 As recently as December, three months ago, the budget deficit for the coming financial year was going to be almost $100 billion. That figure has come down by a third because of an improved economic outlook. The government spending about a half of that improvement on temporary measures to help people with the cost of living. The improved economic outlook is though largely due to the government itself, although things are a lot better than it expected. The unemployment rate has dived to about the lowest in 50 years, and the budget expects it to dive further still. That is pushing up government revenue from tax and pushing down government spending on benefits. Over five years, the improvement in the budget position just due to unemployment is itself about $100 billion. It's also pushing down government debt as a share of GDP, not because government debt is falling very much in absolute terms, but because GDP, the economy is growing precisely because of the government spending in the COVID years of 2020 and 2021. The benefits are mostly going where you would want them to. Low earners are getting $250 from April. That benefit goes to anyone who is in receipt of government payments. For people who the government describes as middle earners, those on up to $126,000, there's an extra $400 when they put in their tax return, an expanded low and middle income tax offset, which by the way finishes after this year. That would be the last of it. And from midnight on budget night, there's a cut in petrol excess. This will take about a fortnight to flow through. But that will benefit everyone, oddly, and it's the odd measure out in this respect, it'll benefit mainly high earners. High earners spend more on petrol per household than low earners.