The Morrison Economy

Two things happened today. I was surveyed by the ABS and I went for a walk. The two aren't usually related, but today they are.

Part of the survey was about employment. The enforced physical distancing regime and related public health measures killed every single piece of work I had at the time. Yes I work in arts/entertainment. Fortunately one of my employers came through with JobKeeper so what was a total disaster became an enforced holiday, which as time goes by I am starting to see as just a prelude to the actual disaster coming in a few months time. But not everyone got a holiday. Some essential workers kept working, quite a few of them actually judging by the rather modest unemployment figures out today.

One of #ScottyFromMarketing's favourites definitely kept their noses to the grindstone. They were recently rewarded via the renovation bonus, so hey keep up the good work fellas...

I'm talking about these guys.

Now there has been some coverage recently about how tradies are closet LNP voters. This is my take.

This pic is fairly standard image around my part of town and I reckon it contains a fairly convincing story. It has all the sort of components for success. They are, in no particular order, housing construction, small business tradies, local suppliers and new cars. If you ever wondered who votes Liberal, think about this.

So here's the story in full. The house (or soon to be mansion) is of course a knockdown/rebuild. It's not actually adding to the general housing stock, rather it's just growing the size of someone's asset portfolio. Significantly, the original house was former public housing stock. I don't know the owners but I don't think they're likely to be ALP voters..

Then there are the tradies in attendance. Bronzed Aussie blokes. A lovely collection of utes, mind you the one in the middle is getting a bit long in the tooth but have you ever wondered how it is tradies can always seem to afford a new ute. Well two words, tax writeoffs. It's slightly more involved than that but it's no coincidence that your average self employed building tradie is getting around in the latest ute as well as running their own super funds and having a few negatively geared properties. It's no coincidence because keeping the housing market alive and growing is the Australian way. Just as long as it stays in private hands, the government is more than happy to keep throwing them incentives.

I know, it's not all fairly floss and million dollar Macmansions for builders but for some, there is some real cream around and it's exactly that component of the economy our current neoliberals favour. Fine. But the redistribution of wealth to the already well off comes at a cost to those less fortunate. The people I know who lost their poorly paid insecure jobs aren't going to suddenly start buying houses or new utes. And once the six months are up, all sorts of hell is going to break out.

Possibly it will all be rainbows and fairy bread. Magic pudding for everyone. Just as long as house prices keep going up. After all the arts are for sheilas...