Good work on behalf of the government, but I do wonder whether this news and falling fuel prices (partially as a result of the cut to the excise tax) Australians might be getting a bit complacent again. These are short-term improvements to a problem that could be long-term and is out of our control. Now is the time to be thinking long-term about how we can prepare for the worst case scenario, including making changes to our individual lifestyles, not sticking to our usual routines of driving everywhere for everything and then suddenly panicking again if things take another turn for the worse.
I don’t think the federal government necessarily has to make long-term policy decisions right now. My concern is more that short-term decisions can and will influence public behaviour to the point that more significant responses may be needed in the longer term. We don’t seem to be willing to adapt to the crisis or learn to live with it. Instead it’s either pretending everything is fine and ignoring the problem or panicking and demanding the government do something about it, which results in short-term “solutions” like cutting the fuel excise tax so we can all go right back to pretending the problem doesn’t exist or affect us when it absolutely will at some point.
Hmm… the primary cause of recessions is a collapse of public sentiment.
Like 3 weeks ago if everyone thought “oh wow this is really terrible we better hunker down and not go away for easter”, you basically have an immediate recession.
Sometimes a recession is really necessary - like if this crisis lasts for a year or more then yeah, our economy will probably need to shrink in order to adapt as you say.
On the other hand if reason can prevail for a minute and things settle down with Iran, or even if we can get a good arrangement with the countries receiving our LNG to keep us topped up with Diesel, then we might be able to sail through this.
This post claims that we have more fuel now than we’ve ever had. At this moment the whole fiasco is a problem of public sentiment.
Cutting the excise and telling everyone to go away for Easter was a way to soothe public sentiment. Everyone just cool down, keep doing what you’re doing, and we’ll adapt as necessary as the situation unfolds.
I guess I’m saying that for the moment, we do want people to pretend the problem doesn’t exist because in a way the problem has been misunderstood.
Good work on behalf of the government, but I do wonder whether this news and falling fuel prices (partially as a result of the cut to the excise tax) Australians might be getting a bit complacent again. These are short-term improvements to a problem that could be long-term and is out of our control. Now is the time to be thinking long-term about how we can prepare for the worst case scenario, including making changes to our individual lifestyles, not sticking to our usual routines of driving everywhere for everything and then suddenly panicking again if things take another turn for the worse.
I agree that its always a great time to buy an e-bike.
However, i don’t think we should be making long term policy decisions on the basis of the current crisis.
I don’t think the federal government necessarily has to make long-term policy decisions right now. My concern is more that short-term decisions can and will influence public behaviour to the point that more significant responses may be needed in the longer term. We don’t seem to be willing to adapt to the crisis or learn to live with it. Instead it’s either pretending everything is fine and ignoring the problem or panicking and demanding the government do something about it, which results in short-term “solutions” like cutting the fuel excise tax so we can all go right back to pretending the problem doesn’t exist or affect us when it absolutely will at some point.
Hmm… the primary cause of recessions is a collapse of public sentiment.
Like 3 weeks ago if everyone thought “oh wow this is really terrible we better hunker down and not go away for easter”, you basically have an immediate recession.
Sometimes a recession is really necessary - like if this crisis lasts for a year or more then yeah, our economy will probably need to shrink in order to adapt as you say.
On the other hand if reason can prevail for a minute and things settle down with Iran, or even if we can get a good arrangement with the countries receiving our LNG to keep us topped up with Diesel, then we might be able to sail through this.
This post claims that we have more fuel now than we’ve ever had. At this moment the whole fiasco is a problem of public sentiment.
Cutting the excise and telling everyone to go away for Easter was a way to soothe public sentiment. Everyone just cool down, keep doing what you’re doing, and we’ll adapt as necessary as the situation unfolds.
I guess I’m saying that for the moment, we do want people to pretend the problem doesn’t exist because in a way the problem has been misunderstood.