Quackie, Adam Carr probably put it best this morning:
"Otherwise, there is the crisis of leadership, which I’ve talked about before. It’s not just in politics – it’s a disease, as far as I can see, that has permeated through various layers of the community. Larger businesses especially – these guys are just not investing. The way I see things, it’s this culture of mediocrity, of welfare dependence and entitlement that is weighing. It’s the same force, funnily enough, that is guiding the Reserve Bank's exchange rate target.
What we need is a culture that encourages the entrepreneurs, the change agents or dream-weavers. Instead these people get shot down from the outset, labelled as ‘eccentric’ or weird as a means of general white-anting and maintaining the status quo. The US doesn’t do this, which is why it's such a dynamic country and why, unfortunately, many of our own entrepreneurs head over there for financing and other support. What we get stuck with is people without vision, who whine and complain and cry for the government to do something. Like everyone else, I’m hoping confidence bounces following the election – and everyone wants this government gone, it can’t govern and it's done nothing but introduce instability. But given this culture of mediocrity, I’m not sure confidence will bounce anyway.
This is why confidence is low and why ultimately growth has slowed sharply from last year despite all the policy support the Reserve Bank could throw. A weaker dollar and a couple of hundred basis points of easing and things are worse now than they were. Few people know that growth in 2012 was the fastest in five years! We just had too many people whinging that we were in a recession."
