked for that when they worked for a government department.
[textblock style=”7″]
Like what we do at The AIMN?
You’ll like it even more knowing that your donation will help us to keep up the good fight.
Chuck in a few bucks and see just how far it goes!
[/textblock]
