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New Zealand Budget Deficit Set to Worsen Amid Global Growth Fears

New Zealand Budget Deficit Set to Worsen Amid Global Growth Fears

SYDNEY—The New Zealand government warned Thursday further near-term budget deterioration with the country's nascent economic recovery at risk from a slowdown in world growth and the potential for ongoing volatility in financial markets.
The fiscal update forecasts the budget deficit will widen to around 12.1 billion New Zealand dollars, equivalent to US$7.2 billion, in fiscal 2026, up from a deficit of NZ$10.1 billion in fiscal 2025.

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Listings from 1972 show unbelievable house prices in nation's most expensive city
Listings from 1972 show unbelievable house prices in nation's most expensive city

Yahoo

time25 minutes ago

  • Yahoo

Listings from 1972 show unbelievable house prices in nation's most expensive city

A page of real estate listings from 1972 has left Aussies shocked at just how much house prices have increased in the last 50 years. In the nation's most expensive city — where the median home value is now more than $1.2m — property prices have increased by an eye-watering 5000 per cent since the listings were published. The 1972 edition of The Realtor shows a page of homes located across Frenchs Forest, Belrose, Beacon Hill and Allambie Heights on Sydney's Northern Beaches. One three-bedroom home was for sale for just $23,950, while the most expensive property on the page is a four-bedder with 'room for a pool' listed at $44,950. One of the homes in Beacon Hill, valued at the time for $27,500, sold in 2021 for $2.55m — a staggering increase of more than 9000 per cent, outpacing the growth in average wages which has been under 2500 per cent over the same 53-year-period. Northern beaches realtor Mark Novak from Novak Properties told Yahoo News that even the smaller homes on the old listing page would be worth upwards of $2m now. "You can see in that photo, there's the little fellas that are just one level three-bedders, they're about that $2.2m mark. And then you can see the two storey examples, they're probably in the higher end of that $2.7m - $2.9m mark," he said. "It's wild." While these days you'd be lucky to get a new car for those 1970s prices, back then it was still out of reach for some. The average weekly wage in Australia in 1972 was $85.50, according to data from the Reserve Bank of Australia. This would put the average Australian's annual salary at just under $4500 a year. To purchase the cheaper three-bedroom home, a resident would be spending about five times their salary, though the interest rate was around 7 per cent. In 2025, the typical Australian full-time worker earns just under $100,000. With the median house value in Frenchs Forest currently sitting at $2.2m, buyers would be forking out more that 22 times their salary to buy a home in the area. While the increases feel ridiculously steep, Mark insists it's all part of the steady property trend that sees homes double in value every 10 years or so. He described the area around Frenchs Forest as a "lovely, honest, Australian" neighbourhood, where the families work hard and care about their community. He said it's likely the people who bought their homes 50 years ago may not have been particularly wealthy, but are now sitting on a pot of gold. But despite that, he made the interesting point that many of the homes on the listing remain relatively unchanged. "The houses look the same. I think you'd find the kitchens and bathrooms have been changed, but structurally they're pretty similar from the outside. "These are those guys where the furniture is the same. The cars are similar. They've kept everything. They bought once when they were real young and they never got in and out, or changed it. Whereas our generation and the newer generation, you're constantly evolving and changing, which costs money." For those first home buyers overwhelmed by today's prices who think they'll never be able to afford a home, Mark says it is absolutely possible and offered a tip. "Use your super. First home buyers can use their super, but not many people know that. They can voluntarily contribute to their super above their normal repayments and then pull it out to buy a property so they can save faster," he said. Do you have a story tip? Email: newsroomau@ You can also follow us on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, Twitter and YouTube.

Column: Will Tesla suffer if Musk alienates both political wings?
Column: Will Tesla suffer if Musk alienates both political wings?

Yahoo

time2 hours ago

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Column: Will Tesla suffer if Musk alienates both political wings?

Donald Trump and Elon Musk — two epic disrupters of U.S. politics and the automotive industry, respectively and vice versa. Over the past year, they united over the election and efforts to cut government spending. They parted ways amicably … and then started trashing each other. It escalated quickly with Musk suggesting that the president be impeached and that he is implicated in the Jeffrey Epstein child-prostitution scandal. Musk later reportedly called the president before posting that he regretted some of his words: 'They went too far.' It was a remarkable breakup — incredible drama between the world's most powerful man and the world's richest man, who had been the closest of allies for hundreds of days of campaigning and governing. To the extent that it was a reality TV train wreck, I'd just as soon leave it be. But since the primary business in Musk's remarkable portfolio is nominally an automaker, it actually matters in this industry we cover. Sign up for Automotive Views, Automotive News' weekly showcase of opinions, insights, ideas and thought leadership. Love it or hate it, this disruptive era in which we live is providing us all with some real-life experiments in economics — the likes of which we probably thought we would never see. For decades, basically everyone who went to college was taught in an economics or history class that widespread tariffs would do more harm than good. Trump argues for a different approach, and he's pursuing it. Or he's pursuing it to negotiate for something else. In either case, we're now seeing how that works: So far, there's been a lot of paralysis, especially among suppliers and foreign automakers, but also a big investment announced recently by General Motors. His political strategy has been unorthodox, yet he's won two electoral colleges and one popular vote. He's only the 21st president to win two elections. So he's had success, whether some people like it or not. Same for Musk, of course: He approached the auto industry unlike anyone else — with an expensive electric car — had a couple of near-total collapses, and came out as the world's richest man and CEO of the world's most valuable automaker. That success helped propel his rocket business SpaceX and other ventures such as Starlink satellites and Twitter, which he bought and renamed X. But the disruptive move I'm watching was his decision to be an automaker CEO who got personally and financially involved in partisan politics. While new-vehicle sales skew to the affluent, when you sell something in the millions or tens of millions, a brand or model has to connect with a broad swath of people. And while there can be success with, say, a polarizing design, mass-market brands generally try to avoid alienating large chunks of their potential customer base. I've cited here before the story about Michael Jordan saying he didn't speak out on politics because 'Republicans buy sneakers, too.' In retrospect, he said it was just a funny line among friends. But the thing is that he wasn't wrong, and every business school graduate knows it. Musk, however, is not your typical MBA type. So out of his frustration with former President Joe Biden — who habitually sided with the UAW and its automakers against the U.S.-based global leader in EVs, even as he advocated for a carbon-neutral future — Musk threw an estimated quarter of a billion dollars behind the Trump campaign. That's an unbelievable sum of money to many of us, but when Trump won, it looked like the greatest bet ever. From late October to late December, Tesla stock more than doubled and its market cap approached $1.5 trillion. While Musk's political activism may have upset many of his loyal, environmentally motivated customers, there were a lot of reasons to be bullish on Tesla under Trump. It seemed likely that NHTSA and the SEC would take a more sympathetic view of the company's issues. Beyond that, Musk has refocused the company's future on artificial intelligence, humanoid robots and robotaxis. (Tesla said it plans to launch its service in Austin, Texas, on June 22.) A new administration with a deregulatory inclination toward self-driving cars was a significant tailwind. Now, those advantages for Tesla are gone or at least seemingly diminished. Structures that have legacy automakers paying to buy Tesla's credits for selling emission-free, fuel-efficient vehicles could be eliminated. (And let's not forget that Trump hinted at ending federal contracts with other Musk-affiliated companies.) Turning back to the auto business: The conventional wisdom is that Musk has now alienated all but the most apolitical consumers. Environmentally minded liberals might like EVs, but Musk's support of Trump (and the far-right Alternative for Deutschland party in Germany) has them seeking out other brands' offerings. There might have been an opportunity to become the preferred electric brand of the president's Make America Great Again movement — especially the tech-forward, high-income types and those motivated by the president's endorsement of the brand on the White House grounds. But after this month's blowup — with longtime Trump adviser Steve Bannon arguing to deport Musk — that notion seemed ever more remote. No fans on the left, no fans on the right. Is Elon out in deep water in an electric boat surrounded by sharks with no friends to bail him out? Maybe not. There is significant animus against Musk on the EV-inclined left, especially in the wake of his DOGE team's deep and sometimes chaotic cuts to government entities and programs. Certainly, protests at auto retail outlets are rare. The damage to stores is not acceptable, but it shows the intensity of the situation. But I still have to wonder how far consumers will follow those kinds of feelings. Michiganders, for instance, often assume that Americans prefer to buy American cars made by American (union) workers. But I've been to America, and most of them don't care. They want the best car for their money, whether it's American, German, Japanese or Korean. Some are clamoring for cheap Chinese cars: If Xi Jinping wants to pay for half of their EV, they ask, why not let him? So maybe they won't care about Elon's politics. Tesla sales are down a little this year, but some of that might be attributable to production hiccups. If the Model Y — the bestselling model in the world last year — provides a great value, they'll probably buy it regardless of what they think of the CEO. And now we get to find out. Have an opinion about this story? Tell us about it and we may publish it in print. Click here to submit a letter to the editor. Sign in to access your portfolio

EPA employees stream for the exit
EPA employees stream for the exit

E&E News

time4 hours ago

  • E&E News

EPA employees stream for the exit

More than 1,300 EPA employees are poised to leave the agency in what may be the single largest exodus in its history. As of Friday morning, 1,334 staffers had followed through on 'early out' offers that require them to start paid administrative leave Monday, according to figures provided by the agency. That number is about half of those who initially applied in April for early retirement as well as a second deferred resignation offer. Employees older than 40 have more time to mull their options. Those leaving make up more than 8 percent of EPA's current workforce of almost 15,700 employees, which includes about 550 who are already on leave following an earlier deferred resignation offer. The latest wave reportedly includes numerous mid-level and senior managers who will take decades of experience with them as they go out the door. Advertisement 'It's a tremendous loss for the agency and for ORD,' said Chris Frey, who served as assistant administrator of the Office of Research and Development during President Joe Biden's administration, adding that he's been 'gobsmacked' at the names of some of those who are exiting.

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