Australia’s economy will get WORSE before it gets better as unemployment is forecast to hit 9 per cent – the highest level in 26 years – by Christmas and Treasurer Josh Frydenberg warns of the greatest disaster ‘since the Great Depression’
- Treasury is expecting Australia’s unemployment rate to hit 9.25 per cent in 2020
- That misery would be the highest national jobless level since September 1994
Australia’s economy is expected to get worse before it gets better with Treasury expecting unemployment to surge to levels unseen since 1994 by Christmas as the COVID-19 crisis worsens.
The renewed lockdowns in Melbourne are already expected to wipe $3.3billion from the national economy within the next two months.
Four year’s worth of gross domestic product is forecast to wiped out in just three months as Australia’s economy is plunged into the deepest downturn since the 1930s Great Depression and budget deficits surge to the highest levels since World War II.
Treasury is now expecting Australia’s jobless rate to surge to 9.25 by the end of December – a level unseen since September 1994.
Australia’s economy is expected to get worse before it gets better with Treasury expecting unemployment to surge to levels unseen since 1994. Pictured is Treasurer Josh Frydenberg
The renewed lockdowns in Melbourne are already expected to wipe $3.3billion from the national economy within the next two months
Australia’s jobless rate soared to a 22-year high of 7.4 per cent in June as a record one million people were officially unemployed, with plenty more gave up looking for work.
Australia’s economy is expected to contract by seven per cent in the June quarter alone – wiping out the equivalent of four years’ worth of economic activity.
Gross debt will hit $850billion by the end of this financial year as the government borrows big to fund JobKeeper wage subsidies and a boost to JobSeeker unemployment benefits.
Economists fear it would take three decades to pay this off and return to a budget surplus for the first time since 2007.
Treasurer Josh Frydenberg pointed out Australia had lower government debt as a proportion of GDP compared with most other advanced nations.
Australia’s budget deficit this financial year is expected to be the biggest since World War II as a share of the economy.
Four year’s worth of gross domestic product is forecast to wiped out in just three months as Australia’s economy is plunged into the deepest downturn since the 1930s Great Depression and budget deficits surge to the highest levels since World War II. Pictured is a Melbourne fast food worker wearing a face mask
A deficit of $184.5billion is projected for 2020-21, making up 9.7 per cent of GDP, with spending more than triple the amount Labor spent at the height of the Global Financial Crisis in 2009.
That is the worst fiscal figure since 1945 when spending took the deficit to about 25 per cent of GDP.
By comparison, former prime minister Kevin Rudd’s Labor government left a budget deficit of $57.7billion which was 4.7 per cent of GDP a little more than a decade ago.
Australia’s net debt is expected to hit $488.2 billion, or 24.6 per cent of GDP, as of June 30, 2020a nd increase to $677.1 billion, or 35.7 per cent of GDP the following year.