WENDELL HUSSEY | Cadet | CONTACT
Doing it tough at the moment? Struggling with the bills? Having your heart sink when the cashier reads out your total when you head to the supermarket?
Well, you might be struggling with an economic situation that our governments and institutions have done absolutely fuck all to combat.
Like the federal government refusing to put a cap on gas and energy prices to stop large multinational companies sending our resources overseas for huge profits, and allowing the cost of power bills to go through the roof.
Or the government leaving the issue of inflation to the Reserve Bank, who can only punish poor people and line the pockets of the banks with endless rate rises that do very little to combat the issue of inflation.
Or the government refusing to lean on the ACCC to ensure that Coles and Woolworths aren’t price gouging customers and ripping off farmers to line their own pockets.
Or, you could be a stupid peasant who doesn’t understand how to save money and you should just leave the economics to the people who know how to make sure the system benefits people like them, enlarges our poverty class, and widens the gap between the haves and have nots.
If that’s the case, which is more than likely given how many whinging working class people have adopted the learned helplessness model of working 40 plus hour weeks and not having enough to live comfortably, then here’s a handy list of people who’ve learnt how to save money.
- The Commonwealth Bank – $2.5 Billion: Formerly known as the bank owned by the people, the Commonwealth Bank is now topping the banking cartel rich list by jacking up the interest on loans before the raise the rates on savings. They made $2.5 billion last quarter, by tightening the belt and pinching pennies.
- National Australia Bank – $7.7 Billion: While you might think that $7.4 billion is way bigger than the Commbank’s profit, this is actually their last financial year profit. Which works out at a 2.5 billion dollar savings hole compared to the boys and girls in black and yellow.
- ANZ Bank – $7.4 Billion: Look, it’s pretty clear by now, saving money by cashing in on interest rate rises that cause devastating flow on effects for ordinary people is a pretty great way to tighten your spending and save your coin.
- Westpac – $7.1 Billion: Same thing as their counterparts at NAB and ANZ. Obviously they found a way cut down on coffees and and eating out, but they get bumped down because they couldn’t save the extra couple of billion that the market leaders the Commonwealth bank could.
- Shell – $4 Billion: What? Shell saved how much? You thought there was a war in Ukraine and global pressures on the oil markets that drove up the price of petrol? Wrong, Shell saved money by raising the profit margins on their liquid gold and pocketing a few billion dollars.
- Qantas – $2.47 Billion: How the hell did the nation’s former public airline make so much money after facing the toughest two years in aviation history? Well, the government gave them your money, and they saved all of the profits they made after using public dollars, to keep driving up profits. That’s a handy hack if you can’t afford vegetables for the kids this week. Just ask the government for a multi-billion dollar bail out package.
- Origin – $1.1 Billion: 1.1 Billion you are thinking. What’s this pissy amout of money you are using as an example of good financial management. That’s a fair question. Most of the companies that dig and drill our natural resources out of the ground and ship them offshore saved heaps more money, they did, but Origin still managed to make a decent amount by jacking up the margins on your power prices during ‘an energy crisis’ entirely manufactured by the industry and facilitated by the federal government and powers around them. You don’t need any explorations licences to do that at home.
- Woolworths – $1.6 Billion: They blew their opponents Coles right out of the water last financial year, saving a whopping 500 million more. How did they do it? Well they made sure they drove farmers into the ground with negotiations while raising the price of their grocery products storewide. Given they are one half of a supermarket duopoly, they fall to the end of the list because they clearly aren’t as good at saving as some of the other major corporations.
So there you go. If you are worried about keeping a roof over your head and food on the table, maybe stop whinging and go out there and give it a crack. Predatory lending? Lobbying governments for hand outs? Jacking up profit margins. These are just some of the simple tricks anyone can use to save a bit of money.
