Qantas isn’t the only company that seeks favours from government. It’s not neoliberalism - it’s crony capitalism.
If I were clever, I would have followed through on an idea I had a handful of years ago and set up an investment fund to put money into the businesses whose CEOs spend most time in Canberra schmoozing politicians. These companies have an outsized knack of securing government grants and competitive favours. I would be rich by now and scrolling gleefully through my share portfolio.
But it should only take a second to realise that none of the defining characteristics of neoliberalism now apply to the Australian economy. Government spending is only going up. Australia is highly regulated. And “free market” capitalism? Well, in a free market, Qantas would have had to compete with Qatar.Regulation is not necessarily bad. For the most part, Australians like living in a highly regulated country.
But it is instructive that Davidson finds himself on a unity ticket with Matt Grudnoff from the progressive Australia Institute. Grudnoff says the problem we have in Australia is that we don’t have enough competition – because we’ve drifted away from a free-market system into an oligopolistic one.
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