Angus Taylor and Jane Hume are holding a press conference in a short little bit to discuss the selected living cost indexes data released today (Greg Jericho covered that off a little earlier but the takeaway is: the ABS divided households up into types – employees (ie someone working); government beneficiaries (so those on Jobseeker or Disability Support or Single Parenting Payment), Age Pension and “Self-funded (or let’s be honest, tax-break funded) retirees. The upshot is that in the past year the increase in the cost of living was: Employees: 4.0%, Age Pensioners: 2.5%, Other govt transfer recipients: 3.2%, “Self-funded” retirees: 2.5%, CPI: 2.4%. – The big reason for the difference with inflation is in the past year the cost of mortgage repayments went up 14.7% in 2024 (down from a 18.9% rise in the year to September.) And since March 2022, mortgage repayments have risen… (gulp) 159%)

Greg predicts that Taylor and Hume will say that since June 2022 employee cost of living has gone up 17.7%. He’d like you to keep in mind that in June 2022 it was rising at 4.6% – the highest for 11 years, whereas now it is rising at 4.0%