Australian budget

By Leith van Onselen Western Australia’s per capita share of goods and services tax (GST) revenue will rise from $0.34 in the dollar to $0.47 in changes announced yesterday by the Federal Government, thus increasing the state’s share of GST revenue by around $1 billion in 2018.

By Leith van Onselen It seems Treasurer Scott Morrison has finally seen the light.

By Leith van Onselen Greens leader, Richard DiNatale, has been rubbished by economists for proposing a socialistic “universal basic income” (UBI) scheme in his Press Club Address yesterday.

By Leith van Onselen With the annual cost of the private health insurance rebate expected to soar to $6.8 billion by 2020-21: Debate has raged over how a future Labor Government might reform the private health insurance system to make it more efficient and sustainable.

By Leith van Onselen It appears the Labor Party is still considering speeding up the timetable for lifting Australia’s superannuation guarantee (i.e. compulsory superannuation contributions) from the current date of 2025 : Revenue and Financial Services Minister Kelly O’Dwyer warned Labor against meddling with the current trajectory in an environment of flat wages growth.

By Leith van Onselen A key rationale for the Turnbull Government’s company tax cut package was to boost foreign investment in Australia and, therefore, ‘jobs and growth’.

Ken Henry is making sense at The Australian: Former Treasury secretary Ken Henry has slammed the emerging bidding war between the Turnbull government and Labor to cut taxes as “theatrically absurd” given the rising tide of public spending baked into the budget.

By Leith van Onselen We noted previously how the NSW State Government has hit ‘peak stupid’ in deciding to spend $2.5 billion to demolish and rebuild the Olympic Stadium and the Sydney Football Stadium, both of which are underutilised.

By Leith van Onselen The Conversation yesterday published a ripper series of charts on Australia’s private health insurance system, which illustrates the strong inflation in premiums that has taken place over the past 15-plus years.

Media responses to the exceptional efforts of Senator Tim Storer paint a gloomy picture for Australia.

Oh dear… The Govt just shut down debate on the BCA’s company tax letter.

By Leith van Onselen A Newspoll survey has revealed that the majority of Australians (51%) view the Aged Pension as a welfare safety net, not an entitlement that is earned after paying a lifetime’s tax.

By Leith van Onselen David van Gogh from Australian technology and risk advisory firm Amstelveen has penned an opinion piece calling for payroll taxes to be cut in a bid to boost wages growth.

By Leith van Onselen Industry Super Australia’s Matt Linden says Labor’s revised policy on cash refunds for excess dividend imputation credits is fairer and will primarily affect the wealthiest households.

Via The Australian: Senate leader Mathias Cormann yesterday conceded the government “will need to do some more work” to get the two more votes it needs, and said the ­Enterprise Tax Plan Bill would be shelved until budget week.

By Leith van Onselen It’s been just 10 months since the Turnbull Government passed its Gonski 2.0 school funding reforms and we are facing another bun fight.

By Leith van Onselen Last month, various experts challenged the efficacy of the Inland rail project, with Australian Rail Track Corporation (ARTC) head John Fullerton and the Grattan Institute’s Marion Terrill believing the project probably won’t deliver a commercial return.

Labor is putting on a master class of tax policy reform process.

Via the AFR: Fewer than one in five of Australia’s leading chief executives say they will use the Turnbull government’s proposed company tax cut to directly increase wages or employ more staff, according to a secret survey conducted by the Business Council of Australia.

By Leith van Onselen Anglicare and the left-of-centre Per Capita think tank have both today slammed Australia’s tax a welfare system, claiming taxpayers are spending six times more providing tax concessions to Australia’s wealthiest households than is spent on the unemployed.