>At the same time, Australia's growth rate has been among the
>strongest in the world. How can that be, if all these titans are
>falling?
I think some whopping privatisations - and a very low dollar that has done nothing to discourage a huge credit-consumerism orgy but has substantially boosted mining and agriculture exports - have made us look good. We've nothing left to sell, a lousy market to sell it into, our consumers are slowly pulling their heads in and our salient trading partners are beginning to pull theirs in, too. I suppose we've successfully destroyed some excess capital, now ... but ... an economy with the third-worldish characteristic of relying on primary industry and the first-world characteristic of high consumer expectations and personal debt ... well, you always get cross at me when I come over Cassandraesque ...
Cheers, Rob.