Investing in social housing, health care and the public sector will help address stalling economic growth in Tasmania, a new report has found.
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Australian Bureau of Statistics data analysed in the report showed Tasmania had lost more jobs as a percentage of employed people than other parts of Australia.
"Unemployment has actually continued to rise, reaching 7.6 per cent in September-the second highest in the nation after Queensland, and the highest since the start of the crisis, rising 1.3 percentage points over the last month," the report found.
"These figures do not include displaced workers who have simply given up looking for work altogether."
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It was delivered ahead of the state government's budget announcement on Thursday.
The report's author, economist Dan Nahum, said the government should not withdraw effective stimulus yet and gave five recommendations to help the state's economic reconstruction.
He said a deficit should not be feared by the government if it aided the recovery.
"Now is the time to invest - the cost of borrowing for government will remain at historically low levels for some time to come," he said.
"On a range of measures, the Tasmanian labour market is more precarious than most of Australia's, which makes a proactive, decisive, and ongoing fiscal response to the downturn all the more important. Given the important role the household sector plays in the Tasmanian economy, the state government must target household demand in its reconstruction effort."
The report's five recommendations included:
- Increase investment in public housing. The government has already committed to building 1000 new social housing units by 2023 but there were 3373 people on the waiting list in June.
- Expand public sector investment into health, aged and disability care sectors to create jobs.
- Return outsourced public sector functions to government where possible.
- Co-invest in strategic industries including general manufacturing, sustainable energy/manufacturing, renewable electricity exports, tourism/hospitality, arts/entertainment, food production and higher education.
- Not withdrawing effective stimulus quickly.
The government has built 316 social houses and released 34 affordable lots of land onto the market under the second Affordable Housing Action Plan, according to the latest figures.
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Jackson Worthington
General news reporter with a special interest in social justice, the economy and family violence. Jackson.Worthington@austcommunitymedia.com.au
General news reporter with a special interest in social justice, the economy and family violence. Jackson.Worthington@austcommunitymedia.com.au
Isobel Cootes
Sports reporter at The Canberra Times. A Novocastrian with a passion for football (or soccer as they call it in the capital) via The Examiner and The Port Lincoln Times.
Sports reporter at The Canberra Times. A Novocastrian with a passion for football (or soccer as they call it in the capital) via The Examiner and The Port Lincoln Times.
