The June quarter GDP figures released by the Bureau of Statistics showed that over the past year the economy grew a seemingly strong 3.6%.
But as labour market and fiscal policy director Greg Jericho notes in the Guardian Australia column, beneath those good numbers are a lot of problems, not the least of which is that wages continue to fail to keep up with inflation. Over the past year the total compensation of employees rose 7% but inflation in the national accounts rose 8.3%. Over the same period corporate profits went up 25%. We are at the absurd state of affairs where GDP is rising strongly, but real wages are not.
We now have a situation where a record low share of national income is going to employees and a record high share is going to profits.
The talk is always about lifting productivity and wages will follow, but the story for far too long now has really been productivity rising and profits following.
Between the Lines Newsletter
The biggest stories and the best analysis from the team at the Australia Institute, delivered to your inbox every fortnight.
You might also like
Analysis: Will 2025 be a good or bad year for women workers in Australia?
In 2024 we saw some welcome developments for working women, led by government reforms. Benefits from these changes will continue in 2025. However, this year, technological, social and political changes may challenge working women’s economic security and threaten progress towards gender equality at work Here’s our list of five areas we think will impact on
The continuing irrelevance of minimum wages to future inflation
Minimum and award wages should grow by 5 to 9 per cent this year
Go Home on Time Day 2024: Exposing the $91 billion rip-off smashing exhausted Aussie workers
Despite new Right to Disconnect laws coming into force earlier this year, new research reveals Australians are still working an average five weeks’ unpaid overtime each year.