Alan Kohler is one of Australia’s most experienced commentators and journalists. Alan is the founder of Eureka Report, Australia’s most successful investment newsletter, and Business Spectator, a 24-hour free business news and commentary website. He also hosts Inside Business, a half-hour Sunday programme on the ABC, is the finance presenter on the ABC News - and producer of the nightly graph (or two).
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Comments on this article
Comments PolicyI think we are all not just Keynesians now, but socialists, whether we voted for that or not (See Brace for a hard China landing , September 1).
I would say the opportunism of the political class means they have grasped still more power during the crisis and the efforts for greater individual freedom and responsibility that took decades to develop have been thrown away by collectivist ideology wrapped up in paternalism to make it more palatable. When you dumb down a populace with idiotic television and education for work rather than living well you can hardly expect them to be able to vote intelligently. Solution - recommit to the values of individual freedom and responsibility. This is the true leadership function of politics. We should to debate this as if our lives depended upon it because I believe they do.
Only way for China to get out of their problem is to convert to more domestic consumption, it is going to be very tough to manage (See Brace for a hard China landing, September 2).
So it is a matter of when? The world will become an interesting and scary place.
Well said Ben O'Grady (September 1, 2:57PM), or have we also after years of plenty grown fat and become lazy? The political class can always con much of the citizenship into believing that they have all the answers which many of us foolishly believe. If anyone cared to examine world history they would find that every recession was engineered by interfering politicians.
A standout trait I have observed in the past few years is the number of people who rush sniveling to the government for a handout every time it looks like rain. Whatever happened to the can do attitude we used to be proud of?
China is expanding its influence by investing in developing economies – those whose economies are either subsistence-based or rely on primary production and exports.
From Beijing's perspective, there are more similarities than differences between land purchases in Tanzania and central Queensland (See Brace for a hard China landing, September 2).
Great comments Ben (September 1, 2:57) and John (September 2, 12:16). Politicians never let a crisis go to waste and always introduce restrictive, interventionist policies "for our own good" but always detrimental to our liberty (See Brace for a hard China landing, September 1).
As I see it the China story continuing and not turning into a bone crunching hard landing ironically depends on a massive redistribution of wealth within China. That is all those Chinese will need to have much higher western style wages in order to be able to afford all those new apartments and replace all those broke western consumers (See Brace for a hard China landing, September 1).
How the imbalances between the eastern and western economies resolve themselves will indeed be the story of the next decade or so. Ironically the current Chinese investment in developing countries seems to be a continuation of the move of capital to the lowest cost centres - even before the Chinese have themselves finished their own development internally.
It all comes back to the ability of central banks directed by government policy to print fiat money (See Brace for a hard China landing, September 1). The only true check and balance is some sort of universal standard of value that cannot be manipulated to political purposes. Yes that G.... word.