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But we know that things are not that simple. We don't usually getwaves of green lights sweeping us past every intersection. Gooddata behind us - even if it survives the revisions - does notguarantee good times ahead. It's certainly welcome, but while iteases the problems facing Australia and the world in the next 18months, it does not remove them. For Australia, the next big test is the introduction of the carbontax on July 1, along with $2.4 billion of handouts to households incompensation and the school kids bonus. That will be a test of thehyper-emotional, hyper-negative tone that suffocates politicaldebate in these times. Influential forces are trying to derail thetax, and would not mind if they derailed the economy as well. For Europe, the next big test will be Sunday's Greek election, andthe negotiations that will follow, whoever wins, to either rewriteEurope's fiscal austerity pact or remove Greece from the eurozone.At this stage, everyone is taking positions to try to influence theelection result. What will happen after it is anyone's guess; thestakes are immense. Take Australia first. At face value, last week's GDP figures tellus the economy is powering ahead, propelled by robust consumerspending (up 4.2 per cent in a year), quite extraordinary growth inengineering construction (up 53 per cent in that time), stronggrowth in payrolls (7.4 per cent) and productivity (4 per cent) andbooms in sectors from finance to government administration,healthcare, the professions, wholesale trade and agriculture. Most of that is probably broadly true, if overstated. As I reportedon May 11, the Bureau of Statistics has run into technical problemswith its jobs data, leading it to overstate jobs growth in 2010 andunderstate it in 2011 and 2012. Federal and state tax collectionsconfirm that actual job growth has been stronger than the bureaufigures show. And that means the economy has also grown morestrongly than we thought. Healthcare and the professions are growth industries. The farmershave had a lot of rain, wholesalers have had a lot of imports. Thebig banks are shedding staff, but they are also losing market shareto smaller banks and non-bank lenders. And migration figures implythat population growth is accelerating. But there are serious question marks over the two drivers ofgrowth. Growth in consumer spending actually slowed, yet the bureausays that prices have stopped rising, so we've actually hit thepedal to buy more and more. Tell that to High Street. Even more amazing, it says engineering construction costs arealmost flat, despite the mining boom: in the past 3½ yearsthey have risen 1.8 per cent (0.5 per cent a year), a sharp changeafter 24.8 per cent growth in the previous 3½ years. Tell thatto the Pilbara. The GDP numbers are likely to be revised down, but to still fairlybuoyant levels. The central problem remains: mining is boomingwhile south-eastern Australia is not. In the year to March,spending grew by 10 per cent in the resource states but only 2 percent in the south-east. The dollar, after three months of welcomefalls, has bounced back up to nudge parity with the US dollar. And,like everyone else, our growth depends on what happens in Europe. The rescue of the Spanish banks buys time for Europe's leaders tonegotiate a growth pact, then either exempt Greece from its budgetconstraints or push it out of the eurozone and risk the fear anduncertainty that would create. It was a good week for us, and the world, but there are rough timesahead. The best thing is that we are entering this period instronger shape than we thought. And more than most countries, weare able to make our own fortune. Tim Colebatch is economics editor. Follow the National Times on Twitter: @NationalTimesAU. We are high quality suppliers, our products such as RTD Calibrator Manufacturer , Socket Tester Manufacturer for oversee buyer. To know more, please visits Digital Multimeter.
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