A ‘caring’ budget would have put productivity first

So we take people out of the workforce for three years, load them up with debt, and at the end of it, they are about as useful to an employer as if they hadn't gone to university in the first place. Not all, of course, but a significant minority.

Is this supposed to enhance productivity?

Net-Zero pursuit putting energy producers out of business

Powering Australia is a policy that is guaranteed to destroy productivity. Decarbonisation is going to make us all poorer because it is going to put the price of power up, amongst other things.

Politicians claim we're going cheap, green, and clean.

While their preferred wind and solar technologies might appear cheap, they raise system costs because they cannot stand alone and require expensive storage, networks, and gas-fired power to complete the circuit.

The government is spending $2 billion on a hydrogen hub in Queensland as part of this plan. On current chemistry, green hydrogen consumes seven watts of energy for every one watt it stores.

Hardly productive!

This photo shows the Liddell Power Station after it officially shut down operations in New South Wales, Australia, on April 28, 2023. (Courtesy of AGL Energy)

The energy transition might be necessary, but there is no point in fudging the cost.

The government is trying to recoup some of the loss through higher taxes on mining companies.

This budget does that by adjusting the Petroleum Resource Rental Tax, a change that makes it less likely anyone will ever want to drill a greenfields project in Australia again.