Sound like an economist at this weekend’s dinner party!
The Economy
Good debt bad debt: Our deficit is $29.4 billion. Return to surplus predicted by 20-21 – long after Malcolm Turnbull and Scott Morrison have gone, we suspect.
Unemployment of 5.75 per cent and will fall to 5.5 per cent in 2018-19, then to 5.25 per cent in 2020-21. The cost of living will rise to 2.25 per cent next year, 2.5 per cent in 2019-20. But will your pay go up to cover it? Yes – you should be getting rises of 3% by 2018.
Help for home hunters?
First-home buyers can salary-sacrifice up to $30,000 on top of the compulsory 9.5 per cent into their superannuation to save for a home deposit. But many complain that will mean a long wait to raise the kind of deposit you need in today’s housing market.
Retired couples who downsize will be able to put $300,000 each into their superannuation from the proceeds of their home sale.
Health & families
Up goes the cost – 0.50 cents in two years. But the price of GP visits and medicines will fall thanks to new work on pricing. The government is putting $2.5 billion more in early learning and child care, including the new system of fee subsidies. Changes to the Parental Paid Leave scheme will be scrapped , meaning 72,000 people won’t lose out and 7000 won’t have their payments cut.
From July this year, individuals earning more than $180,000 a year will no longer have to pay the two per cent “temporary budget repair levy”, which gives back $200 for every additional $10,000 of income.
If you’re planning to start a family, childcare fee rebates will increase by thousands of dollars annually from July 1, 2018.
Infrastructure
Big spending here – $75 billion in infrastructure funding up to 2027, including $5.3 billion for the Badgerys Creek Airport, inland rail connecting Brisbane with Melbourne
Smokes
No Budget is complete without smokes and beer, right? Well, nothing on beer but the cost of rolling your own cigarettes and cigars will now be taxed the same as cigarettes.