Unconventional Economist

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also Chief Economist and co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.

What happened to the entry level apartments?

Last decade’s high-rise apartment boom was built on shoebox apartments.

How supply is reshaping Australia’s housing market

Australia’s housing market continues to split in two, with Sydney and Melbourne recording solid declines in value.

Australia must prepare for the next global fuel shock

Expensive homes and mega-mortgages risk blowing up retirement system

Australia’s retirement system has been based on the presumption that the overwhelming majority of people would own their homes outright upon retirement.

Andrew Leigh can’t stop lying on immigration

Young Aussie jobseekers face challenging future

Tim Toohey from Yarra Capital recently warned that if AI is “deployed at scale in Australia over the next two years”, then the nation’s unemployment rate could rise to over 6%, up from 4.3% currently.

Weekend reading & MB media appearances

Economist warns NZ house prices could hit decade low

As illustrated below by Justin Fabo from Antipodean Macro, New Zealand home values have fallen by more than 30% in real inflation-adjusted terms, back to 2019 levels: The latest house price results from the Real Estate Institute of New Zealand (REINZ) recorded a second consecutive monthly gain, rising by 0.3% in March.

Property downturn accelerates in Sydney and Melbourne

Last month, Louis Christopher, the founder of the property analytics firm SQM Research, published updated home price forecasts for 2026, presented below.

Canada fixed its rental crisis. Australia chose not to.

This week, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) released data on net permanent & long-term (NPLT) arrivals, which remained at historically high levels in February 2026.

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