Tag Archives: treasury

Australia Awards program with Indonesian Finance Ministry officials on strengthening the public policy process

In late October, I felt honoured to deliver workshops on economic forecasting and industry policy to officials from the Indonesian Ministry of Finance. The officials were recipients of Australia Awards from the Australian Government and were visiting Brisbane to attend … Continue reading

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Australia’s boldest experiment and the first age of the econocrat

In the early 1990s, there was an article in the Weekend Australian on “The age of the econocrat,” which described the huge influence that economists in Canberra had on policy making at the time. It was an article which partly … Continue reading

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Could the Commonwealth Treasury please send me my $5,000, rather than sending it to George St?

Queensland Treasury has produced an absolutely cracking set of post-Budget presentation slides, which it has kindly shared with the Economic Society of Australia (QLD), of which I’m the Secretary. The slide deck contains some excellent facts and charts on vertical … Continue reading

Posted in Budget, Tax | Tagged , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

GST much more efficient way to raise revenue than income tax

Flavio Menezes, Economics Professor at the University of Queensland, has an interesting piece at the Conversation fact checking a bold claim by federal MP Andrew Leigh that the GST is as economically inefficient as the income tax and less equitable … Continue reading

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Right diagnosis from Qld Treasury on Qld’s debt problem, but wrong prescription

The Review of State Finances (see p. 80) produced by Queensland Treasury to inform the 2015-16 Budget is clear that Queensland Government “debt is too high.” The Treasury acknowledges that the State’s balance sheet is not “in a position to … Continue reading

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ACE 2015 tax policy panel discussion involving Treasury suggests little chance of major tax reform

The official Treasury water bottle. A pleasant surprise in the ACE 2015 conference bag. Thanks to Graeme Davis from Treasury, Alex Robson from Griffith, Miranda Stewart from ANU and Paul Abbey from PwC for some informative and stimulating presentations at … Continue reading

Posted in Tax | Tagged , , , , , , , , | 2 Comments

ACE2015 careers session on a day in the life of a professional economist

The 2015 Australian Conference of Economists (ACE2015) has commenced in Brisbane at QUT’s Gardens Point campus. Yesterday I participated as a panelist in a session at the PhD Colloquium on a day in the life of a professional economist, along … Continue reading

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Strong LNG-led export growth means Qld should record economic recovery in first half of 2015

Queensland appears on track to record a recovery from the technical recession of the second-half of 2014, due to a large increase in exports in recent months, in part associated with the LNG now being shipped out of Gladstone (see … Continue reading

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Great initiative from Qld Treasury to explain forecasts in Economic Society seminar

As Secretary of the Queensland branch of the Economic Society of Australia, I’m very pleased that, on Wednesday 15 July, the day after the Treasurer delivers the State Budget, a senior Queensland Treasury official, Greg Uptin, will give a briefing … Continue reading

Posted in Macroeconomy | Tagged , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Courier-Mail story on Qld Govt’s fiscal challenges

I was quoted by John McCarthy in an article in today’s Courier-Mail (see image above) regarding the Queensland Government’s fiscal challenges. I’ve previously commented on the big challenge the Government has of sticking to its fiscal strategy announced at the … Continue reading

Posted in Budget, Infrastructure, Queensland Government | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment