Featured Opinion
Sydney lockdown exposes international border dilemma
Keeping the international border closed for longer may be the unavoidable trade-off for keeping Australia’s internal borders and economy as open as possible, while waiting for the vaccine rollout to ramp up.
Editorial
Stuck in the middle between elimination and herd immunity
What has so far been overlooked is that NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian has not shut down the whole state.
Political editor
The pandemic deja vu we didn’t need to have
Suddenly the country is back to COVID-19 panics and lockdowns with no relief in sight. How did Australia’s success in managing the pandemic veer off course?
Columnist
Sydney is no Shanghai in the lockdown stakes
After experiencing China’s hardline lockdowns in the early days of the pandemic, Michael Smith found a different style of lockdown over the weekend.
China correspondent
Barnaby Joyce might have the right leadership stuff
The resurrected Deputy Prime Minister has a good chance of success – despite what the critics claim – because of the common traits shared with other long-term political leaders.
Columnist
Intergenerational Report 5.0 must grow a bigger pie
After previously underestimating health costs, the new report must tackle Australia’s declining productivity to make the challenges of population ageing more manageable.
Death duties would level up generational tax-wealth inequalities
An inheritance duty set at a similar rate as the GST would stop young people being treated as peasants and the old and rich as the nobility by the taxation system.
Contributor
The inflation loop haunting the Fed
The bond market has told the Federal Reserve there won’t be much in the way of inflation to deal with down the track if it lifts rates a bit early.
Contributor
More From Today
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
Local start-up joins unlikely lockdown-driven gold rush
The switch to virtual and hybrid events is helping some companies attract capital at eye-watering valuations. Melbourne’s Delegate Connect could join them. Â
- 1 hr ago
- James Thomson
- Opinion
- Investing
Investors confront the big trade-off between asset values and returns
Investors have seen the value of their share, bond and property portfolios surge in the past year, but some worry their longer-term returns will be dismal.
- 1 hr ago
- Karen Maley
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
LaTrobe Financial’s wealth arm the focus for bidders
As the LaTrobe Financial strategic review heads for the pointy end, it’s the group’s asset management arm that’s become the focus for bidders.Â
- 1 hr ago
- James Thomson
- Opinion
- Aged care
Will government register of powers of attorney stop elder abuse?
It should assist with fraud and forgeries (although a determined wrong-doer will always find a way around the protective processes).
- Peter Townsend
Yesterday
Perilous moment as mutations test gold standard systems
Critical gaps in Australia’s much-vaunted testing and tracing system are being exposed by the delta variant as new data reveals how exposed the country is.
- Tom Burton
- Opinion
- Mergers & acquisitions
Leave scheme takeovers to the courts
The question of who vets a takeover by scheme of arrangement lies at the heart of concerns about handing approval to the Takeovers Panel.
- Guy Alexander and Charles Ashton
- Opinion
- Tokyo Olympics
Going ahead with the Games comes down to money
Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is gambling that Japan can get through the Games without it becoming a global superspreader event, so he can call a snap election.
- Ben Ascione
This Month
- Opinion
- Political unrest
America is getting meaner
Tribalism, and the corrosive hatreds that go with it, has surfaced in many of our daily interactions, accounting for much of the meanness of this moment.
- Timothy Egan
- Opinion
- The AFR View
Business is leaving politics behind on carbon
The voluntary market for carbon credits is just one example of business picking up the 2050 challenge by themselves.
- The AFR View
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
All sides claim a win in battle for Boral
Seven Group, Boral investors and the company itself are entitled to pat themselves on the back after Seven raised its takeover bid.Â
- James Thomson
- Opinion
- Federal politics
PM faces carbon tariffs amid crumbling virus plan
Scott Morrison’s absence this week when the Coalition’s national COVID-19 response was crumbling, as was any semblance of sanity in its junior partner, was unfortunate to say the least.
- Updated
- Laura Tingle
- Opinion
- Coronavirus pandemic
When will we get to herd immunity?
Australia is on track to vaccinate more than 90 per cent of adults in early 2022.
- Christopher Joye
- Opinion
- Celebrities behaving badly
Admit everything! How to make a modern Hollywood apology
Outraged mob at your door? You’d better ‘listen’, ‘learn’, ‘evolve’ and, most important of all, show gratitude.
- Sam Leith
- Opinion
- Flat Chat
Strata schemes flying under COVID-19 radar
In the absence of clear government directions, you are entitled to ask your committee what measures it has discussed in terms of curbing infections.
- Jimmy Thomson
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
This might be Crown’s most damaging week yet
In Crown’s alleged tax rort, Commissioner Ray Finkelstein has a real-life test of the gambling giant’s claims to have reformed its culture. He seems far from convinced.Â
- James Thomson
- Opinion
- Global economy
The biggest threat to America is America itself
The greatest challenge to America’s future is less a surging China or a rogue Russia than its underperformance at home.
- Nicholas Kristof
- Opinion
- Iran
Iran bets on revolution and repression
Iran has a new hard-line ideological leader. That means the West’s 42-year crisis with the country is only going to get worse.
- Bret Stephens
- Opinion
- Westpac
Industry Insight: Plenty of room for optimism in manufacturing sector
Defence, food and beverage, and energy are sectors offering a great of deal of hope as we emerge into a post-Covid world.
- Anthony Miller
- Opinion
- Chanticleer
Boral is ASX’s biggest cash box
The building materials group has given shareholders a roller-coaster ride over the past 30 years and made some look fondly at the golden years when Sir Eric Neal delivered 14 years of successive earnings increases.
- Tony Boyd
- Opinion
- Canberra Observed
This government, or the next, will have to fix the NDIS
The cost forecasts in Monday’s IGR will be used as a springboard to return the disability support scheme closer to its original purpose
- Phillip Coorey
