Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
Again, I dips me lid at your exquisite use of language, Mick
It is most likely the liberal sprinkling of facts and basic mathematics that makes the rhetoric look better.
Originally Posted by
Lead Balloon
... But...
It's of course your estimate of what's probably been "spent". Never an acknowledgement of the costs that you don't measure in dollars because you don't want to.
Now, that's manifestly and demonstrably incorrect, isn't it? In our discussions I was very clear that there are "non-financial" costs that are difficult to convert to properly estimated dollar costs. Remember this?
... let's draw this argy-barge to a close because I do not have the time to be formulating "proper estimates" for non-financials. If you want to compare a speculative 'let it rip' scenario to the actual solution that Australian Governments have pursued, run with a cost of around $450 billion (that's $350 billion for the federal response (including tax revenues foregone), $60 billion for the aggregate state based responses and $40 billion for the 'non-financials'). If that doesn't suit, put your own numbers in.
So, to be very clear I most assuredly
did acknowledge 'the costs that you don't measure in dollars' and I provided an estimate that went into the calculation. Moreover, I invited you to provide an alternate cost if you didn't like the $40 billion estimate.