Inflation rates Australia versus China, New Zealand, UK, US, Germany, Spain, Brazil, Turkey, Lebanon

Australia may be facing record inflation, but that is nothing compared to some countries as New Zealand is mired in a miserable cost of living – while China looks smug.

Prices soared as the country faced the perfect Covid storm and soaring fuel and electricity bills while flood-stricken farmland saw food prices skyrocket.

The battle against inflation is being fought globally – and even though Australia is suffering, the 5.1 percent inflation rate here is still among the best in the world.

Australia may be facing record inflation, but it pales in comparison to some countries as New Zealand is mired in cost of living woes – while China looks smug

China has so far emerged almost unscathed while most other countries are suffering from the Covid stimulus package that has overheated the global economy.

In New Zealand, inflation is currently at 6.9 percent and has brought some families to the brink of starvation as they struggle to cope with rising prices.

Kiwis actually pay 25 percent more for food needs than Australians, comparison site Finder found this week.

They purchased a basket of identical household necessities from Woolworths in Australia and their New Zealand chain Countdown which revealed a worrying difference.

Kiwis actually pay 25 per cent more for food than Australians, comparison site Finder found this week

Homes in Auckland are now down 11.7 percent, the latest sales figures have revealed, and it’s even worse in the capital Wellington where prices are down 13.5 percent.

The family shop costs NZ$97 in Australia, but NZ$121 in New Zealand.

Two-thirds of the price difference comes from 15 per cent GST for all food in NZ, which is GST-free in Australia.

But Kiwis still pay 9 per cent more than Australians for the same product – and with prices soaring higher, it’s getting worse for families.

New Zealand’s 30-year high inflation rate has driven many people to extreme measures, including using water spray in the bathroom instead of toilet paper and eating garden snails.

We feed them oatmeal for a while to get all their feces out, then cook them with garlic. Chewy but delicious,” Kate Todd told stuff.co.nz.

Others say they don’t eat at all so they can afford to feed their young.

‘On a bad week, sometimes I don’t eat at all just to have enough for the kids,’ one mother told researchers for a paper on food insecurity in the Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand.

Another revealed how his family relied on help to survive.

‘If it weren’t for those food packages, the kids wouldn’t have eaten for about a week,’ he told the researchers.

The cost of living crisis also made property prices fall in New Zealand.

Homes in Auckland are now down 11.7 percent, the latest sales figures have revealed, and it’s even worse in the capital Wellington where prices are down 13.5 percent.

The decline was partly triggered by a rate hike but also Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern’s decision to stop negative gearing on new buying and halt it completely by March 2025.

Despite being the original source of Covid, China has kept inflation close to the world’s best 2.5 percent, just behind G20 countries Saudi Arabia at 2.3 percent.

But even though they have kept inflation under control, Beijing is now facing a humiliating and destructive recession and the end of their much-lauded ‘economic miracle’.

The Communist superpower has seen a dramatic slump in its GDP after the massive Covid shutdown in Shanghai devastated production and export lines.

On Friday, China acknowledged GDP shrank 2.6 percent in the last quarter and rose only 0.4 percent YoY, compared to the previous annual growth of 5-6 percent.

Unless production bounces back in the next quarter, it will send the country into a technical recession, ending decades of soaring growth since 1976.

China has seen a dramatic slump in its GDP after the massive Covid-19 shutdown in Shanghai devastated production and export lines

In Australia, current The 20-year high inflation rate of 5.1 percent is widely expected to worsen when the latest figures are released on July 27, likely to reach 6.3 percent.

In a double hit, runaway inflation caused interest rates to rise, adding hundreds of dollars to mortgage payments for families across the country, while wages lagged and the cost of living soared.

But among the G20 countries, Australia’s inflation rate still ranks sixth best, far ahead of struggling allies like the US and UK, both at 9.1 percent, and even economic superpower Germany at 7.6 percent.

Spain and Brazil both face double-digit inflation of 10.2 and 11.98 percent, while Russia’s inflation has exploded to 15.9 percent after its war with Ukraine.

Spain and Brazil both face double-digit inflation of 10.2 and 11.98 percent, while Russia’s inflation has exploded to 15.9 percent after its war with Ukraine.

But Turkiye – formerly known as Turki – is being devastated by the current financial crisis, with inflation now at 78.62 percent, even worse than Argentina’s 64 percent.

Super-inflation took over after Turkish President Recep Erdogan raised the minimum wage by almost a third from $254 to $328, giving 40 percent of the workforce a massive pay raise.

Opposition parties say the real interest rate is actually double the official figure, and analysts warn the country’s economy could collapse.

“No one really trusts official Turkish data anymore,” economist Timothy Ash of BlueBay Asset Management tweeted earlier this month.

‘There is no hope of such a credible policy response.’

The crumbling economy saw Sri Lanka’s government topple this week in a popular uprising as inflation hit 54.6 percent and the country ran out of money and fuel.

A similar economic crash saw Sri Lanka’s government topple this week in a popular uprising as inflation hit 54.6 percent and the country ran out of money and fuel.

Elsewhere in the world, Lebanon currently has the worst inflation in the world as the economy there collapses under a 211 percent price increase.

Zimbabwe and Sudan have the second-worst inflation rates at 192 per cent, but neighboring South Sudan has the lowest inflation rate in the world at minus 4.29 per cent, though that figure camouflages an economy that has stalled and stagnated in crisis.

Venezuela at 167 percent after nine years of hyper-inflation and civil war-torn Syria at an inflation rate of 139 percent complete the bottom five behind Turkiye.

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