Election 2016

[M61A1]

All of which ignores the social and humanitarian side of the equation. So someone on $4 million a year is complaining because they pay like 45% tax (unless their diligent accountant manages to substantially reduce that) and someone on $20,000 a year pays 0%.

I'm sorry, but the person earning $4 million still has over $42,000 a WEEK after tax to live on, whereas the person on $20,000 has, well, $384.

 

Do they ask what your income is when you go buy your groceries? Does everything cost 110 times as much for the rich guy?

No, but for an awful lot of them, they worked 110 times harder...:amazon:In any case why is it relevant, why should stuff cost more because you earned more?

 

So what happens they say "f#ck it, it's not worth the effort, I want a housing commission house and free money, I've paid taxes all my life y'know"

 

Reducing spending, makes a lot more sense than increasing taxes. The govt needs to get back to essential infrastructure, and user pays for everything else.

 

 

[dutchroll]

... the highest income earners I know personally are medical specialists. They can well be on 2 million or more a year.

1) OK, Mrs Dutch is in one of the highest paying medical specialties and based on that information, she must be hiding well over a million dollars per year in a secret bank account. Her and I will be having stern words tonight.

 

2) She maintains that of dozens of specialist colleagues she knows, maybe two of them earn over $2 million/year. This is in the Sydney area, the national home of the highly paid specialist.

 

3) To speak of that sort of income, you're talking about the top tier of the top tier - the Charlie Teos and his equivalent, of which there are very few in the country. It is wrong to imply this is commonplace. Most specialist physicians, for example, and particularly the staff specialists are more like $250k or less. Maybe a little more in some cases. Yes a lot of money. But not $2 million!

 

On your analysis, these guys are paying for benefits for the rest of us BUT most of their patients are pensioners and most of their income comes straight from the taxpayer.

That's a "non sequitur" argument ("it does not follow"). The vast majority of the high-end specialist income is derived from the private healthcare system, which is not taxpayer funded.

 

..... and it doesn't take much to understand that a few high numbers raise an "average" significantly.

Yes I know. Yet where it's convenient in his article, he quotes the "average" anyway. That was my whole point. Have your cake and eat it too.

 

I don't know what your family status is, but I've had kids in the past, and the amount of money that is thrown at families that earn good incomes is staggering.

Both my parents who are on a pension, and myself, have needed to provide fairly substantial amounts of financial assistance (in the tens of thousands of dollars) to my brother and sister-in-law who both work but have congenital disabilities they were born with and which make communication very difficult, and to my sister in the USA who had a daughter there born with a lifelong medical condition and was pretty much bankrupted by the American healthcare system despite working full time and being on an average wage.

 

On the other side of the family we bought my elderly pensioner parents in-law a modest house and pay for its upkeep because one has mobility difficulties and needed to move closer to town and various facilities. Naturally there's no way on earth they could afford this on the pension.

 

All of this was at our personal expense, and no government assistance helped in any significant way with any of the situations our family members have been in.

 

I don't give a damn whether an average earner would be ticked off at being labelled a "welfare recipient", because, if you are an average earner, and collecting what the govt is happy to give you, you are a welfare recipient. ( I have been one myself).

I think you missed the bit about Creighton creating that label by counting public transport, education, etc etc. You're labelled a "welfare recipient" because you go to a public school or use public transport? That's what it has come down to?

 

How about actually defining the term in a way that is not completely pointless rather than a way that can be applied to literally anyone including the top tier income earners, because believe me, they happily use Medicare and the PBS too. Just a suggestion.

 

 

[bexrbetter]

On your analysis,

Not "my" article, I just generally agree with the guts of it - besides the verifyable math..

 

I know how much tax I have paid over the years while being a modest income earner for the bulk of it while raising 3 children who during that time easily used up that tax and more via hospitals and schooling.

 

Lower the burden on "the rich" and they might actually stay citizens of Oz, rather than Switzerland for example, check out how many so called Oz movie stars and sports stars are based elsewhere to avoid Oz tax, and keep their money in Oz and invest in Oz.

 

 

[M61A1]

1) OK, Mrs Dutch is in one of the highest paying medical specialties and based on that information, she must be hiding well over a million dollars per year in a secret bank account. Her and I will be having stern words tonight.

2) She maintains that of dozens of specialist colleagues she knows, maybe two of them earn over $2 million/year. This is in the Sydney area, the national home of the highly paid specialist.

 

3) To speak of that sort of income, you're talking about the top tier of the top tier - the Charlie Teos and his equivalent, of which there are very few in the country. It is wrong to imply this is commonplace. Most specialist physicians, for example, and particularly the staff specialists are more like $250k or less. Maybe a little more in some cases. Yes a lot of money. But not $2 million!

 

That's a "non sequitur" argument ("it does not follow"). The vast majority of the high-end specialist income is derived from the private healthcare system, which is not taxpayer funded.

 

Yes I know. Yet where it's convenient in his article, he quotes the "average" anyway. That was my whole point. Have your cake and eat it too.

 

Both my parents who are on a pension, and myself, have needed to provide fairly substantial amounts of financial assistance (in the tens of thousands of dollars) to my brother and sister-in-law who both work but have congenital disabilities they were born with and which make communication very difficult, and to my sister in the USA who had a daughter there born with a lifelong medical condition and was pretty much bankrupted by the American healthcare system despite working full time and being on an average wage.

 

On the other side of the family we bought my elderly pensioner parents in-law a modest house and pay for its upkeep because one has mobility difficulties and needed to move closer to town and various facilities. Naturally there's no way on earth they could afford this on the pension.

 

All of this was at our personal expense, and no government assistance helped in any significant way with any of the situations our family members have been in.

 

I think you missed the bit about Creighton creating that label by counting public transport, education, etc etc. You're labelled a "welfare recipient" because you go to a public school or use public transport? That's what it has come down to?

 

How about actually defining the term in a way that is not completely pointless rather than a way that can be applied to literally anyone including the top tier income earners, because believe me, they happily use Medicare and the PBS too. Just a suggestion.

I think his whole point was that a lot people get a lot more value than the tax they paid, while at the same time believing that they pay more than they get back, and then demand that the "rich" should pay more, just because they have more.

 

The idea being to get people to open their eyes and think about what is that they actually get for their money, and how much they are subsidised by those who the want to keep milking.(raping really).

 

That said, it's unlikely that those concerned would be reading the article anyway, if they were to read a paper at all, they would probably checking out which reality show star was wearing what, in the Courier Mail.

 

When you consider that an average person earns significantly less than the published "average wage", using the higher figure actually makes estimates more conservative, as even those who are earning the "average wage and above are still receiving handouts.

 

Things have to change, they give a lot of people health care cards that don't need them. (I know, I was one of them) What has been my experience is that once something is perceived as "free" they just use it with wild abandon. In the case of medical, they visit the doctor quite frequently for almost anything, get heap of tests carried out, get the cheap medication, and when they hit the safety net, they go all out and get every script filled imaginable....it's free right? I've seen what one person can get and in real terms the cost to the tax payer would be substantial.

 

Once again...my experience only.

 

 

[dutchroll]

- besides the verifyable math..

So Creighton states: "It is absurd to claim the “rich” - assuming incomes rather than wealth are the defining criterion - aren’t paying their “fair share” of tax when they in fact pay all of it."

 

.....that's verifiable maths is it? The rich pay "all" of it do they? Average income earners pay "none" of it do they?

 

 

[bexrbetter]

In the case of medical, they visit the doctor quite frequently for almost anything, get heap of tests carried out, get the cheap medication, and when they hit the safety net, they go all out and get every script filled imaginable....it's free right?

Welcome to Logan City.

 

 

[M61A1]

Ha Ha......I lived there too....once upon a time

 

 

[dutchroll]

So someone on $4 million a year is complaining because they pay like 45% tax (unless their diligent accountant manages to substantially reduce that) and someone on $20,000 a year pays 0%.

Don't worry.

 

I'm finding myself in the surreal and bizarre situation here of earning 2 & 1/2 times the "average" wage (wife earns a bucketload more than that) and arguing that I have no issues with the proportion of tax we're paying while others presumably on much less money argue that I should get a tax cut!

 

What the.........?

 

Geezus. The very plain and simple reality is that I would not even notice the effect of a tax cut to the top marginal rate. I really didn't want to say that, but I think it's getting to the point that I have to!

 

 

[M61A1]

I reckon you'd notice the difference if they put the tax rate down where it should be, not this 1 and 2 percent rubbish.

 

 

[dutchroll]

Alright.

 

The higher tax brackets in Australia currently are 37c in the dollar over $80k, and 45c in the dollar over $180k.

 

If you abolished the highest one completely, and dropped the 37c down to say 35c over $80k, a person earning $200,000 a year would save precisely $4,000 in income tax.

 

I don't think you realise how little a top marginal tax rate cut affects people on high incomes. I'm being quite serious in saying that I wouldn't even notice that extra $153 in my fortnightly pay, because if I'm earning $200k, my take home pay every fortnight is $5,248.00 (I'm not including Medicare, for simplification).

 

I'd rather give the money to someone who really needs it. $153 is a lot of money to someone on a low income.

 

 

[M61A1]

I get what you are saying there, but what I am suggesting is that if we had a more responsible govt and the highest tax you paid was 30%.....that's what I mean by tax cut.

 

In any case sometimes all is good , then a change in personal circumstances leaves you wondering how much better off you would be if someone else wasn't spending your money. People always say "it's only money " but you had to trade a lot of your life for it. People who take your hard earned cash, are taking part of your life, that's fine if you want to give it to them, but it's not otherwise.

 

 

[Bruce]

Dutch, you are a nice guy but the world is a complex place. Not all of the recipients of your $153 a fortnight will spend it wisely. In fact, only a few would.

 

I reckon that if you were to control their budget and make sure that their money was well spent then you would do some good.

 

There have been plenty of surveys which show that the poorer people spend with the least wisdom, and that doesn't even take gambling and drugs into account.

 

There are some signs of needed reforms, very little and very late, but good to see. A few weeks ago in Coober Pedy we were restricted in buying grog. The town's outlets are all networked, so you can't go from one to another. And the aborigines did indeed look cleaner. The guy at the bottle shop said it was 70% effective, this new measure. And it wasn't done in a racist way, it applied to everyone.

 

How about if you paid welfare with a card which wasn't valid for smokes, drugs, gambling or grog?

 

 

[dutchroll]

Not all of the recipients of your $153 a fortnight will spend it wisely. In fact, only a few would.I reckon that if you were to control their budget and make sure that their money was well spent then you would do some good.

On that I am in complete and total agreement with you!

 

That's a difficult problem to tackle. The only thing I could say with a degree of certainty is that successive Governments have failed at it.

 

 

[M61A1]

Dutch, you are a nice guy but the world is a complex place. Not all of the recipients of your $153 a fortnight will spend it wisely. In fact, only a few would.I reckon that if you were to control their budget and make sure that their money was well spent then you would do some good.

 

There have been plenty of surveys which show that the poorer people spend with the least wisdom, and that doesn't even take gambling and drugs into account.

 

There are some signs of needed reforms, very little and very late, but good to see. A few weeks ago in Coober Pedy we were restricted in buying grog. The town's outlets are all networked, so you can't go from one to another. And the aborigines did indeed look cleaner. The guy at the bottle shop said it was 70% effective, this new measure. And it wasn't done in a racist way, it applied to everyone.

 

How about if you paid welfare with a card which wasn't valid for smokes, drugs, gambling or grog?

The card idea has been a success, but only where almost all the welfare received was managed by the card, where ever they have used the concept of partial welfare by card, it has failed.

 

The Lefties love to tell us that we have no right to control how other's welfare is spent, and that the card system has been a failure, but given that it is a benefit, not pay, paid by taxpayers, I think that maybe the taxpayers have a right to see that money spent on what it was meant for.

 

 

[Marty_d]

It's a complex issue for sure. On the one hand if you restrict welfare to certain "approved" costs - food, rent, power, school costs etc, then you would think there'd be better outcomes.

 

However then you get other problems, like grocery stores in remote locations price-gouging those who can least afford it. I'm also sure, humans being the creative little critters we are, that schemes would be worked out to get around the card - eg someone working at a shop being willing to pay out say 70% of the card value in cash/alcohol/smokes and pocketing the difference. Judging by history these type of income management schemes are rolled out, then not properly policed or evaluated.

 

Also there's some irony in that those on the Right, who claim the ideals of personal responsibility and freedom from interfering government, seem to do a 180 when it comes to welfare.

 

There are no simple answers. The trouble is that these issues are inextricably linked to politics, so there's always a disincentive for the proponents of a scheme to properly research and evaluate it in case the answers do not match their claims. The best we could do is: research schemes around the world to see what works and what doesn't; seek out and use the advice of objective experts in the field; ask the communities themselves what they think would do the most to help them; implement schemes with rigorous quality assurance and evaluation; keep an eye out for unexpected consequences and have the flexibility to respond; learn from history.

 

 

[M61A1]

.Also there's some irony in that those on the Right, who claim the ideals of personal responsibility and freedom from interfering government, seem to do a 180 when it comes to welfare.

 

.

That's not irony....once you accept someone else's money, there should be some measures in place to ensure that money was spent on what it was meant for. If the govt wasn't interfering, and there was personal responsibility, they might not be getting that money anyway.

 

The schemes have been effective when implemented wholly, but have failed miserably when the left got involved and said that you have to give them cash as well.

 

 

[Bruce]

There was this guy on a bus complaining loudly to his mate about how he had spent all his $400 welfare money on these drugs which "didn't do effing nothing" so he had to go to a soup kitchen to eat. At least he would have benefited from a halfway measure, but really I think you are right M6. The "cash as well" effectively sabotages the scheme.

 

 

[fly_tornado]

Pauline will fix that problem! She hates welfare

 

 

[Marty_d]

Giving a thick narrow minded anti-everything whinger a job as a senator is an egregious form of welfare.

 

 

[spacesailor]

They ( the wealthy company),

 

Apple have been fined $18m for tax evasion, payed 1% instead of the company 4% tax, Ireland!.

 

25,000 people are being under payed in Australia.

 

Morning news today.

 

Don't you wish you could pay tax at Their rate, we wouldn't whinge at that suorly (surly! which is correct )

 

spacesailor

 

 

[spacesailor]

WOW

 

Apple is to repay $20Billion !.

 

Come on Aussie get on that bandwagon, and we can pay ALL our bills, & be outa dept for years to come.

 

spacesailor

 

 

[M61A1]

WOWApple is to repay $20Billion !.

 

Come on Aussie get on that bandwagon, and we can pay ALL our bills, & be outa dept for years to come.

 

spacesailor

Did you read the article properly? Apple had a deal with Ireland in regard to tax, the EU then decided that Apple should pay more.

 

Suppose you payed your tax as required by the country your business is in, then someone else decides you should pay more, then hits you with a bill.

 

 

[Marty_d]

You think 0.005% is "tax"?

 

 

[dutchroll]

Actually Apple violated longstanding EU anti-trust laws and Ireland - an EU member - knew full well Apple was doing that and facilitated it.

 

The EU is enforcing the law which Ireland turned a blind eye to.

 

**the EU anti-trust laws prevent companies from gaining an unfair advantage over competitors due to Government assistance.

 

 

[M61A1]

Sounds like the simplest solution then would be not set up a company based in the EU, if that is the case.