Australia may be on the verge of a record inflation but it’s nothing compared to some countries like New Zealand is inside cost of living misery – during China looks on smugly.
Prices soar as the nation stares down a perfect Covid storm and fuel and electricity bills soar as food prices soar in flood-ravaged farmland.
The fight against inflation is a global one – and while it hurts Australia, inflation here is still among the best in the world at 5.1 percent.
Australia may be facing record inflation, but it’s nothing compared to some countries as New Zealand mires in cost-of-living misery – while China looks on smugly
China has so far escaped almost unscathed, while most other countries are suffering from the hangover from the Covid stimulus packages that have overheated the global economy.
In New Zealand, inflation currently stands at 6.9 percent and has left some families on the brink of starvation as they struggle to cope with soaring prices.
In fact, Kiwis pay 25 percent more for groceries than Aussies, comparison website Finder found this week.
They bought a basket of identical household items from Australia’s Woolworths and their New Zealand chain Countdown, which revealed the alarming difference.
In fact, Kiwis pay 25 percent more for groceries than Aussies, comparison website Finder found this week
Homes in Auckland are now fetching 11.7 percent less, the latest sales figures have shown, and it’s even worse in the capital Wellington, where prices fell 13.5 percent
The family shop costs NZ$97 in Australia and NZ$121 in New Zealand.
Two-thirds of the price difference comes from 15 percent GST on all groceries in New Zealand that are GST-free in Australia.
But kiwis still pay another 9 per cent more than Australians for the same products – and with even higher prices things get worse for families.
New Zealand’s 30-year high inflation rate has prompted many to take extreme measures, including using water spray in the bathroom instead of toilet paper and eating garden snails.
“We fed them oatmeal for a while to get all their poo out and then cooked them with garlic. Tough but nice,’ said Kate Todd stuff.co.nz
Others say they completely lack meals so they can afford to feed their children.
“Sometimes on a bad week I don’t eat at all just so there’s enough for the kids,” one mother told researchers for a paper on food insecurity in the US Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand.
Another revealed how her family relied on handouts to survive.
“If it weren’t for those food packages, the kids wouldn’t have eaten for about a week,” she told researchers.
The cost of living crisis has also caused property prices in New Zealand to fall.
Homes in Auckland are now fetching 11.7 percent less, the latest sales figures have shown, and it’s even worse in the capital Wellington, where prices fell 13.5 percent.
The decline was fueled in part by rising interest rates, but also by Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s decision to halt negative gearing on new purchases and phase it out entirely by March 2025.
Despite being the original source of Covid, China has pushed inflation down to almost a world-best 2.5 percent, just behind G20 Saudi Arabia’s 2.3 percent.
But despite keeping inflation under control, Beijing is now facing an embarrassing and damaging recession and the end of its much-heralded “economic miracle.”
The communist superpower has seen its GDP plummet dramatically after massive Covid shutdowns in Shanghai shattered production lines and exports.
On Friday, China admitted its GDP contracted 2.6 percent in the most recent quarter and grew just 0.4 percent year-on-year, compared to previous annual growth of 5-6 percent.
If production doesn’t recover in the next quarter, it will plunge the country into a technical recession, ending decades of rapid growth since 1976.
China has seen its GDP slump dramatically after massive Covid shutdowns in Shanghai shattered production lines and exports
In Australia the electricity The 20-year high inflation rate of 5.1 percent is widely expected to worsen when the latest figures are released on July 27, possibly reaching 6.3 percent.
In a double whammy, runaway inflation is driving interest rates up, adding hundreds of dollars to mortgage payments for families across the country, while wages lag and the cost of living soars.
But among the G20 countries, Australia’s inflation rate still ranks sixth, well ahead of struggling allies like the US and Britain, both at 9.1 percent, and even economic superpower Germany at 7.6 percent.
Spain and Brazil are both facing double-digit inflation rates of 10.2 and 11.98 percent, respectively, while Russia’s inflation rose to 15.9 percent after the war with Ukraine.
Spain and Brazil are both facing double-digit inflation rates of 10.2 and 11.98 percent, respectively, while Russia’s inflation rose to 15.9 percent after the war with Ukraine
But Turkiye – formerly known as Turkey – is being devastated by the current financial crisis, with inflation now at a staggering 78.62 percent, even worse than Argentina’s 64 percent.
Superinflation took hold after Turkish President Recep Erdogan raised the minimum wage by nearly a third from $254 to $328, sending 40 percent of the workforce a massive wage increase.
The opposition party says the real interest rate is actually double the official figure and analysts warn the country’s economy could be doomed.
“No one believes the official Turkish data anymore,” economist Timothy Ash of BlueBay Asset Management tweeted earlier this month.
“There is no credible political reaction to be expected.”
A collapsing economy sent Sri Lanka’s government into a popular uprising this week as inflation hit 54.6 percent and the country ran out of money and fuel
A similar economic slump sent the Sri Lankan government into a popular uprising this week as inflation hit 54.6 percent and the country ran out of money and fuel.
Elsewhere in the world, Lebanon is currently experiencing the worst inflation in the world as its economy collapses under a 211 percent rise in prices.
Zimbabwe and Sudan are second worst at 192 percent, but neighboring South Sudan has the world’s lowest inflation rate at minus 4.29 percent, though those numbers mask a plummeting, sluggish economy amid the crisis.
Venezuela at 167 percent after nine years of hyperinflation and civil war-torn Syria with an inflation rate of 139 percent round out the bottom five countries behind Turkiye.
