Reform-The Uncertain Road Ahead

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RECENTLY it has become fashionable to say that people are suffering from reform fatigue, that there has been too much change inflicted on us, either by Governments or by globalization, or both, and that it's time to take a breather in the pursuit of world's best practice in Australia.

But the rest of the world is not going to stand still while we take a breather. Our exchange rate, for instance, is the scoreboard that determines how we are doing against the competition. We should be shocked to learn that, once, an Australian dollar would buy US$1.50. Today it buys about one-third of that. It used to buy more than 500 Yen. Today it buys 67 Yen-a 750 per cent adverse change. So we …