http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/st ... 71,00.html
9% growth in spending, aimed solely at buying elections and made possible by the mining boom. Well, we have no mining boom today, the mild recession we are suffering was sufficient to lay bare the crap economic management by the economic vandals, V1 & V2.
By stopping/reducing this churn of paying tax and claiming all of it back (and sometimes more) Swan should be able to affect major efficiencies at the ATO: free up manpower to spend more time on auditing businesses!Going to families earning up to $150,000 a year, the $17 billion in family tax benefits is Canberra's third biggest spending program after grants to the states and the age pension. It means that families earning up to $60,000 effectively pay no or little tax. The problem is that the revenue bonanza supporting Howard's grand political strategy has collapsed with the end of the resources boom and the grip of recession. And, with hindsight, the federal Treasury argues Howardism could only be sustained while sky-high prices for Australia's iron ore and coal exports were pumping up national income and, with it, the national tax base.
Swan has to stop the recession causing wholesale unemployment and try and undo the damage from V1 & V2. Expect a concerted attack on middleclass welfare over the next decade at least! (Oh, yeah, LOW_IQ defines middle class welfare as the rich being taxed to pay for the very poor. Poor, silly little fluffy bunny, that is not what middleclass welfare is: it is taking from those doing it tough to give to those doing quite well.
Swan has committed to a 2% limit to real spending over the next couple of terms. So any disaster, any need for govt spending needs to be financed by savings elsewhere. The Fibs will accept it, they are pretty much a spent force looking at the onrushing light of the train of their demographic doom. Crash!
I have been saying all this pretty much throughout the wasted decade.