World-Class Balancing Act

The numbers look scary, but Australia is comparatively well off when it comes to national debt

- Benjamin Ong

The amount of money, in Australian dollar terms, that the federal Treasury is unleashing into the economy comes to $98 billion in “response and recovery support”, including $25 billion under the Covid-19 response package and $74 billion under the JobMaker plan.

This is “to responsibly deal with the greatest challenge of our time” and “rebuild our economy and secure Australia’s future … to ensure the Australian economy recovers strongly by targeting additional temporary support measures to boost household incomes, bring forward business and infrastructure investment activity, and drive the unemployment rate back down”.

There’s more money for every sector of the economy – well, almost, as “winners and losers” (the mainstay of annual budget reveals) pepper the headlines. Can’t please everyone, hey?