- Wages to rise 4% this year and in 2011-12, and then 4.25% in 2012-13 - Impact of natural disasters at home and abroad will lop 0.75 percentage points off growth in 2010-11 Full coverage Best of the web: Who is saying what about the budget Families

- Cuts to the effective tax rates of 50,000 single parents by up to 20 cents in the dollar - Transitioning more parents with high school kids onto job search payments - Phasing out the Dependent Spouse Tax Offset beginning with partners under 40 - Further $300 a year of the Low Income Tax Offset to go into pay packets from July - Increase Family Tax Benefit Part A for older teenagers by up to $4208 a year, or $161 a fortnight

- Payment advances of up to $1000 for Family Tax Benefit Part A recipients to meet unexpected family expenses - Extending the freeze on the higher income limits for family payments for two more years to save $1.2 billion - Paid paternity leave implementation deferred by six months to January 1, 2013 - Limit the eligibility for Family Tax Benefit Part A to children up to the age of 21, from 24 Workforce

-$558 million National Workforce Development Fund to deliver 130,000 new training places over four years - $101 million national mentoring program to help 40,000 apprentices finish training - $100 million for more flexible training models - Extra $1.75 billion in addition to the $7 billion already marked for vocational education and training - 30,000 more places in the Language, Literacy and Numeracy Program to provide the basic skills essential for a job

- 16,000 skilled migrants for key regions where there is a labour shortage Welfare - $233 million for new support programs for the long-term unemployed and 35,000 targeted wage subsidies - Strict new work tests for the disability support pension brought forward - Participation plans to get teen parents back to work and new requirements for jobless families

- $460 million to extend the Education Tax Refund to cover school uniforms. - Additional payment of $500 a fortnight for POW from WWII and Korea Health - $16.4 billion in additional growth funding for public hospitals from 2014-15 - $3.4 billion over four years for emergency departments, elective surgery and 1300 sub-acute hospital beds

- $1.8 billion in investments in hospitals and health care for the bush - $717 million over five years to expand access to diagnostic imaging services and make medicines more affordable - $1.5 billion over five years for mental health initiatives including a new national mental health commission - $139 million over four years to continue the national bowel cancer screening program - $53 million over four years for dental internships to improve access to dental services

- Saving of $581 million over five years by slashing the Medicare rebate for GPs drawing up mental health treatment plans and restricting patients to 10 instead of 12 treatments Schools - $425 million to reward top performing teachers. - Teach Next initiative will provide $18 million for new pathways into a teaching career - $200 million to support disabled school students

- $222 million to extend National School Chaplaincy program The bush - $4.3 billion of investments in regional hospitals, health care, universities and roads - $232 million in new strategic investments, including $100 million for suburban employment hubs and $61 million for smarter motorways. - 16,000 skilled migration places to the regions, complemented by Regional Migration Agreements for communities with skill shortages

Indigenous affairs - Half a billion dollar boost to education, employment and health services for indigenous Australians - Includes $171.3 million boost in targeted assistance for indigenous students - 6400 indigenous students will benefit from a new $50.7 million Youth Career Pathways Program - Govt will spend $16.1 million extending and expanding the Cape York Welfare Reform Trial

Small business - First $5000 of the cost of a vehicle can now be immediately written-off by small business. - Reduction in tax instalment payments by $700 million in 2011-12 - Small businesses to get a head start on the company tax cut that will be funded by the Minerals Resource Rent Tax. - $34 million package to help Australian manufacturers better supply resource sector projects

- Reform fringe benefits tax for cars with a single rate regardless of how far a car is driven, saving $954 million over five years Defence - $1.1 billion not spent in the new equipment program in 2010-11 to be handed back to the government. - $1.3 billion cut from the equipment program over next four years. - No cuts to uniformed defence work force but civilian side will be cut by 1000 positions

- Defence to spend $1.9 billion on ongoing operations in Afghanistan, Middle East, Solomons and East Timor. Climate - $100 million for renewable energy and energy efficiency projects - Saving of $156 million over four years by closing the national solar schools program two years earlier than expected in mid-2013 - Saving of $970 million over four years by reforming tax breaks for company cars in order to remove the incentive for people to drive further

- No details on planned carbon tax: budget impact to be released mid-year when the scheme's design has been finalised Other initiatives - $36 billion for roads, railways and ports, like the Moreton Bay Rail Link in Queensland, the Gateway Project in WA, the Western Ring Road upgrade in Victoria, and duplicating the Pacific Highway. - Increase in public service efficiency dividend, saving $1.1 billion. - $1.06 billion for managing asylum seekers in 2011-12, a more than four-fold blowout

- $300 million to boost sport from the community level up to elite competition - $24.9 million over four years to establish an independent Parliamentary Budget Office to help scrutinise budget and fiscal policy. Budget savings - better targeting of family payments ($2 billion) - temporary flood and cyclone levies ($1.7 billion)

- increasing public sector efficiency ($1.1 billion) - tightening car fringe benefit rules ($954 million) - deferral of infrastructure projects ($945 million) - phasing out of dependent spouse tax offset ($755 million) - removing access to low income tax offset for unearned income of minors ($740 million)

- annual real growth in spending capped at 2%, targeting 1% rise - government spending as share of GDP projected to fall to 23.5% by 2014-15 from 25.2% in 2010-11 - total savings from 2010-11 to 2014-15: $22.2 billion Tax reform - Changing car fringe benefit rules to a single flat rate of 20 per cent to remove the unintended incentive for people to drive their vehicle further than they need to, in order to obtain a larger tax concession.

- Phasing out of the Dependent Spouse Tax Offset to increase participation incentives for spouses without children - Replacing the Entrepreneurs Tax Offset with a small business tax package that includes a $5000 immediate deduction for motor vehicles - Allowing infrastructure projects of national significance to carry forward losses with an uplift factor to maintain their value, to improving certainty for investors - Increase of Family Tax Benefit Part A payments for 16 to 19 year olds - Reducing the overlap between Family Tax Benefit Part A and Youth Allowance

- Reducing access to income splitting by high-income earners, by removing the Low Income Tax Offset for the unearned income of minors - Improving the reporting of taxable payments made to some contractors, and taking stronger action against fraudulent 'phoenix' activity, fraudulent tax refunds, and non-payment of tax on government payments. Loading - Tightening of tax enforcement for certain businesses in the building and construction industry, requiring them to report to the Australian Taxation Office annually on payments made to contractors in the industry, along with the contractor's ABN, with effect from July 1, 2012. BusinessDay, with AAP