On the first official day of the 2022 election campaign, Labor leader Anthony Albanese notably stumbled over Australia’s jobless rate and the cash rate.
What numbers should politicians – and voters – know and care about besides the price of a litre of milk or petrol, or a loaf of bread?
Here are eight of the most important.
1. Number of mass bleachings of the Great Barrier Reef
According to leading marine scientists such as Terry Hughes, the Great Barrier Reef is enduring its sixth mass coral bleaching event on record. Authorities say they are still assessing its severity and extent.
All six have occurred since 1998; four since the 2015-16 summer. Significantly, the most recent has unfolded for the first time during a typically cooler La Niña year.
March’s record marine temperatures pushed corals beyond their heat tolerance, and it remains unclear how many will recover. Quite aside from its environmental value, an estimated 60,000 tourism jobs depend on the reef.
2. Share of renewable energy in Australia’s power grid
Renewable energy supplied almost a third, or 32.5%, of national electricity generation in 2021, according to the Clean Energy Council’s annual report released earlier this month. That was up from 27.7% in 2020, and included Tasmania’s 99.9% share.
Still, the renewable energy industry’s momentum is slowing, council head Kane Thornton says – in part because of federal policy uncertainty. That matters if Australia (or any other nation) is to wean itself off fossil fuels.
3. Wages growth – and outlook
The wage price index (WPI) figure may carry the most weight of any of the economic data: its next update lands 18 May, just three days before the election.
Wages rose 2.3% in 2021, shy of the consumer price increase (see below), according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics’s most recent reading.
That next index update will cover the March quarter. According to the federal budget, the index for the year to June is forecast to rise to 2.75%, and accelerate to 3.25% and 3.5% in the following two years.
4. Consumer price index on the rise
The WPI isn’t the only big number to land before 21 May.
The consumer price index for the March quarter will be unpacked on 27 April by the ABS, and shoppers know it’s likely to eclipse the 3.5% recorded for 2021.
Although only a proxy for the true cost of living, the CPI serves as a key inflation guide. In 2021, it outpaced wages by more than 1 percentage point – so many of us went backwards in “real” terms. By mid-year, economists are tipping the CPI to rise to 5%.
Somewhat optimistically, treasury predicted in last month’s federal budget that CPI will peak at 4.25% this fiscal year and decline in each of the following three years.
5. Jobless rate on the skids
During the official election campaign, the Morrison government will get two releases from the Australian Bureau of Statistics of the monthly unemployment rate – arguably its more positive economic result.
February’s 4% jobless rate was one of the two numbers Albanese fluffed on Monday. Already near a 48-year low, the rate may drop into the 3%-range when the bureau releases March labour force figures on Thursday.
If the many “help wanted” signs in shop windows are any indicator, the tally may be lower again when the ABS posts the April figures on 19 May – two days before the election.
6. How hawkish can the RBA get?
The other number Albanese tripped over was the official cash rate set by the Reserve Bank of Australia.
Actually, it’s a target rate – and it has sat at 0.1% since November 2020. The central bank board has met 15 times since, and left it undisturbed at that record low.
The next board meeting is 3 May. Investors and economists aren’t expecting the RBA to provide a pre-election shock by lifting the cash rate target, but consensus is growing that rises will begin the following month – possibly continuing each month for the following year or so.
A higher cash rate will feed into higher repayment costs for mortgage holders and businesses alike, as banks pass on their own higher borrowing costs.
7. How fast is Australia’s economy growing?
Another good news story for the government, generally speaking. Gross domestic product expanded 4.2% in 2021, leaving it 3.4% larger than before the pandemic, the ABS says.
That the economy is growing relatively rapidly should not come as a huge surprise given those record-low interest rates, some record-high commodity prices (even before Russia invaded Ukraine), and record budget deficits that peaked at 6.5% of GDP in the 2020-21 fiscal year.
Treasury predicts GDP growth will peak at 4.25% this fiscal year before slowing to 3% next year, and easing back into the 2%-plus range for the following three years. However, estimates that commodity prices will sink to more normal levels may prove to be too conservative – the slowdown might not be so sharp.
8. Global carbon dioxide levels
As the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change noted last week in the third report of its sixth assessment, the time for serious action to reduce – if not eliminate – greenhouse case emissions is “now or never”. Every 0.1 of a degree of avoided heating matters.
According to the US National Atmospheric and Oceanic Administration’s four monitoring sites, the most recent global average carbon dioxide content was 417.14 parts per million, up from 340ppm in 1980 and about 280ppm before the industrial era. (CSIRO’s most recent reading from the aptly named Cape Grim: 413.1ppm.)
Other greenhouse gases are also on the rise, and shouldn’t be ignored.
It's always a 'yikes' every month I update this graphic...
— Zack Labe (@ZLabe) April 9, 2022
[Greenhouse gas data provided by @NOAA_ESRL: https://t.co/UFCoZRvf1O] pic.twitter.com/GOjEdEQqPH
