US Election Finally Decided
After a gruelling three-day slugfest where battleground states swung from blue to red and then back again, America finally has a new Commander-in-Chief. Democratic candidate Joe Biden is now the President Elect of the United States of America. With this brings a number of economic implications that could serve to make or break a struggling US economy, reeling after the disastrous effects of COVID-19. Biden has notably taking a more careful approach in tackling the virus, as he outlined in the Presidential Debate that he wants to take control of it before resuming business as usual.
This includes hiring a group of experts at the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention to help set national, evidence-based guidance to stop outbreaks as well as making significant investments in vaccine distribution and testing. As if that wasn’t done already. Furthermore, one of Biden’s acts as President will be looking at implementing a stimulus package, with further aid to business and the labour force stalling heavily ahead of the election. Aptly named the “Emergency Action Plan to Save the Economy”, his legislation sets out to increase unemployment insurance, send more direct payments to struggling Americans, forgive some student loans and provide more aid to small business. Here’s hoping a Republican Senate allows him to actually get some work done.
Australian’s Exporters in fear as China implements trade bans:
Unprecedented suspensions on Chinese trade were seemingly confirmed this week, with seven Australian export products no longer able to be exported to China. These products include wine, lobster, copper, coal, sugar, barley and timber. These reported suspensions seem to hold the very balance of our economy, as they could potentially cut Australian exports by up to 6 billion dollars. This incredible figure was to be expected, given that China is currently Australia’s largest trading partner, making up a massive 30% of our exports. This comes after an investigation that was launched back in August by China, investigating potential anti-dumping actions. Specifically, China investigated reports that Australia were “dumping” wine at deliberately low prices in order to crowd out local producers and claim a larger market share.
Unemployment rate continues to fall
Unemployment fell to 6.8% down from 7.5%, as the number of Australians out of work dipped back under one million. However, this was not reflected in the state of Victoria as unemployment actually rose to 7.1%, with 40,000 people added to the job line as a result of stricter restrictions following continued outbreaks of the virus. Competition for jobs seems to be decreasing, but the aftereffects of the virus are still lingering. Specifically, statistics from LinkedIn show the number of applications per job heading back down to pre-COVID levels.