Citing slack sales and the strong dollar as factors driving the cuts, Toyota has joined other manufacturers, including the steel and aluminium industries, which had already announced job losses.

Flat consumer demand has also hit the retail sector, and reduced borrowing by households and most businesses has led to banks and finance organisations announcing their own job cuts.

The threat of worsening economic news from Europe is acting as a dampener on confidence and there are fears of possible interest rate rises as banks complain of increasing costs of funds.

To make things more difficult, reports of hedge funds and other large-scale speculators borrowing cheaply offshore to buy high-yielding currencies such as the Australian dollar have led many to suggest the dollar could soon reach new highs.

According to the latest Commsec survey of the economic performance of Australia’s states, resource-rich Western Australia and Queensland are streaking ahead of other states, including NSW, where employment is more dependent on the manufacturing and finance industries.

The much-touted ‘‘two-speed economy’’ appears to be alive and well.

While jobs and investment bleed out of the economy’s more labour-intensive sectors, huge sums continue to flow from overseas into mining, energy and resource projects. China, in particular, is investing heavily in Australian coal, gas, iron ore and even uranium, seeking dependable supplies for its fast-growing economy.

It’s a difficult dilemma for the government, which appears to have largely abandoned the Rudd-era policy objective of extracting greater public revenue from the mining boom to help bolster those employment sectors that are struggling to hold their ground.

As other sectors languish or go backwards, it becomes less politically feasible to do anything other than encourage mining projects with ever-greater enthusiasm – an approach that some economists suggest will only make the difference between the thriving and struggling sectors even more pronounced.