Will it work?  If you mean Rudd’s Christmas present; no.  The best hope is that those who receive the windfall will use it pay off debt. Unfortunately, I think many will choose to extend their credit further with new purchases.  This, after all, is what the government wants.  Tax-payers cash used to buy goodies from K-Mart & Target et. al. then trickles back to China.  I also hope that the new subsidized houses in the outer suburbs come with fuel rebates.  Seriously, local industry could be kicked started with an injection of cash into solar industry and government buildings could be upgraded to become energy efficient for a start. However, no-one seems to be willing to talk about the real issue, which is an economic system based on never ending credit.  Feeding this capitalist beast is like giving a junkie another fix in the hope that, at some point in the future, they will be able to wean themselves off the hard-stuff.  If by some miracle, this juggernaut is slowed, it will only be temporarily. The American credit card bubble will be the next big story as industry inevitably slows and unemployment rises.

You’d be wrong there, Duncan, on one point.  Nobody (with any clout) hopes that the junkie will be weaned off the poison.  They are hoping the addiction will go on for ever.

Just as they are hoping that infinite growth is anything other tah an economic fantasy.

We all have fantasies, but for most of us they don’t affect the real world.  For a relative handful of rich, important buggers, they do.