The video recording of a webinar on the economic impact of COVID-19 I participated in last Friday is now available. The other panellists were Danielle Wood from the Grattan Institute, Griffith Professor Tony Makin, and QUT Professor Pascalis Raimondos. My remarks start at around 32:20:

I emphasised that all Queensland regional economies have been severely affected, with the more tourism-dependent regional economies such as Far North Queensland and the Gold Coast the worst affected. I noted reopening the state border is crucial to reviving tourism spending and the hospitality sector in Queensland. And, in the Q&A at the end, I observed the public health and economic disaster unfolding in the United States is a major risk to the speed and strength of the eventual global economic recovery from COVID-19.

You can download Danielle’s and Pascalis’s slides from the QUT Centre for Data Science website.

Finally, thanks to Pete Faulkner for giving me early access to his regional labour market forecasts which I referred to in the webinar.