06/05/2026
The RBA Is Hitting Mortgage Holders While the Real Cost of Living Crisis Goes Untouched
This is just my opinion — what’s yours?
Australia is being told that interest rate hikes are the solution to inflation. But the reality is far simpler — and far more uncomfortable. The RBA is using one blunt tool that only hits one group: people with mortgages and business loans. Everyone else is largely unaffected, and in some cases, they’re better off.
Meanwhile, the real cost of living pressures — petrol, insurance, groceries, energy — continue to rise, untouched by rate hikes and untouched by meaningful policy action.
This is the gap between the story and the truth.
Rate Hikes Don’t Fix the Costs That Are Actually Hurting Australians
Inflation today isn’t being driven by people buying too many TVs or going out for brunch. It’s being driven by essentials:
• Petrol, pushed up by global conflict and supply constraints
• Insurance, rising at double-digit rates due to climate risk and reinsurance costs
• Groceries, driven by supermarket pricing power and supply chain pressures
• Energy, shaped by global markets and domestic infrastructure
None of these respond to interest rate rises. None of these are caused by household overspending. And none of these are fixed by squeezing mortgage holders.
Yet that’s where the pressure keeps landing.
A Narrow Tool Masquerading as a National Strategy
The RBA can’t lower fuel prices. It can’t regulate supermarket margins. It can’t reduce insurance premiums. It can’t build more housing.
It can only raise rates.
So it keeps pulling the same lever, even though it only affects a minority of households. The impact is concentrated, not broad. It’s targeted, not universal. And it’s increasingly out of step with the sources of inflation Australians are actually experiencing.
A More Honest Conversation Is Needed
If the goal is to address the real cost of living crisis, the focus needs to shift to the areas driving it:
• competition and pricing in essential goods
• supply chain resilience
• insurance affordability
• fuel and energy costs
• housing supply and rental pressure
Rate hikes don’t touch any of these. They simply squeeze the only group the RBA can reach.
Until that’s acknowledged, Australians will keep hearing a national justification for a policy that only hits a narrow slice of the population — while the biggest cost pressures continue rising unchecked.
That’s my view — what’s yours?
