If the worst inflation figures in 22 years don’t force the Reserve Bank into the tiniest of official interest rate rises, what would?
That’s the question doing the rounds of the RBA after the shocking numbers from the Bureau of Statistics that showed inflation at its highest point since commercial television inflictedThe RBA has all the evidence it needs for a rate rise. Sherlock Holmes would be in no doubt about what Philip Lowe needs to do.A headline rate of 5.1 per cent . An underlying rate of 3.7 per cent . A record gap between inflation and wages .
Then add in a federal budget that’s pumping billions of dollars into the pockets of consumers already enjoying record-low interest rates and unemployment at or below 4 per cent that even the RBA’s own business liaison program shows is finally getting a lift in wages. Miss Marple, Hercule Poirot, Sherlock Holmes, Inspector Morse, Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe – all would be in agreement about what the bank has to do if they turned their minds to Australian monetary policy.There will be more questions of the RBA if it doesn’t act on Tuesday. And those questions would squarely go to its independence given all the evidence it has at its disposal to justify the first interest rate increase in an election campaign since 2007.
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