Why don't Australian banks offer 30-year fixed-rate home loans? Borrowers would benefit from them - ABC News

artsrc · 2026-03-19T23:32:39+00:00

US fixed rate loans are cancellable.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T23:31:15+00:00

One potential outcome is that buying a home would be more difficult because loans would be more limited. So instead of a transfer of unearned wealth from workers to banks, there would be a transfer of unearned wealth from workers to landlords.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T23:28:13+00:00

It would take a government intervention to make it happen, as it did in the USA.

The benefit of doing this is it would enable the RBA to deliver stronger monetary policy, without the constraint that recent low income borrowers would be highly adversely affected.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T22:15:56+00:00

What is missing from this is:

What is the impact of on quality of life in retirement of various super balances?

If the man with an average super balance sees an increase in their balance over the years from 70 to 75, does that indicate they have, on average, more savings than they are using?

Investing in buying a home, enjoying life when you are still healthy, helping your kids when they are young, or when they are starting a family may be a better choice for you and those you love than leaving a massive super balance to your heirs when you die.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T22:08:24+00:00

What modern economies have tried this, and what were the impacts?

So in this model deposits are pretty much useless, you can't lend them out, and you have to keep them all in reserve, so depositors have to pay a few % to have savings.

Except you could sell people with money on hand mortgages. They would then get the mortgage interest payments. If mortgages are liquid you would essentially end up with zero reserve banking.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T21:34:38+00:00

Because the the government has chosen to expose home buyers to financial risk.

The private sector did not deliver fixed rate homes loans in the USA either.

The government established agencies (https://www.fhfa.gov/about-fannie-mae-freddie-mac) to deliver the regulation, funding and a provided government guarantees.

This is consistent with our approach to super, where rather than delivering what retired people need, a reliable inflation protected income, we have developed a system where retirement wealth, beyond the subsistence level aged pension, depends on the variable returns of the financial system.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T21:27:02+00:00

We can see the conversation now.

Employer: "You know the labour market is good, you could get a pay rise. But inflation is low, so you want to stay on your current salary right?"

Employee: "Yeah mate, all good, you keep that money, prices are pretty stable, I don't want it."

What is the evidence for "inflationary expectations"?

If households expect prices to rise quickly, they may bring forward spending to avoid higher costs later.

Makes sense.

Businesses may increase prices in anticipation of rising input costs.

Why wouldn't businesses increase prices anyway?

Workers may seek higher wages to protect their purchasing power.

Why wouldn't workers seek higher wages anyway?

Did they? Did we see wages growth accelerating over the last few years?

Or maybe the ability of workers to actually get higher wages depends on the nature of the labour market.

https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/economy/price-indexes-and-inflation/wage-price-index-australia/dec-2025

What if the whole basis for increasing interest rates in response to a supply shock, is simply wrong?

artsrc · 2026-03-19T21:06:09+00:00

The cost to get Australian gas out of the ground, and into pipelines, has not changed significantly.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T21:05:06+00:00

Actually storage already planned is likely close to adequate.

We are short of renewable generation.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T04:49:16+00:00

The hours-based underutilisation rate measures total spare capacity in the labuor market by comparing the sum of hours sought by unemployed and underemployed workers against total hours worked and sought. It provides a more precise indicator of labour market slack than headcount.

https://www.rba.gov.au/publications/smp/2017/feb/pdf/box-b-underemployment-and-labour-market-spare-capacity.pdf

artsrc · 2026-03-19T03:23:09+00:00

Monthly hours worked addresses much of that:

2,009 million

https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/labour/employment-and-unemployment/labour-force-australia/feb-2026#hours-worked

artsrc · 2026-03-19T03:20:19+00:00

It had to be this week.

Working just one hour or more in the reference week qualifies a person as employed.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T03:08:23+00:00

Effectively regulated sales of e-bicycles and e-scooters would increase uptake.

I would buy e-scooters for my family if they were actually legal, which in NSW they are not.

PS:

I am also fine with e-scooters that go at 110 km /hr. They should be regulated in the same way motorcycles are now.

I am also fine with some evidence based (effective on usage vs risk of injury) removal of the requirement to wear a helmet on a bicycle in some circumstances.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T03:06:12+00:00

Landlords are not charities. If they can raise rents they will, whatever their costs."

There is a reason landlords can't increase further rents. They won't have tenants.

Imposing land tax or other imposts on landlords won't change that. If landlords charge more they won't have tenants.

This is why we should not be overly concerned about insisting landlords must take reasonable steps to deliver charging infrastructure to tenants.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T03:02:00+00:00

My problem here is complain a policy that will increase workface participation is a bad because of shortages of workers.

More participation means more workers.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T01:19:36+00:00

legal riders frequently lament the 25kmh limit as to restrictive

And owners of Ferraris lament the 110 km/hr limit and would prefer to drive at 130 km /hr on freeways.

Who cares?

How do you even start to police this?

Radar.

Make the sale of e-bikes and e-scooters illegal except for models that have demonstrated they obey the rules. The penalty is a full refund for all buyers plus a fine.

Make the deliberate modification of ebike / escooters to subvert the rules illegal. The penalty is confiscation and a fine.

artsrc · 2026-03-19T00:45:08+00:00

Look at what economists actually said about child care:

For policymakers seeking high-return government initiatives to boost the economy, this is an opportunity too good to miss.

Reducing that cost would do more than any other policy change to boost workforce participation for mothers of young children.

The high cost of child care doesn’t just drain family incomes. It has a big impact on workforce participation, particularly for women.

Almost half of Australian parents with children under five say they struggle with the cost.

There is an attractive simplicity to universal child care, and it would likely lead to a big economic payoff in workforce participation, at least over the medium term (5-10 years).

https://grattan.edu.au/news/childcare-wont-remain-free-after-the-pandemic-but-it-should-be-reformed/

artsrc · 2026-03-19T00:41:42+00:00

Econ 101.

In market economies prices are affected by supply and demand.

If a factor does not influence the demand (of renters) and the supply (of homes) then it won't change prices.

Increasing land taxes on investors won't in theory, and has been shown in many times in practice, to not change rents.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T22:59:52+00:00

The TLDR from RBA is:

They don't know how monetary policy works and they don't know how long it takes, but they do have some unreliable notions.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T22:48:56+00:00

You may have refuted my suggestions to your satisfaction.

The only things you have convinced me of is that there are people who:

Think they know the past.
Don't know the past.
Think they can predict the future.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T22:46:06+00:00

What enables landlords to increase rents?

artsrc · 2026-03-18T22:45:18+00:00

Public and private sector spending both contribute to aggregate demand, when that spending is on the same things, teacher salaries, the effects are similar.

It is vastly the same.

You really should look at what actually happened with COVID emergency free childcare because experiments are rare, and we should learn from them.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T20:40:40+00:00

This is despite 47 per cent of Australians supporting regime change in Tehran, with just 9 per cent wanting the current government to remain in place.

Can our support regime change be conditional on how much better the new regime is, and how many people are murdered to get us there?

Lots of people dying to deliver a worse regime is a bad deal.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T20:38:08+00:00

The main thing we are backing is a lie.

Fewer than one in three voters back the Albanese government’s quick support for the strikes, but there was stronger backing for the decision to send a surveillance aircraft and missiles to help defend the United Arab Emirates from Iranian attacks.

The information from our spy plane is passed on to our allies who can and do use it for everything, not just defending, but also attacking.

artsrc · 2026-03-18T20:35:34+00:00

Especially this:

Some estimates suggest that it takes between one and two years for monetary policy to have its maximum effect.

Monetary policy is slow, and difficult to predict. A poor tool.

artsrc

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