Why we need a financial buffer
The months before a budget can be a miasma of claims and demands and recommendations by every politician, economist, lobbying group, and industry body in the country.
Calls for raised spending and lower taxes frequently come couched in emotive terminology, ramped up with dramatic prognostications of the real-life impact on people if one sector is neglected over another, or if one vital public service fails to get a level of funding, or if ...