Sometimes I wonder whether the economy is being managed for our benefit or for the benefit of the big businesses that dominate it. The two big supermarket chains we get to choose between, the two domestic airlines and privately owned airports, the three foreign mining giants that were allowed to redesign the mining tax they didn’t like, and the four big banks that control so much of our superannuation and the investment advice we get, not to mention our savings accounts and mortgages.

I’m old enough to remember when economic life seemed to be dominated by big unions. Hardly a month passed without our lives being disrupted by some strike. We’d be walking miles to work or finding someone to mind the kids while the teachers were out.

Illustration: Kerrie Leishman.

I remember finishing a holiday in New Zealand with our young family, only to find the baggage handlers in Sydney were on strike and being stuck in Christchurch for an extra two days.

Thank goodness we don’t have to put up with all that any more. But in place of being bossed around by the unions, we now have big business calling the shots. They don’t inconvenience us like the unions did, but they do seem to have the ear of government.