Cranky Lizard speaks…
September 2020.
“ Winterwood”…A Song by Don Maclean.
Victorian and Federal Politicians have been reported as saying that the Victorian economy, a large and vital part of the Australian economy will take years to recover from the shocking mess created by the disgraceful shambles of pandemic management of the current Victorian Government.
But Cranky Lizard is a little more optimistic than that.
Victoria is a vital state of the Commonwealth of Australia. It makes a huge contribution to the National Economy, and although Melbourne and its close environs is a dynamic financial hub and a large manufacturing and processing center; the engine room of the Victorian economy is outside of Melbourne and the Central Business District.
The engine room is the vast primary industry of agriculture which creates wealth, generous wealth, for Australia; and this industry spreads across the Victorian landscape from East to West and from North to the South.
Beef cattle, sheep, dairy farms and the associated satellite enterprises that combine with these primary grazing and dairy industries shall continue to function without too much interruption – despite the madness of Melbourne.
Timber, sawmilling is busy, productive and profitable throughout the North East and South east of the State.
Prolific broad acre farming of grains, wheat, barley, sorghum, canola, corn and oats flourishes mainly in the North West and West and the Gods have begun to smile softly on the rain patterns, as a La Nina seductively flings her skirts around her thighs and promises rain.
Which, in turn promises economic activity and healthy financial returns as primary industries always deliver in weather patterns of rain and sunshine.
Cranky Lizard is optimistic about the Victorian economy, and therefore the Australian economy. Victorians are hard working productive people; they are more than capable of dealing with this virus and the political circus in Melbourne.
Cranky Lizard reckons that there are other ‘good ‘ signs and promises of better things to come…
Some of them are:-
There will be a vaccine for this virus, and it will be within 12 months. The human race will have learnt how to deal with viruses of this kind in the future through the application of artificial intelligence in developing fast computerization processes. These processes, in turn, will allow the continuing increase in our general depth of knowledge of how these viral swine function and how to kill them, or, at least deny them their capacity to replicate. To put it simply we, humans, will learn from this and we will deal with future pandemics more ruthlessly. We shall be able to insulate ourselves from these monsters for years to come…there is also an important defense level in all of this – Cranky Lizard will leave you to think about that! [ Hint: Biological warfare defense…]
Australia will gain from enhanced immigration streams of energetic, dynamic and loyal people from South East Asia, specifically Hong Kong. This stream will assist Australia in overcoming the ‘ageing ‘ population. At the end of World War II this country had a huge debt problem, much more so than now, we dealt with it by productive immigration, and we can do that again. We know from our current experience that the productivity of the immigrants and their need for goods and services will drive the wealth creation cycles we need, to deal with our National debt. We have done this before, and Cranky Lizard is confident we can do it again.
Australian manufacturing will emerge from this mess as a stronger, broader and better-balanced sector of our economy. We can and shall make the ‘things ‘we need for our daily lives. We can, and will, participate in world-class technological development using AI and ‘nano’ science to allow us to create new and resourceful bases from which to develop our energy and agricultural sectors of our economy.
Small and medium-sized enterprises will be the engine which drives our economic resurgence towards financial strength. The human activity and ingenuity surrounding these enterprises is staggering; SME’s have, for at least the past 20 years, been the beehives of our economy – they shall continue to be so…
Axiomatic to these predictions will be the shifting away from the adversarial systems of our workplace relations. Necessity will force us to adjust and replace the clunky, chest-thumping industrial relations regimes that we have a State level and at Commonwealth level. Union thugs and greedy, mean-minded bosses, and there are plenty of both out there, will no longer have a place in a workforce that can work from home, that relies upon robotic technology and that can literally give the bird to any union or employer that does not apply commonsense. Cranky Lizard looks forward to that as a long overdue and welcome occurrence!
We have been a society enthralled by stock market performance and the associated dividends – this will change, rapidly. Major corporations and their returns will not be as important as individuals and their well being. Financial structures will vary with the arrival of the WFH [ work from home ] phenomena. For the foreseeable future, Cranky Lizard sees that interest rates will remain low and this provides incentives both in borrowing and entrepreneurship.
Our current young generation can look forward to better quality housing and much lower prices, simply because we shall need the dwellings for immigration and for housing our children; improved building systems, individual self-contained housing units located in major regional areas will also add to the general mix.
Cranky Lizard has taken some big leaps here, ably assisted by the optimism of Robert Gotleibsen of The Australian newspaper.
Australia and the Australian way of life deserve big leaps – in thinking and action.
Very, very few of us have been alive when our country has faced a more challenging time.
Sure, we have had them…The Depression, the Spanish Flu pandemic, existential threats in World War II…but we have weathered them and emerged stronger.
We are, as a Nation, the envy of much of the global community of Nations. We have arrived at our current point on our journey because we have had decent political leadership when we needed it; and we, we, as people, as Australians, have recognized that at the times when we need to, we can throw off the political cloaks and work together to build our Nation.
That is what we must do now.
Cranky Lizard knows that the future is so bright that “we shall have to wear shades.”
Enjoy your days. Life is good and there is plenty of it about.