Australian National Accounts – GDP growth slows significantly – slipping towards recession under current policy settings

The Australian Bureau of Statistics released the latest – Australian National Accounts: National Income, Expenditure and Product, March 2025 – today (June 4, 2025), which shows that the Australian economy grew by just 0.2 per cent in the March-quarter 2025 (down from 0.6 per cent) and by just 1.3 per cent over the 12 months. GDP per capita growth was negative -0.2 per cent as output growth was outpaced the underlying population growth. There was a major slowdown in household consumption expenditure growth and the government sector overall contracted. While the overall slowdown led to a decline in import expenditure (which adds to growth), the decline in exports was greater, which means that the external sector detracted from growth overall. The problem is that as the overall growth rate declines, it is getting to the stage where unemployment will start to rise.

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The neoliberal destruction of Australia’s higher education system

Today, I am fully engaged in work commitments and so we have a guest blogger in the guise of Dr Scott Baum, who will soon be joining us at the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE) at the University of Newcastle as a senior research fellow. Scott has been one of my regular research colleagues over a long period of time and we currently hold ARC grant funding together to explore regional disparities as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Scott indicated that he would like to contribute occasionally and that provides some diversity of voice although the focus remains on advancing our understanding of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and its applications. Today he provides analysis of how lost the Australian tertiary education system has become in this neoliberal period. While focused on the Australian situation, the analysis unfortunately has relevance to higher education systems in most countries.

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