Ross Gittins is economics editor of the SMH and an economic columnist for The Age. His books include Gittins' Guide to Economics, Gittinomics and The Happy Economist.
Do you realise the Reserve Bank board hasn't changed Australia's official interest rate from 1.5 per cent for almost a year? But that hasn't stopped people in the financial markets from speculating furiously about whether rates are about to go down – or go up.
Behind the demise of the pseudo-economic belief that what's good for big business is good for the economy.
Despite the scare stories about the rise of the "gig economy", full-time jobs growth is surging.
The more we enhance our natural capital and our human capital, the better placed we're likely to be.
One thing you can be sure of is that international trade grows much faster than the world economy. Except that it seems to have stopped.
Treasury will continue to flounder and its influence wane until it switches its goal from smaller government to more effective government.
Recent political shocks – Brexit, Trump and the failure of Theresa May – are prompting much soul-searching and rethinking among the world's leading economists.
For the growing number of us who care more about good policy and effective governance than party loyalties, the news isn't good.
There's no denying the economy has slowed down, by far more than we were expecting. But don't conclude it's likely to subside into recession any time soon.
It's too early to be sure, but not too early to suspect that, if we and the other developed economies keep travelling the way we are, conventional wisdom about what constitutes good economic policy may soon need to be turned on its head.
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