How did it come to this?


When you look at the national accounts figures for the June quarter released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics you just have to shake your head in amazement that a government presiding over the best growth rate in the developed world could not win an election. It just doesn’t make sense. The salespeople of the Labor Government clearly have a lot to answer for.
In seasonally adjusted terms, GDP increased 1.2% in the June quarter, non-farm GDP similarly grew 1.2%. Through the year GDP growth was 3.3%.
1-09-2010 gdpchanges
Good news in the ABS figures is that inflation has not yet become a problem. The chain price index for Household final consumption expenditure (HFCE) was 0.4%, compared to an increase of 0.6% in the Consumer Price Index (CPI) over the same period. The HFCE chain price index is the National Accounts measure most directly comparable to the CPI. Nor are wage rises getting out of hand. Both the trend Real Unit Labour Costs and the Non-farm Real ULC decreased 0.2% during the quarter.

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