{"id":155651,"date":"2025-11-27T12:41:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-27T12:41:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/155651\/"},"modified":"2025-11-27T12:41:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-27T12:41:14","slug":"i-know-how-to-get-the-inflation-monkey-off-our-back-heres-my-christmas-wish-list","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/155651\/","title":{"rendered":"I know how to get the inflation monkey off our back. Here\u2019s my Christmas wish list"},"content":{"rendered":"

Perhaps worst of all, the rate at which workers change jobs \u2013 known as labour mobility \u2013 is declining. This means companies don\u2019t need to offer better terms and conditions to keep good employees.<\/p>\n

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Falling competitiveness measures suggest a systemic problem that will put a floor under inflation unless we tackle the underlying problem.<\/p>\n

There is hope on the horizon. On Friday, the nation\u2019s treasurers gather at a regular meeting of the Council on Federal Financial Relations. If there was ever a group of people with amazing powers to kick inflation to the kerb, this would be it.<\/p>\n

After the Economic Roundtable last August, the CFFR agreed to a reform agenda under the framework of a Single National Market. This speaks to last week\u2019s analysis in this masthead<\/a> detailing the frustrations of federalism. When NSW has a different product standard to Victoria, a Victorian firm may not be willing or able to absorb the cost of selling their product in Sydney. Our report calls out many more examples, and a single national market is a grand idea.<\/p>\n

But more is needed, so here is our Christmas wish list.<\/p>\n

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First, we have called on the Commonwealth to increase incentives for states to boost competition, for example by removing duplication, harmonising standards and streamlining regulation and tax administration. This would lift consumer access to more products and services, and enable more firms to start, grow and introduce new products for even more choices. A pro-competition boom all around.<\/p>\n

Last year, Treasurer Jim Chalmers set up a $900 million Productivity Fund to pay states for pro-competition reform. We have suggested an investment of at least $20 billion over 10 years for the Productivity Fund and other initiatives to get the job done; though a big sum, the economic dividend through faster growth and higher tax revenue would repay this expenditure quickly, and many times over.<\/p>\n

Resistance to the idea that state governments should be paid to reform runs strong. Isn\u2019t that their day job? Ideally, yes. But reform costs money and states will be worse off for the effort unless the fiscal benefit reaped by the Commonwealth is shared.<\/p>\n

Second, we have advocated for state and territory governments to appoint their own ministers for competition, thereby tasking a senior cabinet minister with the job of pro-competition reform.<\/p>\n

And third, we encourage those newly appointed competition ministers and the Commonwealth to actively search for the gatekeepers that unnecessarily hamper competition and remove them, for example by taking away anti-competitive powers from entities such as bar associations and specialist medical colleges, so fees start coming down.<\/p>\n

Hip-pocket pain heading into Christmas really hurts, and the temptation will be for governments across our federation to give households more subsidies for cost-of-living relief. This is the gift of a Christmas puppy under the tree, chasing its tail, but with the vet bill to follow.<\/p>\n

Instead, now our treasurers have the opportunity to box up what Australians really need for Christmas this year: choice.<\/p>\n

Amy Auster is chief executive of Policy Institute Australia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Perhaps worst of all, the rate at which workers change jobs \u2013 known as labour mobility \u2013 is…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":155652,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[114,184,85,46],"class_list":["post-155651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-il","tag-israel"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=155651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/155652"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=155651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=155651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=155651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}