The economist for the director class who's bullish on a Future Made in Australia
The Australian Institute of Company Directors chief economist Mark Thirlwell isn't as critical of Labor's plan to pick winners as some of his peers are, pointing to the success of East Asian countries such as China.
Many economists have been scathing of Anthony Albanese's Future Made in Australia strategy. Mark Thirlwell isn’t among them.
“I’m not one of those economists who just axiomatically thinks that industry policy is deemed to fail. Some economists almost refuse to believe it’s ever possible to do it," he says. "History tells us that that’s not true."
There are plenty of examples of industry policy going wrong. For instance, many economists opposed to the government’s new plan to actively support high tech industries such as quantum computing (and individual companies in those industries) have pointed to the decades of support Australia provided to the car industry, which never became sustainable. But for his part, Thirlwell thinks it's worth taking a step back and considering the examples where it has worked.
“The East Asian model is arguably the most successful story of industrial policy ever,” he tells Capital Brief as part of an interview about his career and the economic climate.
