I’ve told my assistant to “cancel everything for July 23” because Treasurer Josh Frydenberg will be revealing the contents of his Mini-Budget as the country rides to the rescue of ‘Coronavirused’ Melburnians specifically, and virus-smashed Aussies generally.

Yesterday, the PM channelled John F. Kennedy in his “Ich bin ein Berliner” or “I am a Berliner” speech delivered in Berlin, as the Cold War hotted up in 1963, telling us that: “We’re all Melburnians now!”

It’s a nice sentiment and it’s good economics, as well as smart politics, as this new Melbourne lockdown is set to cost Treasury (and therefore us taxpayers) at least $6 billion.

That’s the Treasury team’s best guess but the real cost could be a lot more because we don’t know how this news will affect local and foreign investment in Australia, job creation, consumer spending and overall confidence, which is critical to restoring us back to normalcy ASAP.

We don’t know what the Mini-Budget will bring but there could be some really great gifts, especially for those earning less than $120,000 a year — and that’s a hell of a lot of Aussies.

Predictably, the $70 billion JobKeeper programme will be extended but it will have to be industry and possibly geographically targeted. Clearly, Victoria will be one area needing well-directed wage support. There will be more relief for insolvent trading businesses, so the usual rules of ‘not trading while insolvent’ will continue to be relaxed.

Banks will extend their interest holidays on loans by a further four months, which will be good for those with home loans, who are under job or wage pressure temporarily. But this could hurt dividends for those invested in banks.

But the really big gift will be the bringing forward of tax cuts that were supposed to come in 2022.

Here’s what Josh could be handing out:

• 19% tax rate stops at $45,000 not $37,000.
• 32.5% tax rate stops at $120,000 not $90,000!
• Low Income Tax offset goes from $645 to $700.

Being tagged a Mini-Budget, this blueprint to turbo-charge economic growth is certain to offer business investment incentives and other financial support measures that are bound to encourage spending from those who are largely economically unaffected by this terrible chapter in Australia’s history.

If you’re trying to work out who those people might be, you could start with public servants, essential services people and all those employees of businesses that have easily adapted to employees working from home, communicating on zoom and re-inventing their business models.

And then there are the 12,235 people who have taken this economically threatening environment to go out and buy a Maserati, a BMW, a Merc or even a McLaren! CommSec’s latest luxury vehicle sales index reveals that 12,235 luxury cars were sold in June. This was double the sales in May and way higher than the 11-year low that happened in April.

Of course, very low interest rates and even the instant asset write-off tax incentive for lower priced luxury cars might have helped these sales, but it does tell me two things.

First, there are lots of Aussies who are doing OK economically, through this COVID-19 crisis. And secondly, these luxury car sales say something positive about the housing market.

A few years back when house prices were falling, the boss of Maserati in Australia, Glen Sealey, explained how when our house prices are rising we buy cars but when the opposite happens, car sales fall.

At the start of this crisis, even the CBA suggested house prices could fall by 30%. But that would have been a worst-case scenario, where unemployment would have been heading to 10%.

I’m not canvassing for a house price surge but I hope the Mini-Budget engenders enough confidence to ensure house prices don’t collapse because if they do, then this Coronavirus will become a real economic crisis.

Go luxury car sales!