This was published 7 years ago
Australians obsessed with wealth: Time for a new Great Australian Dream
Should the Australian dream really be about wealth?Credit: AP
Is it over yet? Surely it's over. Surely after the endless rounds of "jobs and growth" and "working families" and "fairness" and "can I just say…", the Australian election has finished.
And yet, obviously, it hasn't. This whole mind-numbing campaign still has another week to go, which is enough to make even the most agoraphobic among us want to book a holiday to some far-flung corner of the Earth and never return.
Elections always make me think about travel, but not just because of the tedium of obfuscating politicians not answering questions and the fact that it's just two parties offering slightly different versions of the same thing that inspires plans of escape. They make me think about travel because the election cycle offers a pretty grim view of the things that Australians think are important.
Travel for a while, and the ownership of 'things' becomes far less important. Credit: Getty Images
This is, after all, the perfect opportunity for us to debate the big issues, the stuff that truly matters deep in our hearts, and come to some sort of consensus over who we are as people, and where our priorities lie.
So what do we talk about? The economy, mostly. Jobs and growth. Negative gearing. Superannuation. Debt and deficit. Interest rates.
These are the topics that get Australians' hearts racing. This is what really matters to people.
And yet they all sound fairly self-serving. Australians are obsessed with the personal accrual of wealth; even – if not, especially – the people who have already accrued that wealth but would like some more.
We don't really talk about the environment, we don't care much about foreign aid, we try not to think too deeply about refugees, and social welfare is something of a taboo topic. Essentially, we ignore most of the areas of policy that would benefit someone else.
This is a pretty accurate reflection of Australia. The official "great Australian dream", after all, is not to see the world, not to create something beautiful, not to make a difference on a global scale – the great Australian dream is to buy a house. Just to own some property; something that you can parlay into another negatively geared investment and live like a king.
What does this have to do with travel? It has to do with the way travel tends to steer your priorities away from those things. When you travel, particularly for a long period of time, all of those cares, all of those electoral talking points that we're being bombarded with day after day, seem to matter less.
Eventually, they mean nothing to you at all.
Travel for a while, and the ownership of "things" becomes far less important. You don't hunger for the latest iPhone or wish you had a designer pair of jeans. Looking good doesn't matter. Having a lot of stuff doesn't matter. Hanging out with good people and enjoying your life does.
Spend time in dorms and ratty hotel rooms, and you begin to believe you don't really need a huge house to call yourself a success. You don't need a whole suite of investment properties to complain to everyone about at the pub. You just need a decent place to live.
Meet people from other countries and your perspective becomes far more global than simply caring about what's going on in your own backyard. Money spent on foreign aid suddenly seems worthwhile. Having your taxes used to fight climate change sounds like a good idea.
When you travel you also see that there are other ways of living your life, that other countries have different priorities. In Bhutan they measure "gross national happiness" as well as GDP. In Scandinavia there's a huge focus on social welfare. In southern Europe having a good time sometimes seems more important than having a good job. Is that such a bad way to live?
Unfortunately, however, seeing all of this and experiencing all of this won't necessarily change you forever. The reason we're all sitting here debating jobs and growth and negative gearing and the health of your super is that once you get home from travelling, you almost immediately revert back to your old ways.
The new iPhone looks super-cool again. An investment property seems like a really good idea. Interest rates matter.
There's also an irony in the fact that to have these overseas experiences and these epiphanies, you need to have money. And for that you probably do need to worry about jobs and growth.
It's just sad that that's the only thing we seem capable of considering. That's all we can talk about. All of those other issues and interests that really are important pale in comparison to our thirst for the great Australian dream.
b.groundwater@fairfaxmedia.com.au
See also: Why every other country seems better to live in than Australia
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