In a secret report to investors, Credit Suisse assesses Labor’s industrial relations policies and predicts “a potentially transformative shift in the bargaining power of labour, leading to a rise in the labour share of GDP over and above cyclical dynamics”. Noting that “productivity has grown almost four times faster than wages” in recent years, the investment bank is forced to admit that a shift in workers’ favour would merely be a “structural unwind” in response to the “windfall” profits companies have taken from the current system. In public, bosses claim the current system is fair and balanced, but in private they acknowledge it is rigged in their favour.
16 February 2019