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Policy

Economy

Yesterday

Insurers have made no money on home insurance policies in four years, as the industry warns premiums will continue to soar and put upward pressure on inflation.

Home insurance premiums are up 56pc, but insurers are making a loss

Insurers have made no money on home insurance policies in four years, and the industry warns premiums will continue to soar as natural disasters become more frequent.

  • Michael Read
Fed policymaker Neel Kashkari.

‘Sideways’ inflation threatens US rate cut forecasts: Fed official

Minneapolis Federal Reserve boss Neel Kashkari said policymakers need renewed confidence that inflation will cool before beginning a rate-cutting cycle.

  • Timothy Moore

This Month

Treasurer Jim Chalmers and former RBA governor Philip Lowe.

Lowe sees ‘strong case’ for RBA board members to stay

Philip Lowe has undercut Jim Chalmers’ push for new RBA board members, saying the existing directors are best placed to steer inflation back to target.

  • Updated
  • John Kehoe, Joshua Peach and Anthony Macdonald
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Treasurer must act on PwC

Readers’ letters on the PwC scandal and trust in the accounting profession; the rights of deportees; the manufacturing of solar panels in Australia; and the art of writing letters.

Federal Reserve Board chairman Jerome Powell speaks at the Business, Government and Society Forum at Stanford University in Stanford, California.

Powell says Fed has time before deciding to cut

Chairman Jerome Powell has moved to shut down any notion that the central bank’s rate decisions might be affected by this year’s presidential election.

  • Updated
  • Steve Matthews
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Liberal MP Garth Hamilton is urging his party to end its opposition to new RBA board appointments, as QLD senator Gerard Rennick questions the need for reform.

Liberal MPs break ranks on RBA overhaul

Liberal MP Garth Hamilton is urging his party to end its opposition to new RBA board appointments, as QLD senator Gerard Rennick questions the need for reform.

  • Michael Read
Federal, state and local government tax revenue is expected to amount to a near-record 30 per cent of gross domestic product in 2023-24, according to the CIS.

Tax surge consuming up to 45pc of household income

Federal, state and local government tax revenue is expected to amount to a near-record 30 per cent of gross domestic product in 2023-24, according to the CIS.

  • Michael Read
Women see economics through a different lens to men.

Why women don’t stick with economics

Economic models of anything are founded on the assumption of Homo economicus. No sensible woman looks at this model and recognises herself.

  • Yanis Varoufakis
Few countries now have a birth rate above the replacement level of 2.1 children a couple, the level needed to keep a population stable.

Population decline will destroy the West as we know it

By 2100, the number of people worldwide will have peaked. The value of assets will drop and the incomes they generate will fall.

  • Dr Stephen Davies
Treasurer Jim Chalmers is preparing the May 14 budget.

Budget to fast-track investment approvals

Treasurer Jim Chalmers is close to finalising a package to get capital flowing for the stuttering energy transition and other Labor priority projects.

  • John Kehoe
Christopher Kent, assistant governor of Reserve Bank of Australia

Reserve Bank ponders the market plumbing

The Reserve Bank board is repurposing the financial system as its cheap pandemic funding is flushed out. It’s doing it as financial markets are only too happy to splash the cash.

  • Jonathan Shapiro
The net zero transition is going to change the picture of demand for capital.

Can Australia compete in the new post-inflation world?

The “new neutral” medium-term interest rate will make global competition for capital far more intense. The country needs to get ready for that.

  • Richard Holden
The resilience of the housing market recovery could make the RBA reluctant to deliver cuts to the cash rate later this year, according to economists.

Population surge and smaller households fuelling home prices: RBA

The resilience of the housing market recovery could make the RBA reluctant to deliver cuts to the cash rate later this year, according to economists.

  • Michael Read
The US public believes prices will rise by 5.3 per cent over the next 12 months.

Australia is set to be the last country to escape inflation

The Economist measured inflation entrenchment in 10 rich countries. Australia tops the index, with Britain and Canada not far behind.

  • The Economist
The explosive growth in the $42 billion NDIS has helped propel federal government spending to near-record levels as a share of GDP

Almost one in three jobs created last year was for the NDIS

The growth in NDIS-related employment has masked the slowdown in private sector industries like construction, retail and manufacturing.

  • Michael Read
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Daniel Kahneman, the author of Thinking, Fast and Slow.

The man who discovered people hate losing more than they like winning

Daniel Kahneman was one of the few psychologists to win the Nobel Prize for economics.

  • Andrew Leigh

March

The latest US economic data could be parsed to bolster either side of the rate pivot debate.

How economists interpreted US inflation data

The Federal Reserve’s key inflation metric has left economists as divided as ever on the timing of a US rate cut.

  • Timothy Moore
Chinese leaders’ anger may be a sign that Joe Biden’s approach is working.

Bidenomics is making China angry. That’s OK

Biden’s China policy is so tough that it makes me, someone who generally favours a rules-based system, nervous.

  • Paul Krugman
Jerome Powell

No need for Fed to rush rate cuts: Powell

The Federal Reserve chairman said February’s inflation data, released on Friday, was “pretty much in line with our expectations”.

  • Catarina Saraiva
Policymakers anticipate three rate cuts this year. Financial markets expect the first rate reduction in June.

US monthly inflation slows; consumer spending surges

Core inflation increased 2.8 per cent year-on-year in February, the smallest gain since March 2021, after rising 2.9 per cent in January.

  • Lucia Mutikani