Ross Gittins
Ross Gittins is economics editor of the SMH and an economic columnist for The Age. His books include Gittins' Guide to Economics, Gittinomics and The Happy Economist.
Deficit realities finally dawn on all
Ross Gittins Something highly significant has happened in just the past week: it's become clear the tide has turned in our politicians' demonisation of budget deficits and debt.
Ross Gittins
Big companies' tax avoidance blatant and shameless
Ross Gittins Paying your fair share is anathema to multinationals.
Ross Gittins
Tail wagging uneasy dog in budget debate
Ross Gittins I hate to burden you with a topic as earnest as the budget deficit so close to the holidays.
Ross Gittins
It's the weak recovery that worries, not surplus
Ross Gittins I hate to burden you with a topic as earnest as the budget deficit so close to the holidays - I had hoped to write about the idea of giving someone a goat for Christmas - but the saga of whether the...
Ross Gittins
It's great to have a conscience, now tell us how we'll pay for it
Ross Gittins You may not have noticed, but last week was among the most significant of the Gillard government's term.
Ross Gittins
Not all that different but clearly better
Ross Gittins This is the I-solemnly-promise-to-be-tough budget. Its nasties come as an IOU. When the whole state had its tongue hanging out for deliverance from the Carr-Iemma-Rees-Keneally government, some...
Ross Gittins
An ugly truth: it's time we raised taxes
Ross Gittins Smaller government means squeezing public services spending.
Ross Gittins
Don't judge government by its size
Ross Gittins In the early 1980s, not long after I got into the economic commentary business, Maggie Thatcher and Ronald Reagan were riding high and the great enthusiasm of the moment was the need for Smaller...
Bad-luck budget won't win any friends, but nor should it
Ross Gittins This is a deceptively tough budget. It won’t impress people – either with its parsimony or its generosity - but that’s not the measure of a good budget.
Ross Gittins
O'Farrell will need better luck next time
Ross Gittins THERE has never been reason to doubt Barry O'Farrell's skill as a politician, but it helps for a pollie to be lucky and, failing that, for him to have the steel to make his own luck.
Ross Gittins
A rabble without a cause
Ross Gittins We're losing the ability to fall in behind a leader, naysayers stealing the floor at every turn.
Ross Gittins
Food figures overcooked
Ross Gittins Australia is a net importer of food? Time to turn up the bulldust detector.
What Keneally and co achieved ... and what they didn't
Ross Gittins This budget foreshadows a marked improvement in the budget balance, which has returned to operating surplus two years earlier than expected.
Ross Gittins
Low rates not always best option
Ross Gittins I think I can safely predict this will be another year of much fuss about rising interest rates and worsening home loan affordability.
Ross Gittins
Jobless fall by the wayside in crusade to harness grey power
Ross Gittins Are you appalled by the greedy decision by the state governments to appropriate a quarter of the hard-won $32-a-week age pension increase from singles living in public housing? Do you share the view...
