This is a hard one, we have to remember that China is a major...

This is a hard one, we have to remember that China is a major trading partner buying our raw materials and that Australia doesn't have the base to convert those materials into something usable. We also do not have the industry to make something with it or the cost base to compete or economy of scale to support those industries.

A tradie quoted me for roughly 3hrs labor to finish off some gyprock (litterally the finishing touch, not installation; I tried my little heart out and kept stuffing it up so gave up) for $500 cash. With wage expectations like that how do we compete with the Indians, Chinese, Vietnamese, Taiwanese etc?

I too would love to see our lucky country do more, but until wage expectations change, how does this happen? Also we do not have an economy of scale to support those bases.

I'm seeing more BYDs driving around than any other EVs in semi rural Northern NSW, price alone sells these things, certainly not long term support, safety standards et al. This is something I've said in this forum before, the rest of the world has to become competitive to out do the Chinese. Subsidies alone will not do it, eventually those subsidies must stop, what then?

Where a countries behaves anti competitively (as current) then I'm 100% for tariffs. Ironic thing about having foreign equity partnerships is that the Australian people (me too) support reducing/limiting/preventing certain foreign ownership of our resources. So, how are foreign partnerships achievable in this circumstance?