Steve, any chance wages have gone up in 10 years (in proportion to rises in house and land prices) or are they cast in cement?

Sage

Of course you are correct, I think real wages have increased by 13.4% since the election of the Howard Govt. this is way short of the 500% increase in the average mortgage.

Joe average who is paying $500 a week to put a roof over his families head, he has to live in an "outer suburb" and drive to work, petrol prices have added $30 a week, council rates are $30 a week. Insurances phone electricity etc another $70 per week. $630 a week before feeding the family. Then of course there are clothes. etc etc

An interest rate rise which looks imminent given todays 4% inflation rate, will resonate around suburbia. They will remember Howard saying interest rates will not go up (although he did not actually say it - that is what they thought they heard).

The inflation dragon is out of its cage, and scaring people witless no government could survive. Its a shame the alternative are witless as well.

Steve,

I think you mean that AVERAGE wages have gone up. These include the stratospheric salaries paid to corporate executives.

Take them out of the equation and look again.

The things that are going up that nobody mentions anymore are bankruptcies, divorce rates, suicides and the number of homeless.

THAT's how you measure the health of a society, not on a financial balance sheet.

Wonder what Beazley's up to pretty well agreeing with Howard about a plan for going domestically nuclear rather than turning more to wind and tidal power, etc?

Not that so much, however, but even if Kim did honestly believe in nuclear, with a Federal election not so far off, it would be better for Kim to keep quiet about expressing himself so similar to the opposition.

It reminds so much of US Democrat front-runner Kerry during the last US election when he promised to send more troops to Iraq to do the job properly, as he said.

Both instances show indication of extremely poor pre-election strategies.

About 80% of people earn less than $40000 a year and almost 40% are part time employed earning even less. No one has a hope except for the bureaucrats, middle management, academics and the elite rich of paying for a house. Forget about peak oil, its peak economic rationalism we should be worrying about.

Bushbred, Beazley's been told by his masters (big business donations) to toe party line or they will not give him their bribes. Unions have passed their use by date as they're hierarchies and people are fed up enough with elite hierarchies constantly bleeding them dry. What we need and will be forced to undertake, will be a much different system.

People need to demand accountability from management, government and politicians. It will come when a viable alternative is brought forward. Sadly it will only happen with civil unrest, as the elite are determined to keep us all enslaved.

A system disenfranchising the populace, making them work harder for less, removes their freedoms and ability to express comfortably in their lives, is destined for the grave. We may wake up one morning, finding our world has fallen over. One significant event, will start the domino effect of collapse. History shows, societies tend to collapse, quickly and violently.

If you look beyond the blinkers, things are going round in circles. Nothing is really happening, we're still concentrating on technologies out of date for our situation, yet any alternatives are quickly pushed aside by the elite, with the populace following like sheep.

Hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayers money is going to prop up failed privatisation yearly, repeating the turn of the 19-20th century, when the elite enslaved the populace and they rebelled after being sent to slaughter in war. Nothings changed, just repeating and we never learn.

I agree with Ludwig.The cost of energy is the issue and Labor are the blind,no eyed deers stuck in the bog.Yeah, a still no eyed deer.
As energy becomes more expensive our living standards will fall.We have to use other alternatives such as natural gas.The Coalition have been very slow off the mark on this issue perhaps because of the power of the oil giants.Shouldn't they be doing what's good for the country?

The reserve bank wants to increase interest rates due to the inflation created by oil and banana prices?They've got to be kidding.People aren't spending more and wages haven't risen much.I think it is more about the balance of payments deficit and our Govt trying to push wages down to compete with China.Unless we are willing to work for $2.00 per hour,there is no way we can compete.

If interest rates continue to rise we will have an economic collapse at much lower interest rates than the early nineties because people are have borrowed so much now due to high house prices.

If Labor started addressing the real issues,perhaps we will listen.I don't think they have the talent or the courage.There is no way we'll vote them back in their present shape,unless the wheels fall off the Coalition.