JBowyer, cost o renewables has everything to do with it. Yes there is an incentive t add generation capacity, but that has the effect of reducing wholesale prices. Indeed the Abbott government's attempt to stop is part of the reason electricity prices remained so high at the time despite the repeal of the Carbon Tax.

Of course preference goes to whoever can generate electricity the cheapest. That's how markets are supposed to work!

I admit there are some anachronisms in the way the RBA operates (such as not directly lending money to the government) but the institution itself is very far from anachronistic - it is a vital part of the public sector that's needed to keep the economy healthy. It's something Britain didn't have at the time of the South See Company (for although the Bank of England existed at the time, it was in private hands until 1946) and contemporary France has a similar problem having surrendered its currency creation function to the ECB - a move that's also caused terrible trouble for Ireland and the PIGS.

Which dick at the RBA are you referring to?

>Tell me why not print one million dollars each for every Australian adult to fire up the economy?
Do you really need me to explain the difference between firing it up and burning it down?

>RBA would like to abolish cash to steal our savings too
Are you sure that's the RBA not the government?

>and we sneer at Zimbabwe?
The country that declared war on its main export industry, discouraged foreign investment, kept the official rate of its currency high (preventing other export industries from developing) but didn't have the resources to keep that rate high (so a collapse was inevitable)?
Stupidity like that deserve sneering!

Aides the price of electricity goes up not down, it increases, it costs us more and more and it is a continuing problem. What part are you having difficulty with. It keeps going up! You deserve a slap for suggesting that is how it is supposed to work because it keeps going up, up and away!
Lowy is the dimwit I was referring to, he is absolutely out of his depth theyt all are. They are clueless and with no idea whatever except they have big fat pensions to fall back on.
The South Sea company was chaired by George the third and a major shareholder was the Prime Minister Walpole. It was a stupidity based on shares going up only on speculation. It ruined England for one hundred years. Mate Bank of England, with the king as chairman and Prime Minister as a major shareholder. Good news is they got out and left the plebs to do their money.
Around the same time Louis the 16th (I think) , Contemporaneously started fiat money, no EC never mind ECB. That went very very well until it did not. Both countries one hundred years plus depression.
Don’t, please don’t, defend the RBA to me. I would bankrupt and jail the whole lot of them.
Sorry for such a long bitter post but you know how it is.

J Bower agree it is going up reserve my right to differ on the reason why
But look at petrol, in my lifetime it went from a very minor part of living expenses to the stage its price murdered weekend drives
For some it limits driving at all,
TAX drives the rise even more than the price of oil
In fact if over night we found a way to use tap water instead government would find a way to tax water
Coal is cheap today, once much cheaper but exports make it so
I continue to think it will be over taken by some thing new
But we should use it till that happens

Belly, they are already discussing how to tax electric cars.
They can see the writing on the wall.
One suggestion so far is a box in every car that tracks the car where
it goes and charges by the km.
Another is cameras on every road to read number plates and work out the km.