The risk of Australia experiencing a wage-price spiral is "quite low" thanks in part to the diminished "pricing power" of workers and the central bank's focus on inflation targets, a new RBA report asserts.
The RBA is expecting the near-8% year-end headline inflation spike to only ease to 6.25% in the middle of next year, while it is turning its guns on the ABS wage price index, which it perceives as too narrow.
Former ACTU secretary and RBA director Bill Kelty has thrown his weight behind appointing someone with a union background to the Reserve Bank board, saying in the wake of claims about its limited perspectives that the central bank has not understood how wages operate "for a long time".
A new RBA report says that greater job mobility tends to be associated with higher individual and aggregate wages and makes it clear the "great resignation" is a distinctly American and British phenomenon.
The RBA has today raised interest rates for the first time in more than a decade, due to a rapid increase in inflation and "evidence that wages growth is picking up".
The RBA's board has rejected suggestions that recent wage pressures flowing from the unexpectedly rapid economic recovery, sub-5% unemployment and closed borders is leading to more generalised pay rises in the short term, while the bank's intelligence-gathering indicates employers are not planning catch-up increases for workers subjected to wage freezes.
Morrison Government nominates Vines to lead ILO; FWO to keep targeting big end of town's underpayments; Sustained border closure could drive up wages, says RBA.
Reserve Bank Governor Philip Lowe has today added a new reason to his long list of why employers are not lifting wages - the "laser-like focus on costs" that has become the "predominant mindset" of many businesses.
The RBA has slightly raised its wage growth forecast, noting that it will almost entirely be driven by the private sector as public sector wage caps remain in effect.