{"id":26334,"date":"2021-06-16T04:17:33","date_gmt":"2021-06-16T04:17:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thepatientinvestor.com\/?p=26334"},"modified":"2021-06-17T06:29:44","modified_gmt":"2021-06-17T06:29:44","slug":"productivity-not-population-key-to-aussie-living-standards-macrobusiness","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thepatientinvestor.com\/index.php\/2021\/06\/16\/productivity-not-population-key-to-aussie-living-standards-macrobusiness\/","title":{"rendered":"Productivity not population key to Aussie living standards | Macrobusiness"},"content":{"rendered":"

From Leith van Onselen at Macrobusiness<\/a>:<\/p>\n

Former ALP minister Craig Emerson has penned an article in The AFR calling on the Morrison Government to tackle Australia\u2019s declining productivity growth, which is central to boosting the nation\u2019s living standards:<\/p>\n

\u201cProductivity growth has contributed 95 per cent of the improvement in Australians\u2019 material living standards since 1901\u201d.
\n\u201cFrom the turn of the century, Australia\u2019s productivity performance began to slide and the longer it has gone on the worse it has gotten\u201d.
\n\u201cOver the period from 2015 until the COVID-19 pandemic struck, actual productivity growth was worse than the low-productivity scenario included in the 2015 intergenerational report\u201d.
\n\u201cIn the decade since 2010 \u2013 even excluding last year \u2013 Australia recorded its slowest growth in GDP per capita of any decade in at least 60 years\u201d.
\n\u201cWithout a comprehensive economic reform program, Australia will inevitably have weak growth in living standards during the remainder of the 2020s and into the 2030s\u201d.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Craig Emerson\u2019s assessment is broadly correct, as evidenced by the stagnant real per capita GDP, wage and income growth experienced over the past decade (even before the coronavirus pandemic).<\/p>\n

Sadly, however, the Morrison Government with the help of the Australian Treasury seems hell bent on leveraging the other \u2018P\u2019 \u2013 population growth \u2013 to mask over Australia\u2019s poor productivity performance and to keep headline GDP growing, even if it means per capita GDP, income growth and living standards deteriorate.<\/p>\n

Rather than using the coronavirus pandemic as an opportunity to reset the Australian economy to focus on quality over quantity, the Morrison Government is intent on repeating the policy mistakes of the past by returning to the lazy dumb growth policy of hyper immigration.<\/p>\n

Rebooting mass immigration will inevitably contribute to Australia\u2019s poor productivity growth by:<\/p>\n