Talk about fortuitous timing. There's an election looming and a budget situation — long portrayed as a disaster — suddenly on the mend.
But what to do with this sudden bounty? Repair the finances and bolster the balance sheet in case the global economics winds turn nasty? Or give way to temptation and indulge the punters?
No prizes for guessing which way the Government will bend and what's in store in this year's federal budget on Tuesday night. For those who appreciate a liberal application of cliches, prepare to be swamped by a watery array of headlines that feature cash, splash and/or shower.
Will it be enough to get the Government across the line, possibly even as soon as later this year?
It didn't work for John Howard in 2007. But having lost 30 Newspolls in a row, the Government doesn't have a great deal else with which to bargain, except for the unusual advantage that Bill Shorten has lost 30 Newspolls in a row as preferred Prime Minister to Malcolm Turnbull.
The budget ceased being a disaster when it became clear the Coalition could not fix it in the dying days of Tony Abbott's prime ministership.
With debt around 50 per cent higher than the level from when he was elected, Mr Abbott suddenly switched tack in mid-2015, arguing "a ratio of debt to GDP at about 50 or 60 per cent is a pretty good result looking around the world".
Mr Abbott's austerity plan, instituted shortly after his election in 2013, was a political disaster for two reasons; it broke a raft of promises from just a few months earlier during his election campaign and sheeted most of the pain on those who were less well off.
Not only that, it may not have had too much of an impact on rectifying the deficit given the spending cuts may well have crimped economic growth.
Why has the economy suddenly improved?
It hasn't. Wages growth is still painfully slow, inflation is below trend and economic growth is tepid.
That is why the Reserve Bank has kept interest rates at a record low for so long and has no plans to raise them any time soon.
Instead, several forces largely outside the Federal Government's control have shifted the budget balance. Commodity prices have been stronger than forecast while employment growth has been good. Combined, those two factors have delivered much stronger revenue flows.
More importantly, the heavy losses incurred from our big corporations in the aftermath of the financial crisis finally have washed through the tax system.
It has taken a decade because, just as our banks and property groups began recovering, the resources boom came to a shuddering halt in 2014.
Typically, it takes three to four years for tax revenues to get back to normal because companies can use previous years' losses to reduce tax. Those credits now pretty much are all used up.
As a result, the budget bottom line is much better than forecast even just a few months ago. According to Commonwealth Bank analysis, there appears to have been a $10 billion improvement and a further $27 billion over the next three years even without any government initiatives.
But what to do with this sudden bounty? Repair the finances and bolster the balance sheet in case the global economics winds turn nasty? Or give way to temptation and indulge the punters?
No prizes for guessing which way the Government will bend and what's in store in this year's federal budget on Tuesday night. For those who appreciate a liberal application of cliches, prepare to be swamped by a watery array of headlines that feature cash, splash and/or shower.
Will it be enough to get the Government across the line, possibly even as soon as later this year?
It didn't work for John Howard in 2007. But having lost 30 Newspolls in a row, the Government doesn't have a great deal else with which to bargain, except for the unusual advantage that Bill Shorten has lost 30 Newspolls in a row as preferred Prime Minister to Malcolm Turnbull.
The budget ceased being a disaster when it became clear the Coalition could not fix it in the dying days of Tony Abbott's prime ministership.
With debt around 50 per cent higher than the level from when he was elected, Mr Abbott suddenly switched tack in mid-2015, arguing "a ratio of debt to GDP at about 50 or 60 per cent is a pretty good result looking around the world".
Mr Abbott's austerity plan, instituted shortly after his election in 2013, was a political disaster for two reasons; it broke a raft of promises from just a few months earlier during his election campaign and sheeted most of the pain on those who were less well off.
Not only that, it may not have had too much of an impact on rectifying the deficit given the spending cuts may well have crimped economic growth.
Why has the economy suddenly improved?
It hasn't. Wages growth is still painfully slow, inflation is below trend and economic growth is tepid.
That is why the Reserve Bank has kept interest rates at a record low for so long and has no plans to raise them any time soon.
Instead, several forces largely outside the Federal Government's control have shifted the budget balance. Commodity prices have been stronger than forecast while employment growth has been good. Combined, those two factors have delivered much stronger revenue flows.
More importantly, the heavy losses incurred from our big corporations in the aftermath of the financial crisis finally have washed through the tax system.
It has taken a decade because, just as our banks and property groups began recovering, the resources boom came to a shuddering halt in 2014.
Typically, it takes three to four years for tax revenues to get back to normal because companies can use previous years' losses to reduce tax. Those credits now pretty much are all used up.
As a result, the budget bottom line is much better than forecast even just a few months ago. According to Commonwealth Bank analysis, there appears to have been a $10 billion improvement and a further $27 billion over the next three years even without any government initiatives.
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