It’s tempting to view the upcoming jobs and skills summit as a retro version of Bob Hawke’s 1983 national economic summit which unified the nation and set up his government for more than a decade of success.
There are obvious similarities: a new ALP government inherits an economy being buffeted by the winds of history, challenging worker representatives and captains of industry to rethink what is normal in pursuit of the national interest.
But before we don the beige-coloured glasses, it is important to recognise that the problems the two governments face are almost polar opposites.
The 1983 summit was called in a period of spiralling domestic wages and prices, with the allure of global flows of goods, labour and capital promising to drive a new era of prosperity.
The accord struck at the 1983 summit was an innovative game changer that would integrate Australia into this global economy, without the hard neoliberal excesses of Reaganism in the US or Thatcherism in Britain.
The grand bargain was to trade off the certainty of a tightly regulated national economy for a more dynamic, global one, underpinned by a social safety net that included Medicare and, later, universal superannuation.
That agreement effectively ended the 20th Century Australian Settlement that had provided workers individual security via the levers of trade protection, centralised wages and – up until the 1960s – race-based immigration controls.
It worked until it didn’t, generating growth and wealth that transformed the nation through the 80s, 90s and into the new millennium until the global capital system mutated – gorging itself on deregulation and gaming itself to the brink of collapse in 2007.
The pandemic further exposed the weaknesses in neoliberalism: the fragility of global supply chains, the inherent risks of people movement and the travesty of small government.
For the majority of Australians the promise of globalisation has dimmed. A majority tell us in this week’s Guardian Essential report that they see the economic system as fundamentally broken.
This disquiet traverses party lines and generations, with more than half of Coalition voters ready for fundamental change. Pointedly, supporters of the Greens and One Nation are both even more likely to reject the status quo.
In a separate question, even more want to see government playing a greater role in the economy, with a whopping 80-20 preference for more, rather than leaving it up to the market.
This is the context of the 2022 jobs and skills summit: a nation that has lost faith in the economic status quo looking for its elected representatives to chart a better path forward that puts more agency back in the collective.
Rising wages are no longer the burning platform they were in 1983. It’s the lack thereof and the flow-on effects of an economy increasingly out of whack with the needs or aspirations of its most important input: the worker.
Right now, many of these workers are struggling with flatlining wages, job insecurity, rising cost of living and interest rates. Key industries that stepped up during the pandemic are now facing crippling labour market shortages, a direct result of their failure to build attractive careers and invest in the training required.
The virus challenged the way the workers had been devalued over decades of economic freedom, with a clear disconnect between the contribution they provide the community and the diminishing value the economic system places on them.
To the cursory reader this may come across as a Marxist proposition, but it is also simpatico with a more contemporary ethos, that of user-centred design, the discipline of making a system work for the subject, rather than expecting the subject to adapt to the system.
This is a mindset implicit in Anthony Albanese’s commitment before the election to make the economy work for ordinary Australians. That is not just political rhetoric, that’s a design specification.
So what does an economy designed for working people look like? Recognising that an economy worth its name needs to pay workers a living wage, has a revenue base to fund basic services and provides the security to invest in their futures.
Some big ideas have been served up pre-summit and in news hardly likely to shock any worker, there is strong support for measures that would have previously been considered radical.
Australians want to see government doing more than fiddling around the edges; there is strong support for price caps, super-profit taxes and industry-wide pay deals. Support for each measure crosses partisan voting lines, with negligible opposition to any of these propositions.
On paper, these are all radical departures from the neoliberal consensus that defined the 1983 summit and so much economic debate since.
Only increasing immigration fits into this framework and, unsurprisingly, it is the least popular option put forward – although one with still significant support. Explaining the impact on housing, health services and infrastructure of this influx will be essential to consolidate support behind this measure.
The broader message from the public is clear: like the successful Hawke government before it, we want the new government to be brave; to recognise the moment it is in and to not just think outside the box, but to break the box. Only this time, the challenge for government is not to coax people into giving them permission to give up control, but to reclaim responsibility for the wellbeing of its citizens by tempering the unrestrained forces of global capital that have so badly let us down.
As governments around the world struggle post-pandemic with broken budgets, rising inequality and distrust in institutions, the Albanese government has the chance to begin building its legacy. Now.
Join Peter Lewis to discuss this week’s Essential report with Guardian Australia’s chief political correspondent, Sarah Martin, and Australia Institute deputy director Ebony Bennett at 1pm Tuesday – free registration here
