Taxation
What should the Australian Defence Force do?
Hint: the answer is in the name The Australian Defence Force (ADF) does lots of things it shouldn’t. Restrict the trading of others The Australian Defence Force (ADF) helps to enforce sanctions. It contributes in varying degrees to efforts to enforce sanctions endorsed by the United Nations Security Council, like sanctions against North Korea, Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq, Syria, and various countries in Africa,...
4 Free Enterprise Policies Guaranteed To Make The Economy Roar!
Red tape is a productivity-sapping and innovation-destroying virus on business. Australia is feeling the effects of a generation of governments that believe any problem in the world can be solved with another little rule, constraint or compliance requirement. Australian business is suffering death by a thousand cuts. There are too many rules to actually know and obey. It’s worse than a mere...
Smoke ‘Em If You Got ‘Em
For those of us who still occasionally like to check in on what the mainstream media is doing, there has been a topic that has got chins wagging and jowls flapping lately: “the tobacco wars”. While the mainstream media, in typical fashion, has sensationalised the story, it is true that black and grey market tobacco is abundant in the community. BLACK,...
Taxing The Country Into Welfare And Disability
"We contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperityis like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.It is impossible." Those were not the words of an Australian Commonwealth Treasurer but rather of Winston Churchill addressing the House of Commons in 1925 arguing against a proposed increase in taxes. Almost...
None of your Business
Housing affordability is a perennial issue that seems to be spilling over into the political domain in a way that is more divisive and acute than ever. And as usual, the political class is more interested in sounding like they are engaging with the issue than actually addressing it. Oddly enough it is the left side of politics that has...
The Misguided Quest for “Fair Share”
“Grab your torch and pitch-fork” was the rallying cry of the left in the recent debate over stage three tax cuts. And so the mob was led to follow a trail of sprinkled money to the door of high income earners to rob them of tax relief. In the debate over Australia's tax system, the concept of "fair share" has...
Cut Taxes To 20%
It goes without saying that rules and sanctions should be clearly specified in advance so people know how they are supposed to behave and what will happen to them if they don’t. Also, importantly, rules must apply equally to everybody. But the rules governing tax liabilities have become so tangled and complex that nobody can be sure any longer what...
Death, Taxes and … Death Taxes?
“We know that there is a growing pot of wealth, sitting in the hands of older Australians that will be passed on in coming decades.” Gosh, that sounds juicy. What government could refuse the temptation to take a slice of that pie? However, that sentiment speaks to the fundamental flaw in the approach of our policy makers towards balancing our books...
Forum Shopping for Native Title rights
The Rolling Stones were wrong: you can always get what you want if you are patient and the taxpayer foots the bill. And if you forum shop. So it was with a recent native title ‘victory’ at the High Court of Australia. The Court overturned a decision of the full court of the Federal Court of Australia. Native title holders at...
Other People’s Money
Philosophy #1: Living On Other People's Money Is Unwise When reading the news and opinion, I am frequently mindful of the idea of other people's money and the perceptive words of French economist Frederic Bastiat, who wrote that “The state is the great fictitious entity by which everyone seeks to live at the expense of everyone else.” I thought of Bastiat...
