Alan Austin, you must be dreaming if you think your article demonstrates why Australia is at the top of the tree or why the US is in the situation it is in.

Good heavens, an ex-ABC employee who now lives in the socialist paradise that is France and who doesn't like the Coalition's economic stance. Wonders will never cease.

Come back to the ABC, Alan, you'll feel right at home.

Joe Hockey may be wrong in assuming that the US bears a smaller regulatory burden than Australia, but he is absolutely correct in pointing out that reducing that regulatory burden is one way to boost productivity and wealth. Australia's fortunate economic situation at the moment is largely the result of having stuff in the ground that people want to buy. Holding on to that wealth, and expanding it, requires rational economic policies that make it viable to own and run businesses in Australia.

Oh come on Alan, you've got to stop talking tripe.

You live in a country that gets its power from nuclear. It does very well indeed supplying that power to the fools that have put a fortune into alternative power, & find themselves having to get their requirements from France.

Surely you can see Germany has stopped backing away from alternate power, only because it is now running like all hell is chasing it, to get away from their fiasco. Their grid can't handle their wind power when it's blowing, & they need French Nuclear when it's not.

The UK is paying a fortune to the wind people to NOT generate power when they can, or their grid will collapse, yet 4500 windmills was producing less than 1.6% of their power last month. Then they have over 100 GOVERNMENT MPs rebelling against their own government to stop the garbage. Sounds like real success.

The Danes have to give their wind power to Sweden to get rid of it, & have none when needed. How can it be that I know this from Oz, & you don’t, when you are sitting in the middle of the poo alternate power has caused right now.

If this is what you call the global consensus regarding emissions reduction, "the reality that emissions are now reducing in Australia and emerging green energy alternatives", you must be as blind as our rat bag greens, & not worth reading.

neverwas is still on the shores of that river, it must a great place to sit and watch reality happen to other people.

"Australia’s productivity has surged in the last six consecutive quarters to an all-time high of 164.82 points."

The definition of productivity used to measure the above is: "Productivity is the real value of output produced by a unit of labor during a certain time." This is a very simplistic measure, as it does not take account of input factors other than labour hours. The author's claim ignores the fact that very high commodity prices, e.g. for iron ore and coal, raised the value of output inordinately in those quarters, thanks to the capital intensive mining sector. Labor has in fact been responsible for applying policies that reduce productivity, viz. raising the costs of employing labour and substantially raising the cost of energy by levying the carbon tax and forcing the use of more high-cost wind and solar energy.

"Yes, energy costs have risen. But why? Mr Hockey seems unaware of the global consensus regarding emissions reduction, the reality that emissions are now reducing in Australia and emerging green energy alternatives."

It appears that AA was inflicted by pro-AGW ABC group-think , and, like others who unquestionably accept what the Left-biased ABC promotes, maintains that unshakeable belief in AGW.

Perhaps, not surprisingly, AA makes absolutely no mention of the massive budget deficits that Treasurer Wayne Swan has run up during the Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard stints as Prime Minister. One wonders what type of French wine the author drinks to keep him in a semi-dozed state.