No, Mr Turnbull, our incredibly high house prices are certainly NOT simply a matter of supply and demand as you claimed in Question Time yesterday.

The real estate industry in Southern California also incorrectly held that undersupply was the reason for their rampant house prices.  That was just before their market collapsed, exposing an excessive supply of dwellings.

The main reason for high house (land) prices in Australia is that our tax system offers incredible encouragement to property speculators. This has come at a grave cost to our productivity.