Australian Federal Election 2022: inflation and cost of living a live issue 23 days out from polling day

Australia recorded its largest quarterly & annual inflation increase in 21 years in the first Quarter of 2022.

The Cost of Living Index (CPI) rose 2.1 per cent cent in March 2022 quarter and 5.1 per cent annually - again largest annual change in 21 years. 

That 5.1 per cent exceeds the 2021 annual rate of 3.5 per cent, as well as the overly optimistic projected inflation figure of 4.5 to 4.6 per cent floated by some economists for the March quarter.

Australian Bureau of Statistics, media release, 27 April 2022, excepts:

The most significant contributors to the rise in the March quarter CPI were new dwellings (+5.7 per cent), automotive fuel (+11.0 per cent) and tertiary education (+6.3 per cent)…..

Notable rises were also recorded across the food group (+2.8 per cent), reflecting high transport, fertiliser, packaging and ingredient costs, as well as COVID-related disruptions and herd restocking due to favourable weather. Main contributors to the rise in food prices included vegetables (+6.6 per cent), waters, soft drinks and juices (+5.6 per cent), fruit (+4.9 per cent) and beef (+7.6 per cent)…..

The grocery component of the group, which excludes meals out and takeaway foods, rose 4.0 per cent in the March quarter." Ms Marquardt said.

Prices for other grocery items, such as non-durable household products (+6.7 per cent), which includes products such as toilet paper and paper towels, also rose in the March quarter….

The price of goods (+6.6 per cent) rose more strongly through the year than that of services (+3.0 per cent)…..

It appears that cost of living increase is now running significantly ahead of wages growth in Australia.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison's one-off election campaign bribe of $250 for eligible Centrelink/DVA recipients won't even touch the edges of the yawning gap which has developed between income and costs due to the broad base of rising prices. In fact the positive impact of this so-called Cost of Living Payment is unlikely to last beyond polling day in many low-income family households.

State of Play 2021: Gender Pay Gap in Australia

 Australian Government, Workplace Gender Equality Agency, 26 February 2021:

Calculating the Gender Pay Gap

Australian gender pay gaps are calculated by the Workplace Gender Equality Agency (WGEA, the Agency). The GPG is derived as the difference between women’s and men’s average weekly full-time equivalent earnings, expressed as a percentage of men’s earnings….

Unless otherwise stated, all measures of the gender pay gap are expressed as a percentage (%) based on average weekly ordinary time earnings for full-time employees (trend data), with changes over time provided as the percentage point (pp) difference.

It should come as no surprise that in the years 2010 to 2020 the trend gender pay gap peaked in November 2014 during Tony Abbott’s term as Australian Prime Minister, when women on the average adult full-time weekly wage were paid 18.5 per cent less than men – that represents est. $282.8 less than men they were paid each week for their labour.

Over the following three years the difference between the male and female average weekly adult full-time wage fell to $238.0.

On becoming Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison presided over an Average weekly ordinary time cash earnings, full time adults, original for November 2018 which saw a difference of $222.9 between the male average weekly adult full-time wage and the female average weekly adult full-time wage. In November 2019 that difference was $223.5 less in the female average weekly adult full-time wage. While in November 2020 there was a difference of $223.1 between the male average weekly adult full-time wage and the female average weekly adult full-time wage.

WGEA states that the November 2020 seasonally adjusted gender pay gap was 13.4 per cent - showing women earned on average $242.20 less than men in that month.

Although Scott Morrison bragged this week about that 13.4 per cent he was careful not to quantify that percentage in dollar terms.

He does not seem to be making much of a difference on the ground for women when it comes to the average experience of the gender pay gap.

Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has toned down hollow bragging lately

Federal Treasurer Josh Frydenberg has toned down his bragging about economic recovery lately, with the Financial Review on 3 September 2019 reporting that:

Treasurer Josh Frydenberg concedes the nation's economic growth for last financial year will be poor but believes activity will pick up in the September quarter because of cuts to income taxes and interest rates.

Fearing a growth number as low as 1.4 per cent for year ending June when GDP figures are released tomorrow, the Treasurer blamed several factors for what will be a sluggish quarter, including the election campaign.

He blames everyone but the federal government of which he is a senior cabinet minister for the following........

On 4 September 2019 the Australian Bureau of Statistics released its 5206.0 - Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, Jun 2019.

The opening lines of its media release stated: 

The Australian economy grew 0.5 per cent in seasonally adjusted chain volume terms in the June quarter 2019 and 1.4 per cent through the year, according to figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) today.

Chief Economist for the ABS, Bruce Hockman, said: “The external sector drove GDP growth this quarter, while growth in the domestic economy remains steady”.

The National Accounts release was accompanied by this graph which shows that, despite this June quarter 2019 growth, GDP growth is the lowest it has been in the last eleven June quarters:

And the decline in GDP growth between June 2018 and June 2019 looked like this:

GDP1
Infogram

Interactive graph from https://www.michaelwest.com.au

It is hardly a coincidence that GDP growth  has a sharp downward trajectory, given that once Liberal MP for Cook Scott Morrison became prime minister he spent most of his time between August 2018 & May 2019 in continuous election mode whilst presiding over a virtual policy vacuum.

In June quarter 2019 new and used dwelling investment continued to decline, the household saving ratio fell to the lowest its been since 2008, while the small growth in household consumption was the second lowest its been in the last eleven June quarters. 

Although mining activity picked up, mining gross value added as a percentage of  GDP was almost half of what it was in 2014 and mining investment in dollar terms was the lowest it had been since the June 2011 quarter.

If it wasn't for government expenditure between April and June 2019 then GDP growth would be even slimmer. Even then, neither Prime Minister Morrison nor Treasurer can claim expenditure figures as entirely the result of federal spending because it was state and local governments which did most of the heavy lifting. 

Did the Australian Bureau of Statistics spy on Telstra customers at one remove in 2016?

“…with its near-complete coverage of the population, mobile device data is now seen as a feasible way to estimate temporary populations” [Australian Bureau of Statistics Demographer Andrew Howe, quoted in The Australian Bureau of Statistics Tracked People By Their Mobile Device Data at Medium, 23 April 2018]

Cryptoparty founder. Amnesty Australia 'Humanitarian Media Award' recipient 2014 and activist Asher Wolf recently reported that in 2016 the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) without informing or seeking permission from mobile phone users ran a secretive, publicly-funded tracking program via signals emitted by the mobile phones of an unspecified number of people, in order to find out where they travelled over the course of an unspecified number of days and how long they stayed at each location.

A presentation of the basic details of this pilot study was made by the ABS researcher leading the pilot at a Spatial Information Day in Adelaide on 11 August 2017.

A second ABS researcher also made a presentation on the day.

Spatial Information Day (which has the ABS as one of its sponsors) is characterised by the organisers as an annual educational and promotional event and was first held just on 18 years ago.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics was swift to reply to Asher Wolf's Medium article, stating that it has only been supplied with hourly agregate data by the telco (Telstra) which did not identify individuals.

However, the aggregated data supplied to the ABS was at the second lowest SA2 Level and some of these statistcal areas have populations of well under 3,000 residents according to 2016 Census data. Which makes the task of matching names to some of the tracked population movements just that much easier for a demographer or determined hacker.

Given recent less than transparent disclosures by data mining corporations concerning data collection/retention practices, readers might forgive me for waiting to see if the other shoe drops in this ABS-Telsta data mining and privacy matter.

One might say that thanks to Ms. Wolf we are all being educated further about big data and the ethics of data collection.

This is the response Ms. Wolf received when she contacted privacy experts concerning the pilot study:

“I find this tracking of people using their telephone location data without their knowledge and consent extremely concerning. The fact that the telecoms company allowed this data to be handed to a third party, and then for that third party to be a government agency compounds the breach of trust for the people whose data was involved,” said Angela Daly, Vice Chancellor’s Senior Research Fellow and Senior Lecturer in Queensland University of Technology’s Faculty of Law, research associate in the Tilburg Institute for Law, Technology and Society and Digital Rights Watch board member.

“After the Cambridge Analytica/Facebook scandal this is yet another example of why we need much tougher restrictions on what companies and the government can do with our data.”

Electronic Frontiers Australia board member Justin Warren also pointed out that while there are beneficial uses for this kind of information, “…the ABS should be treading much more carefully than it is. The ABS damaged its reputation with its bungled management of the 2016 Census, and with its failure to properly consult with civil society about its decision to retain names and addresses. Now we discover that the ABS is running secret tracking experiments on the population?”

“Even if the ABS’ motives are benign, this behaviour — making ethically dubious decisions without consulting the public it is experimenting on — continues to damage the once stellar reputation of the ABS.”

“This kind of population tracking has a dark history. During World War II, the US Census Bureau used this kind of tracking information to round up Japanese-Americans for internment. Census data was used extensively by Nazi Germany to target specific groups of people. The ABS should be acutely aware of these historical abuses, and the current tensions within society that mirror those earlier, dark days all too closely.”

“The ABS must work much harder to ensure that it is conducting itself with the broad support of the Australian populace. Sadly, it appears that the ABS increasingly considers itself above the mundane concerns of those outside its ivory tower. This arrogance must end.”

“For us to continue to trust the ABS with our most intimate details, the ABS must maintain society’s trust. Conducting experiments on citizens without seeming to care about our approval or consent undermines that trust.”

International privacy advocates also raised concerns about the study.

“Data the companies, like telcos, collect inevitably becomes very attractive to government agencies looking to track, monitor, and survey people. Like here, users are rarely informed, let alone consent to these uses. The impact on privacy rights is severe: location information (especially combined with other sensitive data) can reveal startlingly detailed information about your life (where you live, work), connections (who you talk to or visit), preferences (what you buy and when), and health (doctors and pharmacies frequented),” stated Amie Stepanovich, U.S. Policy Manager for digital rights organisation Access Now.

Read Asher Wolf’s full article at https://medium.com/@Asher_Wolf/the-australian-bureau-of-statistics-tracked-people-by-their-mobile-device-data-and-didnt-tell-them-16df094de31

Rate of homelessness is rising across Australia - including in New South Wales

Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), media release, 14 March 2018:

Census reveals a rise in the rate of homelessness in Australia 

The rate of homelessness in Australia has increased 4.6 per cent over the last five years, according to new data from the 2016 Census of Population and Housing.

The latest estimates reveal more than 116,000 people were experiencing homelessness in Australia on Census night, representing 50 homeless persons for every 10,000 people.

Dr Paul Jelfs, General Manager of Population and Social Statistics, said that while there was an overall increase in the estimate of homelessness in Australia, this number is made up of various distinct groups and each tells a different story.

People living in ‘severely’ crowded dwellings, defined as requiring four or more extra bedrooms to accommodate the people who usually live there, was the greatest contributor to the national increase in homelessness.

“In 2016, this group accounted for 51,088 people, up from 41,370 in 2011.

“On Census night, 8,200 people were estimated to be ‘sleeping rough’ in improvised dwellings, tents or sleeping out – an increase from 3.2 persons per 10,000 people in 2011 to 3.5 persons per 10,000 people in 2016,” Dr Jelfs said.

Younger and older Australians have also emerged as groups experiencing increasing homelessness in Australia.

“One quarter of all people experiencing homelessness in 2016 was aged between 20 and 30 years,” Dr Jelfs said.

People aged between 65 and 74 years experiencing homelessness increased to 27 persons per 10,000 people, up from 25 persons per 10,000 people in 2011.

Recent migrants (those who arrived within the five years prior to the 2016 Census) accounted for 15 per cent of the homeless estimate. Almost three quarters of this group were living in ‘severely’ crowded dwellings and the majority came from countries in South-East Asia, North-East Asia and Southern and Central Asia, including India, China and Afghanistan.

The overall number of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people experiencing homelessness in 2016 was 23,437. More than two out of three were living in ‘severely’ crowded dwellings, with just less than 10 per cent ‘sleeping rough’.

Dr Jelfs also acknowledged the support of service providers in enumerating the homeless.

“I would like to thank the service providers and staff who worked with the ABS to tackle the difficult challenge of enumerating this population group and maximise the quality of this important information,” Dr Jelfs said.

Further 2016 Census homelessness data can be found on the ABS website. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

On Census Night in 2016 the number of people who were listed as homeless in NSW:

37,715 persons in total, of which 22,698 were male and 15,010 were female

1,801 of the men and 981 of the women were 65 years of age and older
3,963 were children under 12 years

On Census Night in 2016 the number of people who were listed as homeless in the NSW Northern Rivers region by Local Government Area:

Tweed – 444 (compared to 308 in 2011)

Tweed Heads 156, Tweed Heads 47, South Murwillumbah 49, Murwillumbah Region 52, Kingscliff-Fingal Head 51, Banora Point 45, Pottsville 42

Byron - 327 (compared to 279 in 2011)

Byron Bay 146, Mullumbimby 121, Bangalow 31, Brunswick Heads-Ocean Shores 29

Lennox Head-Skennars Head 4

Lismore - 309 (compared to 283 in 2011)

Lismore 153, Lismore Region 93, Goonellabah 67

Clarence Valley - 230 (compared to 198 in 2011)

Grafton 89, Grafton Region 103, Maclean-Yamba-Iluka 37

Ballina - 77 (compared to 142 in 2011)

Ballina 52, Ballina Region 22

Richmond Valley - 73 (compared to 69 in 2011)

Casino 44, Casino Region 20, Evans Head 15

Kyogle - 34 (compared to 21 in 2011)

Kyogle 27

[See ABS 2049.0 - Census of Population and Housing: Estimating homelessness, 2016]

Australian Bureau of Statistics has carriage of the national voluntary same-sex marriage postal survey - a visual answer to the question "What could possibly go wrong?"

Images of just some instances highlighting predictable issues concerning the Turnbull Government’s national same-sex marriage voluntary postal survey……..

Kerry Ford found 17 marriage equality postal votes dumped in her garden. Photo: Joe Armao

Three letters with the voting forms missing had been dumped in Murrumbeena, in Melbourne's south-east

A bag filled with 39 same-sex marriage postal survey envelopes addressed to Sydney residents minus 

survey forms & return envelopes was found in a local bin

Same-sex marriage surveys found dumped in Melbourne's CBD. Photo: Supplied

PHOTO: Derek has missed out on his chance to have a say in the same-sex marriage survey. 

(ABC News: Tom Lowrey)

Looks like I’m voting yes 4 times! Could be more will see if anymore come tomorrow!

PHOTOs: Dozens of surveys were spotted out of mailboxes at seven different apartment blocks on Saturday morning.

 (ABC News: James Fettes)

Got 4 other people's surveys today, despite them living 3 blocks away from me.

Image: Simon Thomsen.

PHOTO: The ABC tested the torch light theory and found it worked. (ABC News)

Up to 30 postal survey forms have been removed from online auction sites

Newcastle social media marketplace

ABS forced to apologise when some survey form barcodes contained inappropriate words

Facebook 22 September 2017

Discarded postal survey letters on roadways in Brisbane and elsewhere 

But wait, there’s more…….

“So this is what my Aunty did today. #VOTENO or she’ll steal your mail.”

There were 16.0 million electors on the Commonwealth Electoral Roll as of 30 August 2017,

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics by 29 September 2017 only est. 9.2 million of these people had returned a completed voluntary same-sex marriage postal survey form.

Another 13.6 million completed and returned forms would see a survey response rate no politician would dare argue with if he or she hoped to keep their seat at the next federal election.

If over 90 per cent of enrolled electors could turn out to vote for a national song in 1977, surely just as many could get their finger out in 2017 and answer one simple question: "Should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?"

The same-sex marriage survey closes in 30 days time at 6pm local time on Tuesday, 7 November 2017. Survey forms received by the Australian Bureau of Statistics after this will not be counted in official results.

Is the self-inflicted reputational loss suffered by the Australian Bureau of Statistics having a negative impact on the same-sex marriage voluntary postal survey?

 “An Australian Marriage Law Survey Form will be sent by post to every eligible Australian. It will be sent to the address on the Commonwealth Electoral Roll.” [www.abs.gov.au, 8 September 2017]

A reader recently contacted North Coast Voices stating that:

“Two weeks ago I rang the ABS to ask whether I could send my marked postal survey back to them in a plain envelope because as I said to them, I don't trust them. They told me that my survey form would not be counted. I also spoke to my Federal Parliamentarian about this.”

I suspect that this question has been asked a number of times by concerned citizens.

Which raises a question - Is the self-inflicted reputational loss suffered by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in 2016 having a negative impact on the same-sex marriage voluntary postal survey?

The Bureau declares that survey respondents will have their privacy protected and that no-one will be able to identify an individual with their response on the survey form.

However, these survey forms come with a barcode which apparently identifies Commonwealth Electoral Roll eligibility of the recipient and the electoral division in which an individual lives.

So a plain envelope return of the survey form will not hide the survey respondent's identity.

The Bureau has anticipated widespread mistrust in its ability to conduct this national survey without a monumental blunder à la Census 2016. 

Accoding to its website a survey response will be considered invalid if; The printed barcode on the form is missing or altered.

It seems the only individuals with some form of privacy protection are those who are registered as ‘silent voters’ on the electoral roll - they at least will allegedly have their residential address hidden from the ABS and survey forms mailed out by the Australian Electoral Commission in an AEC envelope.

More Australians live in New South Wales and Queensland than in the other states & territories combined

Australian Bureau of Statistics, media release, excerpt, 12 July 2017:

Queensland and New South Wales home to 52.1 per cent of Australia’s total population according to the 2016 Census of Population and Housing ……

NSW certainly has the numbers on their side, outnumbering Queensland residents by close to three million people (7,480,228 to 4,703,193), but Queensland is making a strong play with a faster growth rate of 8.6 per cent, compared with 8.1 per cent for NSW. …..

The 2016 Census tells us there are 28,864 Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people in NSW aged 18-35 years, just edging out Queensland with 25,053.

Between the two battling states, it seems the Cockroaches are the bigger earners, with NSW households earning a median income of $1,486 per week compared to $1,402 per week for a household in Cane Toad country. However, Queensland residents gain an edge with household costs – their median monthly mortgage repayment is $253 cheaper than it is south of the border, while the Sunshine State’s median weekly rent is $50 less. 

The Maroon State also tend to work more in the home, with a higher rate of people engaging in unpaid domestic work (71 per cent in Queensland to 68 per cent in NSW) and child care (28 per cent in Queensland to 27 per cent in NSW). However, the Blue State has a higher rate of providing unpaid care for a person with a disability (12 per cent in NSW to 11 per cent in Queensland)……

…..64.9 per cent of persons in NSW embraced the digital Census, completing their Census form online (above national average), just edging Queensland, where 62.9 per cent of persons used the online Census form (below national average). 

Note: All data presented is based on Place of Usual residence data in the 2016 Census

Was there really a typical Australian in 2016? The Australian Bureau of Statistics thinks so

This month the Australian Bureau of Statistics released its first taste of data from the 2016 national census and rather bravely decided it should be a profile of The ‘Typical’ Australian.

I’m just wondering how reliable this profile is, given the number of people who either stated an intention to or admitted on social media platforms that they falsified some or all of the information they entered on the compulsory census form as a privacy safeguard against personal information data retention and the creation of longitudinal data every Australian.

As the exact number of deliberately falsified forms cannot be known this casts some doubt on census data available to statisticians.

Australian Bureau of Statistics, Census 2016, 11 April 2017:

     ______________________________________________________

The 'Typical' Australian Median Age 38 Sex (Mode) Female Country of Birth of Person (Mode) Australia Country of Birth of Parents (Mode) Both parents born in Australia Language Spoken at Home (Mode) English Ancestry 1st Response (Mode) English Social Marital Status (Mode) Married in a registered marriage Family Composition (Mode) Couple family with children Count of All Children in Family (Mode) Two children in family Highest Year of School Completed (Mode) Year 12 or equivalent Unpaid Domestic Work: Number of Hours (Mode) 5 to 14 hours Number of Motor Vehicles (Mode) Two vehicles Number of Bedrooms in Private Dwelling (Mode) Three bedrooms Tenure Type (Dwelling Count) (Mode) Owned with a mortgage Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people Median Age 23 Sex (Mode) Female Persons born overseas Median Age 44 Sex (Mode) Female Country of Birth of Person (Mode) England Language Spoken at Home (Mode) English Note: * The mode is the most commonly occurring value in a distribution. * Statements of typical age in this release are median values. The median is the middle value  in distribution when the values are arranged in ascending or descending order. * The most common response for each data item is calculated independently. For example, if  the 'typical' person is male and the 'typical' person does 5-14 hours of unpaid domestic work per  week, this does not imply that the 'typical' male does 5-14 hours of unpaid domestic work per week. * No detailed Census data will be issued with this information. Datasets for the above characteristics  will be released as part of the main release of 2016 Census data on Tuesday, 27 June 2017.

The Sydney Morning Herald, 11 April 2017:

The census preview showed that NSW has become more culturally diverse over the past decade.

The typical person in the state now has at least one parent born overseas. In 2006 and 2011, the typical person in NSW had both parents born in Australia. This change also suggests NSW is more culturally diverse than the rest of the nation – the "typical Australian" still has both parents born in Australia.

It's a diversity well masked by averages.

"In my social circles, yes, I guess I'd say I feel very typical but my work is a completely different place," Mrs Purvis says.

"Most of the people I work with speak another language. Their parents weren't born in Australia. A lot of them are younger people who don't have children … and are either still living at home with their parents or renting."

The preview also highlighted the shifting ancestry of the state's migrants. In 2016, the state's typical migrant was a Chinese-born female, aged 44. A decade ago, the typical migrant in NSW was a 45-year-old female born in England.

The state's typical Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander person was a female aged 22.