Be careful what you wish for

Businesses can’t vote. Their influence is limited to brown paper bags, old school ties and control of a diminishing fraction of the combined broadcast and online media.

Today’s Fin Review is full of commentary bemoaning the ‘business community’s’ view that there is a ‘lack of leadership’ in Canberra.

What this means is that the government of the day is 100% focused on pork-barrelling themselves back into power at the next election and that, it just so happens, this means implementing policies that will ultimately reduce consumer sentiment and  consumer spending power.

Root cause analysis … the so-called business community is almost fully exposed to domestic market conditions because, generally speaking, they couldn’t export their way out of a wet paper bag. Even if they wanted to, which they don’t.

Why would they? The government of the day also happens to protect their share of the domestic market with all sorts of hidden import barriers and the weakest anti-oligarchy enforcement this side of Singapore.

I say, be careful what you wish for.

They might reply, it wasn’t us, it was our ancestors that started all this. Just like  coalition supporters might claim that it was the English that were despicable towards the aborigines and hence they have no claims to answer to.

I say, if you are a ‘beneficiary’ then, whether you like it or not, the piper will come calling one day.