"Australia's luck is running out" - Ex treasurer Costello

Firstly, just the statement alone that our luck is running out, is in itself a gross understatement. What in fact is the case is that when Australia elected Tony Abbott as PM we collectively en mass threw all our luck out the window. And drove off at high speed never to get it back. Such is the damage Abbott is doing to Australia. Fucks sake the Abbott gov is becoming a lesson in how to destroy one of the top performing economies in the world. But I digress......

This is about our illustrious former treasurer Peter Costello, who under Howard's political prowess at keeping his gov in office, became Australia's longest serving treasurer. This was more a measure of Howard's political finesse at keeping his toxic gov in office for 11 long years, than a measure of his intelligence as a treasurer.

Indeed the economy he was running in those 11 years was un-fuckable. Bazillions in gov revenue from the resources boom, Australia was awash with money. Wages boomed because of skilled labour shortages. 

Costello and Howard squandered that boom, using it to set up targeted welfare to Howard's middle class "battlers". One election Howard got up on stage and he gave away something like $30billion in half an hour. All to buy votes. Much of that Howard welfare structure is still in place today. Middle class welfare to buy votes, whilst those like us who really fuckin need it apparently have to go into all sorts of strife and survive on a pittance. 

Anyway, so Costello has come out with this crap that it's not SSJoe's fault (I'm reading between the lines) and that the present downturn we're going into is just the result of circumstances. Yeah well he's a Lieberal, what do you expect? But he does make some very pertinent observations about the current state of the Australian economy, for whatever reason:

Australia's longest-serving treasurer warns the country's luck is beginning to run out as wages fall and consumer pessimism grows. 

Peter Costello says while Australia is "far" from recession, the economy was undergoing big changes, leaving people with a sense of uncertainty about the future. 

"(Australia's) luck's beginning to run out," he told a property forum in Sydney on Wednesday. 

"For the first time since the 1990s, per capita incomes have stabilised in Australia - they are no longer growing. 

"Young people under 50 who have lived through a period of uninterrupted rising incomes are beginning to experience something that's different." 

Consumers were "anxious" and had "stopped spending". Read more