Tag Archives: government budget

Listen up, Scott Morrison. It’s time to bust the myth of the budget surplus – The Guardian

Originally published at The Guardian on Jan 6 2017. Warwick Smith A fetish of recent decades, budget surpluses lead to private sector debt and are unsustainable in the long term. The current obsession could lead us to recession. On Facebook, … Continue reading

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The budget is the greatest moral challenge of our time? Bollocks

  By Warwick Smith All the assertions in Malcolm Turnbull’s statement about the budget being a fundamental moral challenge are flawed. Let’s look at them one at a time This article was originally published in The Guardian. The prime minister, Malcolm … Continue reading

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What the government wants us to do – and not do – based on the budget – The Conversation

Warwick Smith, University of Melbourne Budgets are a good opportunity to see through the spin to what the government really wants. Forget the Treasurer’s speech and the budget overview, the truth is in the measures themselves. Generally things the government … Continue reading

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Tax and tax reform in Australia – appearance on Radio National’s Rear Vision

I was one of four guests on RN’s Rear Vision special on tax reform. You can download the audio here. A sample my contribution to the program is below. Keri Phillips: Warwick Smith is a research economist at the University … Continue reading

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Abbott’s love of coal is holding us back on emissions targets – The Drum

Originally published at The Drum (ABC). By Warwick Smith Posted 11 Aug 2015, 4:23pm A larger emissions reduction target would have come at very little additional cost to GDP, but it would have involved the loss of jobs in the … Continue reading

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Video – Talking Justice 2015

A recording of my speech at Talking Justice has been uploaded to the Loddon Campaspe Community Legal Centre YouTube channel. The speech is like a 22 minute summary of my writing over the last year. Speech notes Talking justice – … Continue reading

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A sustainable budget surplus is beyond the government’s control, as Joe Hockey has come to realise

Warwick Smith Originally published at The Guardian. Joe Hockey, the treasurer, now concedes he may not be able to deliver his promised budget surplus any time in the foreseeable future. This news is good for private savings because, when the … Continue reading

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Op-ed in The Australian that attacks my guardian article is incoherent

The below op-ed was published in last week’s Australian. It is critical of my piece in The Guardian the week before. I contemplated publishing a reply but after reading the piece properly there’s actually very little substance to reply to. … Continue reading

Posted in Economic theory, Op-ed, philosophy of economics | Tagged , , , , , | 1 Comment

Guardian article on economic myths

Repeat after me: the Australian economy is not like a household budget By Warwick Smith Originally published at The Guardian. Our political and economic thinking has been warped by bad analogies to the point where we can’t see the real … Continue reading

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