Australian budget

By Leith van Onselen Following scandal after scandal, and a $3 billion Budget blow-out over four years, the Turnbull Government last week announced that it would introduce a new student loans scheme that will impose stricter eligibility criteria for courses, whereas student loans will also be capped.

By Leith van Onselen The CEOs of Australia’s big four accounting firms have joined forces to lobby for cutting the company tax rate to 25% from 30% for all businesses, claiming that it would unleash a wave of prosperity on Australians.

The truth today from S&P, via the Australian: John Chambers, the chairman of the firm’s sovereign ­ratings committee, suggested the federal government risked losing the AAA rating if it continued to miss its fiscal targets.

By Leith van Onselen Over the past month, there has been a strong campaign launched against the Turnbull Government’s hare-brained plan to privatise the Australian Security and Investments Commission’s (ASIC) corporate registry operations (e.g. see here, here and here).

Andrew Thorburn, NAB CEO today in Parliament: Thorburn said the bank had decided to stop political donations at all government levels as they wanted “to be respected as a bank and as a company”, under questioning from Greens Adam Bandt.

By Leith van Onselen A decade ago, Spencer Street Railway Station in central Melbourne was revamped at a cost of $700 million and renamed Southern Cross Railway Station, and was completed just in time for the 2006 Commonwealth Games.

By Leith van Onselen Following scandal after scandal, and a $6 billion Budget blow-out over four years, the Turnbull Government will introduce a new student loans scheme that will impose stricter eligibility criteria for courses, while student loans will be capped.

Cross-posted from The Conversation: Education minister Simon Birmingham recently made the claim that some private schools are “overfunded”.

By Leith van Onselen Australia’s senior public servants are taking the piss.

By Leith van Onselen The Greens have called on Labor to oppose tax cuts to those earning in excess of $80,000, arguing that they are poorly targeted ‘trickle-down economics’.

By Leith van Onselen I have complained incessantly that Australia’s universities have turned into ‘degree factories’, whereby they teach as many students as possible to accumulate Commonwealth government funding through HELP/HECS debts.

The Budget of Lies deserves no less, from The Australian: The iron ore price has dropped to a whisker above the $US55 a tonne threshold as one credit ratings agency offered a bearish view of the commodity’s short and long-term outlook.

By Leith van Onselen The Grattan Institute has lodged a submission to the Senate Inquiry into the Treasury Laws Amendment (Enterprise Tax Plan) Bill 2016, which argues against cutting company taxes.

Scott Morrison is our new China bear, from the AFR: Australia has five years to make its budget more resilient to a potential economic shock from booming debt levels in China, Treasurer Scott Morrison says.

By Leith van Onselen When the Victorian Budget was released in late April, the Treasury projected that stamp duty receipts would continue growing over the forward estimates following a tiny correction next financial year (see next chart).

LF Economics lodged a submission to the House of Representatives Budget Savings (Omnibus) Bill 2016, entitled Australia’s Low Public Debt… With Poor Infrastructure to Prove it, which examines the state of government finances in Australia and calls for significant public investment in economic and social infrastructure.

By Leith van Onselen Back in July, ABC’s The Business and Michael West featured an extraordinary raft of allegations from a 32-year veteran industry insider turned whistleblower, George Rozvany, who claimed that multinational tax avoidance was “out of control” and cost the Budget up to $50 billion dollars a year in lost revenue.

By Leith van Onselen One Nation leader Pauline Hanson has thrown her support behind the Turnbull Government’s proposed four-week waiting period before young jobseekers can receive unemployment benefits, claiming that action is needed to prevent young people from becoming dependent on welfare, and suggesting that the waiting period should be even longer.

By Leith van Onselen Australia’s big business lobby group – the Business Council of Australia (BCA) – has once again lashed out at the Government’s flagged abandonment of company tax cuts for large businesses, claiming that it has effectively given up on “building future prosperity”.

From Macquarie:  A rotation towards public infrastructure investment is an anticipated swing point in the non-mining economy’s transition.