you are deluded…

* George Megalogenis
* From: The Australian
* December 26, 2009 12:00AM

ACROSS-THE-BOARD income tax cuts are off Labor’s agenda as the Henry review looks instead to ease the burden on individual taxpayers by simplifying returns and reducing churn in the tax and family payment systems.

The compromise at the heart of the report now in the hands of Wayne Swan marks the first occasion that a major tax reform will not be accompanied by tax cuts for all. The budget cannot afford them for at least six years. The fiscal straitjacket also means any lowering of the company tax rate will have to be offset by trimming concessions to business.

The findings of the five-member review panel chaired by Treasury secretary Ken Henry mix relief for families and individuals and controversial measures covering the taxation of bank savings, superannuation, petrol, resources, companies and federal-state financial relations.

The ambitious 20-year reform program delivered to the Treasurer this week aims to focus revenue collection on a “small set of broad-based taxes”, according to a document leaked to The Weekend Australian. The overhaul is driven by the challenges of an ageing population, the new baby boom, the rise of China and India, globalisation and the environment.

The politically difficult reforms – including state-based congestion taxes, a national payroll tax collected on behalf of the states and a shift to a new form of taxation for business – are identified in the report as issues for future debate. This side-steps the need for hard recommendations that would have forced Labor to declare its hand early in an election year.

With the budget forecast to remain in deficit until the middle of the next decade, the Henry review has relied on efficiencies to fund some of its proposals. On the personal tax front, the report points out that Australians use tax agents more than most other nations, but for very little real benefit to the economy.

The report wants to minimise churn by doing away with the need to file paper-based tax returns and to give people the option of claiming a standard work deduction instead of taking on the taxman on each item.

Lower- and middle-income earners are expected to be better off through changes to the low-income tax offset and other incentives. Higher-income earners will lose some of their superannuation tax concessions to pay for new concessions for low-income earners. At the moment, lower-income earners receive no benefit from super contributions because their compulsory savings are taxed at the same rate as their regular income – at 15 per cent.

Any cut to the company tax rate in the short term will need to be revenue-neutral because of the budget deficit.

A briefing note Dr Henry distributed in the final stages of the report, which The Weekend Australian has obtained, outlines a two-way pressure on the budget – on the one hand, the ageing population is driving up spending, particularly through health and aged-care costs; on the other, the revenue surges from the resources sector pose adjustment problems for the rest of the economy. The document links a lower company tax rate to a change in the taxation of resources. Miners would cough up the extra cash to reduce the headline rate for all companies.

The briefing note defends the “broad architecture of Australia’s tax and transfer system” – a signal that overhaul of personal taxes and payments is also off the agenda.

Nevertheless, changes within the existing structure to reduce churn are likely to form part of Mr Swan’s opening response.

The review panel has not fallen for the obvious traps of taxing the family home, or extending the land tax base to households in exchange for the abolition of stamp duty on home sales.
Labor is bracing for a difficult debate on petrol taxes. Treasury used its latest pocket brief on the tax system this week to show that Australia has the second-cheapest bowser prices in the developed world, and the fourth-lowest rate of petrol tax, comprising excise and GST.

Labor’s tax reform dilemma can be summarised as too little revenue and too much regular spending.

Personal tax collections are at historic lows of 9.6 per cent of gross domestic product in 2008-09, and 9.7 per cent for the present financial year. They won’t return to double digits until 2012-13, but even then the figure of 10.2 per cent would merely match the level that prevailed in 2006-07. On paper, a lower tax burden should be good news for workers. But it comes at the cost of a large deficit.

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But why should a charitable organisatio, such as IHC, expect its employees to be charitable by not receiving fair rumneration for work done? Would you be willing to do a sleep over in a house with some very disturbed people for a payment of a bit over $3 an hour?

Most of us expect to assist those that CAN’T help themselves but we rightly resist the mantra that we should give everyone money for nothing.

Want a good example.
For years the IHC ran itself doing tremendous work, built up sheltered workshops etc and care houses. (along with many other groups.)
The socialists just despised those efforts, the unions were completely threatened by the work done in the workshops and by the voluntary time put in by thousands of people.
So they enlisted their mothers little helpers in the Public Service and proceeded with destroying all that was built in place from nothing. (Built by individual enterprise and charity et al).
They destroyed the homes, they destroyed the workshops, they have destroyed the goodwill of the people who built this organization and the last straw is that they have now managed to destroy the financial viability of IHC.

That’s what socialism does, destroys the soul.

So Billy, thanks for reminding us what Key said. People should take note and when the next vote comes around remember what socialism and its attitudes does for and to people.

John Key at The Christcurch Press readers’ forum, prior to the election.

Not once, not twice, but thrice spake he “I believe in the welfare state.”

Looks like you need to change the leader.

In 2010 I would like the to see following agenda implemented by the National government

1. To promote good citizenship and self reliance
2. To combat socialism
3. To maintain freedom of contract
4. To safeguard individual rights and privilege of ownership
5. To oppose interference of the State in business
6. To oppose State control of industry

For those in the Government scratching their heads at this heresy, (and those in Government hearing this for the first time) it is merely the National party Founding Principles from May 14th 1936….

Food for thought for all those National MP’s who don’t know their Founding Document from their Treaty Document.
This should be written in every National MP’s employment contract. Oh they don’t have one. Isn’t that against the Law?

Indeed they should be required to stand up and recite in unison this mantra, every morning.

Luc, you ought to read it. There is NO evidence for human caused global warming, and none that CO2 is in any way responsible for warming whatsoever. It’s a total fiction.

I will follow her site with interest.

Some reading over Christmas – a complete 30 year timeline of CLIMATEGATE
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Jo Nova is a disgrace to the term “skeptic.” She trots out the usual selected quotes and distorts the context of those quotes. But good on her for making a bob or two in true capitalist style.

The problem I have with her exploitation of easily confused and susceptible people is that she values making a dollar out of a future crisis (future for some, but current for others like Tuvaluans and Bangladeshis) way above ensuring a future for not only humans, but many other species as well. She is the living embodiment of what we are doing wrong – we are the generations intent on self-gratification at any cost, robbing our own descendants of a future remotely approaching the luxuries and freedoms that we enjoy as of right.

I actually care about the world we leave for our future generations, not just my descendants (may they be plentiful and prosperous) but for all humans and all non-human species.

Those of you, especially those of you who claim to be Christians, who play dice with the future we bequeath need to understand that you demonstrate the modern phenomenon of disconnection from our ancestral lineage.

That’s the sense of understanding inherent in the consciousness of indigenous peoples the world over. It’s about where we have come from and the responsibility to leave a planet in a better, not worse, state.

That’s my Christmas message.

Best wishes to all.

May your descendants be plentiful and prosperous.

Peace be upon you.

Have good Christmas everyone.

cheers

Malcolm

So to my kiwiblog pals, peers and sparring partners … have a fantastic, safe and relaxing Christmas with friends and family. God bless you all.

PS- bruv if you are reading- awesome your mate is doing better

Link: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1228630/How-Hitlers-Nazi-propaganda-machine-tried-Christ-Christmas.html#