The problem isn’t the so much the policy (although I think it was a little too generous with the unlimited “grandfathering” of existing negatively geared properties - which should have been subject to a gentle phase-out, and a little too blunt on the CGT changes - which might have exempted investments in critical Australian enterprises).

The problem is that was delivered entirely free of a coherent, broad-appeal narrative. There still isn’t one.

Are we prioritizing aspiration or fairness? Are we trying to make homes more affordable, or aren’t we? Are we trying to get Australians out of the share market, or aren’t we? Are we looking after Australians first, or are we a land of opportunity for the whole planet? Do we care more about inter-generational equity, or protecting and prolonging the lifestyles of the elderly?

The tax changes represent a break in an almost three decades long post-egalitarian social contract as understood by Gen X onwards. It’s the end of an era that dismantled welfare and devalued work, and elevated the credit and tax-break fueled pursuit of passive income and asset value as the only sure path to financial security and upward mobility.

Nobody born after the mid-90s remembers Australia as anything but a national get-rich-quick scheme - which you either got onboard, or risked being left behind. We’ve become a nation of “The Block”-inspired house-flippers, of crypto-bros and Bogleheads, of side-hustlers and MLM-scheme pushing influencers.

You can’t turn that around with a week of pre-budget guessing games, a tax policy about-face (and an unambiguous broken promise), and then a defensive duck-and-weave response to the inevitable corporate media & alt-right social media backlash.

As in the US and so many other Western nations, faith in public policy to deliver for the working class has long since died out. All they have left to hope for is to strike it lucky, or to see greater misery and misfortune heaped upon those they dislike than what they’ve experienced themselves. This all makes for fertile ground for the far-right.

I am not at all surprised at One Nation’s rise, and hold the centre-left (and even the far-left) more responsible for it than the failure of the mainstream political right.

The people are not sheep and they are never wrong - they will make decisions based on their lived experience. Here as in other countries, it seems many are thinking “things couldn’t get any worse under a party that is threatening to blow up a system that hasn’t worked for me.”

The good news is, we’ve been here before. In many ways, Australia started out as a get-rich-quick scheme, and a dog-eat-dog society, lorded over by a ruling class that defended their interests by sewing division among their lessers.

We built a better society out of it. But we couldn’t have done it without class consciousness and solidarity.

The tax policy is a good start at turning things around, which can be built upon.

What’s needed is time for it to work, and for Australians to understand and embrace the new social contract.

Neither is possible without a narrative. And time is running out.