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You forget to mention that most of Labor's tenure has seen tax returns 4 times higher from mining than Howard ever saw.

Mining saved Australia from the recession, Labor had little to do with it.

Pericles,

Well aware of the GFC and it's ramifications throught the world.
Also aware that with our dollar so high, without the mining sector we cannot compete with other economies on manufacturing unless we go offshore. But this is one small component of the overall GFC.
I would hazard that you will not agree with the theory that without our major exports of coal and mining we would probably be in the same boat as the countries you mentioned.
As part of the global economy, with such a large deficit it is possible anyway that we are now on the way to joining them.

It is impossible to discuss the GFC thoroughly on this Forum. There are just far too many factors involved.

However I assure you I am not hiding under a rock, and so far have heard nothing which encourages me to think more optimistically about our present or near future financial situation.

At this stage one can only present personal views on the present, and guesses for the future. Which is why we have this Forum for an exchange of ideas, and to provoke thought on a wide variety of subjects - preferably politely.

The study found that in broad terms Australia's government debt has been falling since 1932, when it peaked at 98 per cent of gross domestic product. Across all levels of government it is currently just above 20 per cent after climbing since the global financial crisis.
The budget balance has been broadly stable for half a century.
The key finding is that Australia has few examples of economic recklessness compared with other developed nations. Canada's government debt peaked at 143 per cent of GDP in 1946, Japan's reached 233 per cent in 2011, Israel's hit 284 per cent in 1984.
New Zealand recorded government debt of 226 per cent in 1933 and a budget deficit of 7.5 per cent of GDP in 1995.
Developed nations were generally at their most prudent before World War I and during the 1990s, the study finds.
They were generally their least prudent during the mid-1970s and in some cases after the global financial crisis.
The IMF
10 years study mirrors findings of a 2008 Australian Treasury study that found real government spending grew faster in the final four years of the Howard government than in any four-year period since the 1990s recession.
The number of spending decisions worth more than $1 billion climbed from one in the first Howard budget to nine in the last. The proportion of savings measures fell from one-third of budget measures at the start of the Howard era to 1.5 per cent at the end.
In its final year in office, the Coalition boosted the AusLink national roads program by $2.3 billion and announced grants for water conservation and water buybacks worth $10 billion over 10 years.

Of course no mention by Ms Bishop of the broader context that has in large part created this debt burden; namely the limits to economic growth. And by failing to acknowledge said limits Its difficult to see how either of the party's will be able to enact policies to ameliorate the debt burden. More likely we will just lurch from crisis to crisis for decades to come.

Federal Opposition Leader Kim Beazley has expressed alarm at the size of Australia's national debt.
Mr Beazley today told the NSW state Labor Conference at Sydney's Town Hall that Australia's $425 billion foreign debt was a risk to the economy and called for more investment in training and infrastructure.
"Over the long term no economy can sustain a mix of spiralling debt and slowing growth," he said.
"I believe John Howard and Peter Costello are taking us to the edge of the debt cliff.
"I fear Australia's credit card is nearly maxed out."
Mr Beazley said Australia would be unable to compete with emerging economies like China and Singapore without investment in education and training.
"For an unprepared country these are fearsome global competitors with low labour costs and vast economies of scale," he said.
"One thing is for certain - without investment in infrastructure and skills we cannot compete against the hundreds of millions of low paid workers at our doorstep."

Total debt of Aust.$ 2.15 trillion. Commonwealth debt $262 billion + State Govt $ 179 billion. Total Govt debt $441 billion.Housing debt $1.3 trillion.Our GDP $1.2 trillion.

We are not the miracle economy and Wayne Swan is not the world's greatest treasurer.The reasons why we are in so much debt are we sold off all our state banks and the commonwealth bank that used to create some of the money for our growing economy.

We used to deal in cash but now we live on credit/debit cards and far less cash is now created by our own Govts.

We have little industry here that produces consumerables. Thus we import nearly all manufactured products.Only the mining boom saved us but now that is coming to an end.

The RBA should at least create our inflationary money of 3% since this means we are losing value of our labour and pension funds.This could reduce our taxes by $36 billion per yr or provide debt free infrastructure.

It is mathmatically impossible to reduce debt when our productivity + inflation is expressed as debt.This means that the harder we work so must there be more money,but that money comes as debt mostly via inflated housing properties.

Currently people are reluctant to borrow even at low rates so this means less money for our economies,higher unemployement and no growth.The treadmill of debt has our economies chasing their tails and it can only end in collapse.

We must return to Govt Banks and get the RBA creating at least some of our credit.