JC Political Thread - For All Things Political Part 2

[Cheap6]

In all honesty, I'd love to see GST around the 17-20% mark...however, with one major change, all income taxes scrapped. This would mean each and every person would pay their fair share of tax through purchases based on what they spend. There is no fairer system.

I know back in 2006 or 2007 KPMG were commissioned by the Libs to do an analysis on this, it come out that at 17% GST they would gather more income than from income taxes as it would remove the costs associated with personal tax returns etc. I will see my sister in law who was one of the ones on it to see if I can get some better details.

Just like a flat tax rate it sounds good until you think about it. A GST is inherently regressive. Even if you omit, as Australia has done, basics like staple foods, it affects those on lower incomes more than those on higher incomes. Like all regressive taxation, it would tend to cement into place the position in society that an individual is born in i.e. make it more difficult to get out of poverty.

 

[minux]

Just like a flat tax rate it sounds good until you think about it. A GST is inherently regressive. Even if you omit, as Australia has done, basics like staple foods, it affects those on lower incomes more than those on higher incomes. Like all regressive taxation, it would tend to cement into place the position in society that an individual is born in i.e. make it more difficult to get out of poverty.

Ok so I have thought about it and it still sounds great. EVERYONE pays their fair share based on what is spent. If I choose to earn more and buy more, I will pay more. If I choose to earn less I will spend less and pay less...

What is unfair about that?


Oh Cheap6, whats your thoughts about this?

Principia Scientific Intl | New Discovery: NASA Study Proves Carbon Dioxide Cools Atmosphere

 

[vr94ss]

Just like a flat tax rate it sounds good until you think about it. A GST is inherently regressive. Even if you omit, as Australia has done, basics like staple foods, it affects those on lower incomes more than those on higher incomes. Like all regressive taxation, it would tend to cement into place the position in society that an individual is born in i.e. make it more difficult to get out of poverty.

Exactly, which is why no country has a flat tax system. It might sound a "simple" and good idea but if it really was it would have happened... Unless it's the poor who really run the world and force progressive tax on the wealthy:surprise:.

edit: I was wrong. There are countries that have a flat tax(brings to mind Minux's comments about countries that may have FTTP, should I make the same connection?http://forums.justcommodores.com.au...hings-political-part-2-a-145.html#post2433058) but I don't think I'd want to live in any of them unless I was pretty wealthy and there're some tax havens amongst them and if you read it all, some countries that have tried a flat tax are reverting to progressive tax, some that claim to have flat tax don't really(marginal flat tax).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flat_tax#Countries_that_have_flat_tax_systems

 

[vr94ss]

Oh Cheap6, whats your thoughts about this?

Principia Scientific Intl | New Discovery: NASA Study Proves Carbon Dioxide Cools Atmosphere

You really choose your media!

A misinterpreted claim about a NASA press release, CO2, solar flares, and the thermosphere is making the rounds | Watts Up With That?

 

[vr94ss]

Whoops, double posting deleted, see previous post.

Let's see...20 years ago all schools had R.E/R.I, most children learnt morals, it did ZERO harm to anyone I know. Many teachers I know, including my wife welcome it back in the hope it might help guide some of the things that turn up in classrooms now.

Tell me, what harm did it do you? I would show more concern at how our PM supports full term abortion...

Well can you tell me why, in the US at least where they collect these stats, the atheist prison population is less than 1% and Christians make up 75%? We know that that doesn't correlate with the population, divorce figures and others are equally divergent from their "morals". Religion does not improve people, the best it does is scare a small minority of bad people to be good, at worst see Twin Towers, something didn't work. Scaring people(HellFires!!) is not a good moral foundation. Educating and getting people to think makes a far better basis for a good society. In fact I think you could do with some

Can you show me where our PM has proposed full term abortions or is this just more mud(or is it monkey poo) you're flinging?

 

[vr94ss]

You continue to bury your head in the sand and assume that fast internet is only for porn and illegal movies.

If that's all one uses it for maybe they can see no other purpose. Personally I would like remote desktop to be remotely usable and I get 13Mbit on adsl2 now! It's not just download speed it's upload. That's what cripples IT. I could easily use 100Mbit if it was synchronous. The way it is now upload speed eats download speed, when you have that both ends it sucks.

I may as well get up showered, dressed, drive to school, burn fuel, rather than wait for a desktop to load as it is now and as it will be under LNP. A major part of this is the "so called" cost of backhaul traffic, it's why you get no upload speed(and if you use it your download suffers), NBN would eliminate that. I could roll out of bed, walk 30ft and get things done, I can now but the time it costs, that I charge for mind, is measured in many hours per week just waiting for stuff to show up. We don't all use IT for porn or movies. My kids might though

Edit: Example.. Once a month the school newsletter is sent out to subscribed parents(pdf), when that happens and eats all the outbound bandwidth because the office staff send it too early(while school is in progress) kids can't access the 'net for their work. I have to continually gripe about it because I'm the one that get's the phone calls and complaints. ADSL sucks unless all you do is download, time doesn't matter and schoolwork is secondary. As it currently stands, even if they do it after 3:30pm it cripples school webmail or other functionality.

It's the old, I don't use it so it doesn't bother me, I'm all good. We see the same in discussions on P plate law where those off them don't care about those on them. I think it's bout time we became a society again and did things for all.

 

[Cheap6]

Ok so I have thought about it and it still sounds great. EVERYONE pays their fair share based on what is spent. If I choose to earn more and buy more, I will pay more. If I choose to earn less I will spend less and pay less...

What is unfair about that?

Don't misunderstand me, I like consumption taxes it's just that they are not inherently fair and require some way of correcting the uneven imposition. The reason is that not all dollars are created equal. It hurts much more to remove the same dollar value from someone with a low income vs someone with a high income. I'm sure that Gina Rhinehart, while not happy about it, wouldn't be overly concerned with losing (say) $100. For someone on minimum wage losing that amount might mean not eating for a week.

Also, you can't save until your basic needs are met. For someone close to hand-to-mouth survival there's much less scope to save and invest and the opportunity to extract income from doing that is limited, even non-existent. Flat tax rates and consumption taxes tend to concentrate wealth and inequality. That's why progressive tax systems are fair.

 

[Calaber]

It's interesting that those who stand the most to gain from flat taxation are those most in favour of it. (as you might expect)

Given that less than a small percentage of the population are on the 2 highest tax rates, I'd say they'll be whistling Dixie until the cows come home before the present system will change in their favour.

 

[vr94ss]

Don't misunderstand me, I like consumption taxes it's just that they are not inherently fair and require some way of correcting the uneven imposition. The reason is that not all dollars are created equal. It hurts much more to remove the same dollar value from someone with a low income vs someone with a high income. I'm sure that Gina Rhinehart, while not happy about it, wouldn't be overly concerned with losing (say) $100. For someone on minimum wage losing that amount might mean not eating for a week.

Also, you can't save until your basic needs are met. For someone close to hand-to-mouth survival there's much less scope to save and invest and the opportunity to extract income from doing that is limited, even non-existent. Flat tax rates and consumption taxes tend to concentrate wealth and inequality. That's why progressive tax systems are fair.

Oh come on, she earned it. Minux knows that and so does Gina the Hutt. Ho Ho Ho Ho... Don't pretend with him 'cause you know he's gonna misrepresent whatever she says/you says anyway. Ho, ho, ho. I used to try and play nice, talk sense, doesn't work. Hohoho. I'm seriously over it. The moment they open their unsubstantiated **** flinging trap I'm gonna be all over it asking for validation. I hope I calm down tomorrow but atm I could hang a liar from the nearest tree. Hopefully rant over.
Simmering..

 

[vr94ss]

Ouch, kinda sorry, lashout. Dirseguard. Pity I cant realisticly delete it.
Here have horse. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=smbQh-LCKOw