How doomed is Australia? This much.

The ABS, bless their public-service hearts, churns out mountains of data. Pity hardly anyone bothers to look at it. Well, except for masochists and professional weirdos like yours truly.

One of my guilty pleasures? The GFS – government financial statistics. It’s basically a P&L statement for the whole circus of the Australian government. And to its credit, it actually does proper accounting: it nets off all the ‘intra-family squabbles’ between state and federal budgets instead of just throwing numbers in a blender.

And what do the numbers say? Oh boy. They’re not just bad; they’re the sort of bad that should come with a trigger warning. And no, they weren’t on the menu at Cygnet Jim’s Productivity Summit – aka the Rent Seekers’ Tea Party, complete with finger sandwiches funded by you.

I’ve pieced together a couple of ABS datasets so you don’t have to ruin your weekend, and here’s the crash course:

First, remember that ‘general government’ is bureaucrat-speak for everything except the shady stuff – public corporations and ‘funny money’ playpens like the Futures Fund.

So, in the 12 months to June 2025:

• General government revenues: up 4.4 per cent to $1.007 trillion
• General government expenses: up 7.7 per cent to $1.027 trillion

Now, toss in the non-general sector (because the gravy train never stops):

• Total government revenues: up 4.6 per cent to $1.129 trillion
• Total government expenses: up 7.7 per cent to $1.149 trillion

And here’s the kicker: in the same period, GDP limped along with a pathetic 1.3 per cent rise to $2.638 trillion.

That’s right. Government spending ballooned nearly six times faster than the economy. And remember, government spending is part of GDP, so the real growth in the private sector is basically somewhere between anaemic and on life support.

What happens when revenues and expenses both outpace GDP? Easy arithmetic: government swallows more of the economy. In one measly year, their share of GDP went from 41 per cent to 44 per cent.

Yes, nearly half the economy is now effectively commandeered by bureaucrats, regulators, and policy wonks. And if you count the compliance, accounting, and legal industries that exist solely to service the regulatory-industrial complex, Australia has already turned into Argentina – we just haven’t gotten the memo yet.

Meanwhile, at Jim’s Rent Seekers’ Tea Party, the conversation wasn’t about restraint. Oh no. It was all about more taxes, more spending, more control. Because nothing says ‘productivity’ like strangling what’s left of the productive sector.