New financial year brings stage 3 tax cuts and $300 energy rebates for Australians

For those who are really feeling the cost of living crunch at the moment, there is some hip pocket relief that is on the way at various areas. Let's take a look at some of those changes. First of all, those Stage 3 tax cuts. So that means that anybody on an average wage of around $98,000 a year is going to get back just over $2000. We are also going to see that $300.00 energy bill rebate as well. And also we're seeing the minimum wage rise as of today. So that's going up by 3.75% to $24.10 per hour. And that of course also flows through to all those award wages. We're also going to see a .5% increase in super going up to 11.5% as well for your super. And also we are saying to pay parental leave that's going to extend by 10 days. As well as that, we're going to see a whole range of social services payments increasing, like the Commonwealth Rent Assistance. That's all going up in line with inflation and CPI changes. So that's being indexed. But many of the commuters that I've spoken to this morning here at Melbourne Southern Cross station, well, they say this tax relief as well as that energy rebate, it really doesn't touch the sides when it comes to those spiralling bills and costs. I don't think there's any benefit to it, to be honest. It's one $300.00. That's not going to make any difference down the track to me whatsoever. So thank you. But I think that's a better way of doing it. Don't know what it is, but that's not the way for me. I'll cut the train here to get early bird to save $5 every day. People are just really struggling at the moment. There's just everything's too expensive. Food items, $5 for one thing. It's not enough to support people. Definitely don't think it's enough just yet, especially in this climate that we're in at the moment. I think there's everything's going up a lot that we're not getting anything for. So some pretty uniform responses from commuters that I've been speaking to here. Many feel that they're really struggling with those rising cost of living pressures. And of course, inflation is the big worry, Gemma. It's remained stubbornly high at around 4%. And we know that there are concerns among financial commentators that particularly these tax cuts could fuel inflation reef pressure as well. So we're really going to have to keep a close eye on the CPI June quarter figures. They're coming out on July 31. And so we're not just looking at that from an economic point of view, but of course also that interest rate point of view, because that's what the RBA board will really be trying to look at to see whether or not they can get inflation back within that target range. Otherwise, we are potentially looking at yet another interest rate rise above that 4.35 cash, cash rate right now at the moment. So there is still a lot of concern out here amongst many people that feel like they're really doing it tough, both with inflation and also mortgages.