The Greens have described today\u2019s Economic and Fiscal Update as a plan based on austerity and fantasy projections that will lead to ongoing high unemployment.
\nThe figures released by the Treasurer today exposed the urgent need for debt-financed public infrastructure and public services such as ongoing free childcare that will help get us into full employment, not more tax cuts for the wealthiest fifteen per cent of income earners.
\n\u201cThe government is choosing to lock in a high unemployment future. Their unwillingness to invest in job creation is clear in the update released today, which assumes unemployment will remain officially at 9%, even if restrictions are lifted in Q2 2021,\u201d Greens Leader Adam Bandt said.
\n\u201cThis is a forecast based on austerity and wishful thinking. If restrictions aren’t lifted within the givernment’s optimistic timeframe, people will be out of work even longer.
\n“If government debt is as affordable as the Treasurer says, there should be a plan for full employment.”
\n“By investing in nation-building and planet-saving projects, we could guarantee a job for everyone who wants one, but instead the government is choosing a high-unemployment future.
\n\u201cA World War II sized deficit requires a World War II response to get people into meaningful, secure jobs.”
\n\u201cThe cost of servicing Australia\u2019s projected debt remains less than 1% of GDP with interest repayments well below what they were for most of the Hawke\/Keating government in the 1990s.
\n\u201cThe trickle-down orthodoxy of tax cuts and austerity in the October Budget will only make the crisis worse.\u201d
\n\u201cThe Australian Greens Invest to Recover Plan released early in the crisis outlines what we need to do to dig our way out of the economic hole we are in.\u201d
\n\u201cWe should be ensuring that anyone who wants a job can get a job. We can get people to work creating public assets that will last generations, like building 500,000 publicly owned homes to wipe out housing waiting lists, building green infrastructure, and investing in the businesses and technologies we need to create a green manufacturing renaissance.\u201d
\nComments from Greens’ Treasury spokesperson Peter Whish-Wilson:
\n\u201cUsing public debt wisely is crucial to good economic management. The Australian Greens are the only political party putting forward a plan that most economists are calling for. We need to use the cheapest debt in history to build long-lasting public infrastructure and create jobs\u201d, Peter Whish-Wilson said.
\n\u201cScott Morrison and Anthony Albanese should tear a page out of their John Curtin and Robert Menzies\u2019 history books. Those Prime Ministers used record high debt levels of 120% of GDP during and after World War II to create a full employment economy of between 1% and 3% unemployment. It was so successful that Australians weren\u2019t \u201cpaying this debt off for generations\u201d, but rather after a decade, public debt was reduced to pre-war levels and the deficit was gone within six years.\u201d
\n\u201cAustralia\u2019s debt to GDP ratio is still low compared to most developed countries and there is plenty of room for the government to move.\u201d
\n\u201cToday\u2019s Economic Statement by the Treasurer lays out the problem, but he isn\u2019t offering up any type of solution. The Liberal government\u2019s \u201cTax-Breaks-As-Usual\u201d and lack of real investment will never create a lasting economic recovery,\u201d Whish-Wilson said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Greens have described today\u2019s Economic and Fiscal Update as a plan based on austerity and fantasy projections that will lead to ongoing high unemployment. The figures released by the Treasurer today exposed the urgent need for debt-financed public infrastructure and public services such as ongoing free childcare that will help get us into full … Continue reading “GOVERNMENT CHOOSES TO LOCK IN HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT FUTURE”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7415","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-aussie"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7415","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7415"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7415\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7415"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7415"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.16news.com.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7415"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}