Haha
Thats a very pessimistic post by a not pessimistic person
Thanks for reading the post
lindsayf, but I think it's not meant to be pessimistic. I love to be optimistic in most things but sometimes a reality check of the bigger picture keeps you humble and also somewhat nimble.
I hope we will be in better shape than some of the other developed nations and I hope our policy makers do things that are in the interest of the nation's prosperity in the long term. So I hope some of the things I mentioned does not ever come to fruition so that we can carry on as normal.
I think outside the normal boundaries and the system set for us by the elites of society. These include Governments, Councils and other law making organisations and Central and Reserve bankers etc. These things I talked about are really big picture stuff and I am sorry if I sounded pessimistic. I will not post such views going forward. What I think doesn't matter anyway as I am not in a position high enough to action my views to steer Australia to ensure we stay 'the lucky' country, so I am really really hopeful others with power and Governance will do that for all of us.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ The End On Macro Economic Pessimistic Views ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Change of subject:
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Getting back on subject, since we are talking economy at street level, what do people think about the Job Keeper, Job Seeker and PM's new Job Maker schemes ?
I don't want to open a can of worms, but I think our community has been unfairly treated. So I will go ahead...
With the Job Seeker/Keeper schemes, there was a very vulnerable group of people who missed out on any assistance during this period of shutdowns, job losses and reduced incomes. They are the part-time, casual and workers in alternate careers such as arts/music etc.
You see, some of these part-timers and casuals and even some artists etc barely get by even in a normal economy that was operating in full capacity in 2019. Some work two or more part-time or casual jobs or do some odd jobs in the gig economy where the incomes already fluctuate so much that they tend to worry if they have enough work just to get by month-on-month. So when the lockdowns hit and when these group of workers in our communities hot hit hard, their applications for any assistance was rejected.
Instead it was given to employers to continue to fund the full time employees who didn't have a job with Job Keeper or to Unemployed with Job Seeker. I don't know if people understand the irony but these people who got the benefits already had some buffer to get through the hard time:
If you were an eligible Job Keeper, you already had payouts from your employer for retrenchment payouts, any accumulated sick leave pay and accumulated annual leave pay. And for Job Seekers, they always have the safety net of the Dole which was ramped up and re-named to Job Seeker if you lost your full time job as a result of Covid-19 lockdown.
It was not the case with most part-timers, casuals and other people who didn't make up the "Un-employment" numbers. They had the least benefits if their gig or part-time/casual income dried up and I feel they were left in the dark with these schemes as they received nothing !
I think Kevin Rudd's stimulus package that supported all Australians without discriminating whether you formed part of the Employment number statistics or not during the GFC was much better designed to help the most vulnerable in our community. What do others and
lindsayf think ?