This Month
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Labor striking right budget balance between relief, repair and reform
We know that if Peter Dutton and the Coalition were in charge, Australia would be in recession.
October
- Opinion
- US election
We need more free trade, not less
In our efforts to de-risk our supply chains and build our buffers against uncertainty, we can’t afford to jettison free and fair trade and replace it with fragmentation, division and suspicion.
- Opinion
- Competition
Government has listened to concerns on merger law reform
The targeted and balanced merger bill will see most mergers approved faster, with more time to consider the contentious ones.
September
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Our fiscal strategy strikes the right balance
We are repairing the budget without hurting an already weak economy, putting people under more pressure or ignoring urgent and unavoidable spending.
May
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Treasurer Jim Chalmers’ message to the nation
The $22.7 Future Made in Australia policy will make Australia an indispensable part of the global green energy revolution.
April
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Labor’s reforms will de-risk foreign investment
The overhaul in the budget will strengthen the review framework where we need to, streamline it where we can, and make it more transparent, writes Jim Chalmers.
March
- Opinion
- Business Summit
Labor is modernising the economy
The Albanese government will make our economy more productive by easing compliance costs on business where we can, we will abolish hundreds of nuisance tariffs.
February
- Opinion
- Australian economy
How we have made tax relief and tax reform work together
Beware of commentators who claim that it’s only genuine tax reform if the well-off become better off.
December 2023
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Responsible economic management key to Albanese government’s agenda
There’s no shortage of challenges in the budget or the economy, but the mid-year budget update shows we are making encouraging progress.
- Opinion
- Superannuation
Super must deliver in retirement phase
Although there is an appreciation of super’s importance in saving for the future, less attention has been given to how it can be optimised in retirement.
October 2023
- Opinion
- Voice to parliament
Voice is about better value for the billions invested in Closing the Gap
One of the biggest lies of this referendum campaign is that it has come at the expense of a focus on the economy.
August 2023
- Opinion
- Australian economy
Intergenerational Report is about owning our future
After a wasted decade of division and drift, the Albanese government has adopted a different approach, taking care of the here and now while also keeping an eye on the future.
July 2023
- Opinion
- Employment
Labor has bolder full employment aspirations
The NAIRU is a useful measure. But it shouldn’t – and doesn’t – limit the government’s ambitions for getting more Australians into work.
May 2023
- Opinion
- Federal budget
This budget needs to alleviate inflation - not add to it
While the 2023 budget eases the pressure on households, inflation remains the primary economic challenge, says the Treasurer.
March 2023
- Opinion
- Regulation
Confident, but not complacent, about our banks
We are not immune, but our regulators have confirmed our financial institutions are well-placed to help Australia manage global market volatility.
January 2023
- Opinion
- Australian economy
There’s a powerful role for business in the new economy
This new model for capitalism isn’t a rejection of the Hawke-Keating period but an embrace of its underlying motivations.
My vision for a new values-based capitalism
Treasurer Jim Chalmers took time out over summer to pen a 6000-word essay for The Monthly on his vision for a new values-based capitalism. Here is an extract.
- Opinion
- Australian economy
This is Hawke and Keating for the 2020s
The growth breakthroughs for this decade lie in critical minerals and the care economy. They are the new tariff reform and financial deregulation.
October 2022
- Opinion
- Federal budget
Just the start of budget repair hard yards
The 2022 budget is just the beginning of the conversation we need to have as a country about our economic and fiscal challenges, and about the choices we need to make on what’s affordable and what’s fair.
August 2022
- Exclusive
- Superannuation
My three-point plan to move beyond superannuation wars
‘The interests of funders, funds and the broader national economic interest are all inseparable,’ Jim Chalmers tells super and banking bosses.