It would seem Australia's free trade agreement with China couldn't have come soon enough, assuming its benefits will lift the economy.
Prime Minister Tony Abbott used parliamentary question time to boast of the signing of the FTA with China just minutes earlier, and follows hot-on-the heels of other similar agreements secured with Japan and South Korea last year.
He said Australian economic growth will be almost $25 billion better off, jobs will increase by 178,000 and real wages will be 0.5 per cent higher than would have otherwise been because of this trifecta of trade deals.
"More jobs and more trade mean a stronger economy," Mr Abbott told parliament on Wednesday.
The historic agreement came as new figures suggested a subdued growth outlook for the rest of the year.
The Westpac-Melbourne Institute leading index for May, which indicates the likely pace of activity three to nine months in the future, pointed to a growing lack of momentum in the economy.
"The stalling momentum mid-year is a concern given the recent reduction in interest rates and hopes that this would help generate a more convincing upswing in Australia's consumer and non-mining business sectors," Westpac senior economist Matthew Hassan said.
Victoria University senior research fellow Janine Dixon has also questioned the overly optimistic growth outlook painted in last month's budget.
Dr Dixon, from the university's Centre of Policy Studies, says growth projections are based on the unlikely combination of strong productivity growth and rising wages.
She believes the average growth rate over the next four years will be more like 2.25 per cent, rather than the 3.25 per cent predicted in the budget.
The budget anticipates the unemployment rate falling to five per cent by 2020, which would see about 150,000 now unemployed people return to the workforce, she says.
But for the economy to absorb those workers at a time when the terms of trade continues to fall, inflation-adjusted wages would need to fall by 0.2 per cent each year for the next five years.
"We are entering a period in which GDP growth - strongly skewed towards a mining sector for which prices are falling and foreign ownership is significant - will not translate into growth in domestic incomes," Dr Dixon told the Melbourne Economic Forum.
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