tory tax bludgers are the problem 4193

fasgnadh cut

That kind of thing may go down well at the pub with your Labor mates Fasi, but remember I used to help shape Coalition policy for a time. Your statement bears little resemblence to reality.

I'm sure you are aware that the primary motivator for policy is votes in marginal seats. Not favours for plutocrats as you suggest. Every single policy for both the Libs and the ALP is measured against a simple yardstick: how will this affect the votes in the marginals.

So lets leave the clbutt warfare stuff to the "true believers" shall we?

The tax office likes to get a bang for its buck. It is simply more cost effective to go after Joe Average who has understated his income for a decade than it is to open the pandoras box full of corporate lawyers when you try it with a wealthy company.

Not that the wealthy corporations should not be targetted too. In fact a self funded SWAT team of corporate tax accountants ought to be unleashed on any company where there was "reason to believe" tax evasion was going on. Perhaps the role could be contracted out to private accountancy firms who, after all, are the real experts in tax loopholes. Remuneration in the form of a percentage of money recovered. Hmm, a no cost solution. Looks pretty good even at the idea stage.

I seem to remember writing quite a few words on the topic over the years.In fact Google says there are 1290 articles with both "David Moss" and "tax" in them.

True though.

the sources.

No, a VLOOKUP table will buttist in the calculation of tax. It will not stop people from artificially manipulating their affairs to stay under the various threshholds in the tax system. A flat tax would remove the incentive to manipulate because there would be no advantage in doing so. Why pay an accountant good money for no tangible benefit?

Are we talking tax or HECS here?

The GST was supposed to be simple because it was supposed to be a flat rate on everything. The best laid plans of mice and men though...

And whoever the twit was who included FBT and wine equalisation tax on the GST form should be pressed to rest under the full weight of the tax act, volume by volume.

Its probably an exponential progression. Fasgnadh's first law of bureaucracy would be a good name for it.

earned. I not

Hmm, no comment on this one? One of my prettiest soft plastic lures too.

I Pays-or-

I have yet to meet a pensioner who cannot afford medicine. I meet lots of people who need to readjust their budget priorities though.

Whats this crap about families not being able to afford education of sufficient quality to gain entry to Uni? I currently work in the State education sector and it offers more than adequate quality for those who take advantage of it.

In fact I service a number of schools where the favourable staff to student ratio is unattainable in the private sector. Last week I visited a state school with a 1:1 student to computer ratio, all PC's less than 2 years old. Staff to student ratio somewhere around 1:4.

Again that rhetoric flies well down at the Labor club but it crashes and burns on the rocks of reality.

One of my great political regrets is that I was on the preselection panel for Ruddock, which was at the same venue immediately after the one that selected Nelson. If only it had been the other way around...

are

I seem to remember having a hand in those policies. Pensioners were more than compensated for GST changes via the social security system and pensions were CPI linked so they would not be affected by inflation.

get for to an

Yes, gates son should pay the same percentage of his $billions as Joe Average does of his $thousands. Its only fair. Gates Jnr pays $millions, JA pays $hundreds. Both pay at the same rate bit gates pays thousands of times more in absolute terms.

if you remember I said the government should not even attempt to cause equality of outcome.

Methinks you miss the point deliberately. The government should provide equality of opportunity. Individuals have the right to add to what the government provides voluntarily, and according to their means. Gates' parents may choose not to contribute, in which case Gates Jnr has the same opportunity as Joe Average's unemployed sister's child. Gates may slap a $billion on the table and order up 24 hour personal tubreastion by Oxford Professors. If he has the resources, he has the right to do that. Gates Jnr's opportunities are well above standard in that case.

The argument should not be about whether rich kids should have more opportunity than poor kids. In fact wealth is irrelevant to the real question.

The argument should be about how to provide a high standard of basic education for all Australians. Then about how to achieve that standard most efficiently.

Indeed. Inflation is the mechanism which tells us we are paying workers too much per unit of production. Low inflation tells us things are about right. deflation tells us we are paying too little per unit of production and consumption is being affected. If we increase wages without a comensurate increase in productivity inflation takes off. We don't want that. Its bad. Been there, done that, booted out the government that watched it happen. Too much inflation and unemployment trends up. Seen that too, hurts low income earners far more than others. Its bad.

That brings us back to those votes in key marginals. How will the policy affect them?

chaff seperated

DM personal opinion only