Numbers on tax, wine, property and the future

Here’s another taste of the weird and wonderful numbers that come across the dbdata desk every week. They all tell a story that sometimes contradicts what the experts are telling you.

So let’s get into it.

Firstly we all saw our new PM embrace most of the Murray Report reforms on financial services earlier in the week with the Coalition nominating excessive credit card surcharges first off the rank. Look out taxis, hotels and airlines that have been gouging customers for years.

But don’t be surprised if superannuation isn’t the next target with apparently 475 superannuation accounts in existence, with balances of more than $10 million which each receive $1.5 million in annual tax free income. No one is going to pop their heads up the defend these guys either.

And speaking of taxis they never seem to be able to catch up with the changing world before it starts changing on them again. A survey by the Association of Corporate Travel Executives (ACTE) in partnership with American Express Global Business Travel reveals that 13 per cent of corporate travel programs are already including Uber and similar operations and a further 13 per cent planned follow them in the next two years. Another 33 per cent are talking about introducing it. It’s all about competing on price, forget the level playing field.

The boys over at Seven Network know how to make a sale and this week gave everyone a glimpse of the future when revealing their line-up of new shows for the upcoming TV season plus a look at how their digital platforms are going to be included in a new rating system. It definitely wasn’t all about television.

Seven’s director of sales Adam Elliott launched its programmatic advertising offering, the automatic buying of advertising using algorithms, called 7 Screens. He told the Australian Financial Review that Seven would allow advertisers to trade against their potential customers, not demographics, and “connect them with people most likely to pay for their products regardless of their age”. “We know who is who, who is in the market to take a trip, who is house hunting, who is looking at recipes,” he said. Makes you scared to turn on the TV doesn’t it?

Seven’s chief digital officer Clive Dickens even went so far as to predict some of its foodie reality shows next year would be able to let viewers buy products used in the shows online in real time.

And on the subject of food, numbers this week show that rather than declining under a weight of ATO audits the number of hobby farms are jumping.

Sales of blocks up to 40 hectares have been the most popular in Victoria, NSW, Northern Territory and Tasmania, according to analysis of the past 12 month’s sales by Landmark Harcourts.

And it not small bikkies either. In Victoria alone, about 77 per cent of agricultural sales valued at nearly $8 billion were for smaller blocks, or farms, with about 12 per cent for properties from 40 to 100 hectares and around 10 per cent for larger properties.

Reason for the switch in demand went from protecting the environment, to lifestyle choices, to specialised production aimed at export markets.

Australia needs more small farmers like a hole in the head but that’s a story for another day.

The one thing these newly minted agriculturalists weren’t growing were grapes with new data showing the amount of land under vine in Australia is shrinking. According to new figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics the total area of planted vineyards fell from 148,500 hectares in 2011-12 to 135,000 in 2014-15, a decline of nearly 10 per cent.

In Australia’s premier wine-growing region, the Barossa Valley, planted vineyard fell from just under 13,000 hectares to 9300 hectares, with 5748 hectares planted in its famous shiraz grapes, a decline of about 1000 hectares.

But the real pain is being experienced in Australia’s warm-climate regions like the Riverland area of South Australia and the Riverina in NSW. The rising cost of water and lower fruit prices have forced many landowners to replace vines with higher yielding crops or give it away all together.

Despite oversupply many regions like the Barossa and Victoria’s Mornington Pennisula still command high prices for vineyards, but even they are not immune from the downturn. So let’s hope that the lower $A will have some effect on the export of our premium wine products.

I know we all look forward to the bi-annual RLB Crane Index. If not you should because it shows the health or otherwise of Australia’s city construction industry And at the moment it’s booming, helping facilitate the biggest housing construction boom in years.

The number of cranes scattered across city skylines at the moment is up by more than a quarter to 539, the latest survey shows. And its just not in Sydney and Melbourne, The number of cranes deployed on residential buildings rose in every mainland capital except Darwin as the total number of fixed cranes on sites rose from 426 six months ago.

Almost 80 per cent of Australia’s cranes are now engaged in building new homes, the highest proportion recorded to date by the half-yearly index. So for all those economists who are telling people the housing boom is over, what they are really saying is the housing price boom is over.

And lastly some sobering ecostats from the team over at CommSec that underpin the challenges of generational change. 

‘The latest job numbers show that there are 3.6 million people over the age of 65 compared with 3.5 million Australians aged between 25-34 years. And the seniors are keen to work. The participation rate of those 65 years and over in the workforce averaged 12.1 per cent in the year to September, just below record highs. Meanwhile a record 54.9 per cent of those between 60-64 years are in jobs or looking for work.’ Soldier on!

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