Massive cuts to immigration and a switch to nuclear energy are they keys to fixing ‘s woeful economy which is on a par with that of Equatorial Guinea, according to a leading entrepreneur.
Matt Barrie, chief executive of outsourcing marketplace Freelancer, said should on paper be the richest country in the world, but is nowhere near it.
He said a succession of governments have mismanaged the economy to the extent that most people barely scrape by financially despite having some of the highest wages in the world.
Stratospheric real estate prices – brought about by record immigration levels – leave most people with little money left at the end of the month after their huge mortgage or rental costs are exacerbated by spiralling grocery and utility costs.
The evisceration of the manufacturing sector has left almost entirely reliant on primary industry to generate revenue, yet much of what we produce is exported, leaving ns paying irrationally high sums for electricity and food.
‘Our economy in terms of sophistication and complexity is on par with Equatorial Guinea, where they don’t have a cinema in the entire country,’ Mr Barrie said.
The entrepreneur said must wean itself off the migration pyramid scheme which is created a per-capita recession, and use our abundant energy resources to cut business-crushing utility bills and thereby give rise to investment.
He told the latest episode of the EquityMates podcast that: ‘You would think a country with 1200 years of coal supply would be an energy superpower.
‘You would think a country with 28 per cent of the world’s uranium reserves would be an energy superpower. You would think a country with 20 per cent of the world’s gas exports would be an energy superpower,’ the Stanford graduate said.
‘You would think a country with 47 per cent of the world’s lithium production, [that] is sixth in the world for production of copper, fifth in the world for production of nickel – you’d think it would be an electronic and engineering superpower.’
He pointed out that with 56 per cent of the world’s iron ore exports, could make its own steel and export it across the globe instead of selling the ingredients for a fraction of the price to places with much lower manufacturing wages.
‘We should be the richest country in the world, full stop.’
‘Instead we have the greatest erosion of wealth in the developed world, a cost of living crisis, we have house pricing that is astronomically expensive, it does not make any sense.’
Mr Barrie said that with only 3.46 people per square kilometre, should have some of the cheapest land and housing in the world, yet it is close to the world’s most expensive.
‘The root cause of the cost of living crisis is the cost of land and the cause of this is immigration, we have the most expensive casual wages in the world, but again it’s not enough to live on because people need somewhere to live.’
He said ‘s energy crisis is based on the hypocrisy of ending the local reliance on ‘dirty’ coal in the name of climate change, while simultaneously giving more and more to Asian trading partners.
‘We stupidly are going down that path of ‘well what about the environment, we can’t burn coal,’ Mr Barrie said.
‘No, we are burning the coal, every single thing we are digging out of the ground is being burnt, it’s just being burnt by China or Japan.
‘The gas we send overseas is in many cases being reexported. We send it to Japan and they onsell it.’
Mr Barrie claimed the fix was simple.
‘We have to get manufacturing running again in this country. To do that you’ve got to fix the energy problem. We’ve got to make nuclear legal.’
‘I believe immigration needs to be cut by 90 per cent, the skilled migration program is not skilled.
‘You need every person in this country to be able to afford a house over their head to live. To not be a renter or stuck in a mortgage on a treadmill.’
He also suggested international students should pay an ‘infrastructure fee’ of $50,000 before they are granted entry to the country.
He said many politicians only added to the problems was facing.
‘Politicians don’t really know how to grow the economy and really grow industry or do anything other than dig up raw materials out of the ground to ship overseas,’ he said.
‘Both the Liberal and Labor party have been running a program that has been focused on easy, relentless growth.
‘So, as long as house prices gently drift up and as long as wages are gently suppressed, businesses are happy and the citizens are happy.
‘That’s been running for some time but that’s only facilitated by running a very large immigration program.
‘So, we are bringing people into the country, which suppresses wages, and then those people need housing.’
He said under the current Albanese government immigration had gone through the roof – importing the equivalent of the population of Canberra and Darwin each year.
‘How could we possibly build a Canberra and a Darwin per year? It’s not just housing you have to build. You have to build the infrastructure; you have to build hospitals and schools, roads and transport.
‘It’s the state governments who pick up the bill for that, and they’ve been on a massive building spree. It is basically driving the states to the point of bankruptcy.’
1. Iron ore & concentrates 20.3 per cent
2. Coal 15.3 per cent
3. Natural gas 11.1 per cent
4. Education-related travel services 7.1 per cent
5. Gold 4.2 per cent
6. Crude minerals 2.8 per cent
7. Personal travel (excl. education-related) 2.8 per cent
8. Wheat 2.1 per cent
9. Crude petroleum 1.7 per cent
10. Beef 1.7 per cent
11. Aluminium ores & conc (incl alumina) 1.5 per cent
12. Charges for intellectual property 1.2 per cent
13. Professional services 1.1 per cent
14. Copper ores & concentrates 1.0 per cent
15. Meat (excl beef) 0.9 per cent
16. Oil-seeds & oleaginous fruits, soft 0.8 per cent
17. Technical & other business services 0.8 per cent
18. Aluminium 0.8 per cent
19. Copper 0.8 per cent
20. Financial Services 0.7 per cent
21. Refined petroleum 0.6 per cent
22. Cotton 0.6 per cent
23. Other ores & concentrates 0.5 per cent
24. Telecom, computer & information services 0.5 per cent
25. Business-related travel services 0.5 per cent
Source: n Bureau of Statistics.