Dibbers wrote: ↑February 9, 2018, 2:15 pm
papabear wrote: ↑February 9, 2018, 9:46 am
FTR I am not suggesting to tax the poor and not tax the wealthy. I am suggesting we treat everyone equally.
Tax 0 - 1,000,000 (to infinity) all at 30% or what ever works budget wise.
With Child Care - either provide it so everyone has the same universal benefits, or remove benefits all together do not play favourites for votes.
To be honest, I know people will disagree with me, but frankly if you are not about treating people equally when it comes to taxation / welfare / childcare / education. Then in my opinion, you are making the world a **** place, one lazy demotivated person at a time.
In a world of black and white, yes that will work.
But your analogy infers that people that earn $80k a year don't work hard enough. Based on my experience, earning more money doesn't equate to working harder in all instances. And unfortunately, its not as simple as "Go and get a job that pays $200k a year, what? you can't? then stop bludging".
Fact is, if everyone was able to earn $200k a year by "working hard" then we wouldn't be having this discussion.
My wife works 3 days a week as a social worker, she's a govt employee. She helps people who are victims of terrible assaults (mainly sexual assault of children), works her a$$ off and barely gets a break for lunch. She's regularly contacted on her off days for some crisis or other with no financial compensation. Her full time package would put her on roughly $90k a year. She spent 4 years at uni studying to get to where she is, but because she's decided to help people in need, her earning capacity is capped as there isn't really much of a demand outside of govt for social work, and it's pretty much paid the same.
I never went to uni, i went straight into work in the private sector. I don't work nearly as hard, or have anywhere near the impact on society, and i earn just over $90k pa and can probably command more if I leave my current job (which i'm considering). If we didn't receive the subsidy, or got less of a subsidy, one of us wouldn't be able to work. We wouldn't be able to pay our mortgage, and when my son starts primary school, the one who stopped working will have to try and get a job with a 5 year gap in employment which i'd imagine would be a rather difficult prospect... This isn't a woe is me post about our financial situation, we're better off than a lot of people and knew what our career paths entailed.
So your example is relevant in a Utopian world but we don't live in one unfortunately. Fact is, there are a lot of people on $200k pa that are lazy. I'm pretty sure if 10 million (stab in the dark at number of adults in Australia) all were CEOs or ran businesses the economy would be up the proverbial creek.
Now i agree with the premise that if a parent doesn't work then they shouldn't get a childcare subsidy neccessarily, but without a free option, the child misses out on valuable social skills that are developed in these centres. I don't give a rats about the govt curriculum for my 2 and a half year old, but learning to play and share with others and other social interaction skills can't always be taught at home.
I also think that someone on $200k pa has a greater capacity to afford to pay more for childcare and keep working then a couple on less than that combined. Fact is, any single person on $200k pa can probable afford an accountant that can get them to a lower tax bracket anyway.
I'm still of the belief that all of this would be resolved if the government offered public childcare centres like they do public schools. They already control the curriculum and set ridiculous criteria that centres have to adhere to, they might as well be running them anyway. It'd probably be cheaper for them to do that too.
No there is no inference that people on lower incomes do not work hard.
In fact a lot of low income earners work harder then high income earners.
But ultimately money is paid for just those who go "hard" its just about the value of the purchaser.
Ultimately, public service aside, in the private sector you will have to work however hard you have to work for someone to perceive you at that value and pay you that wage, or if you run your own business to deliver / sell that many of what your delivers/sells to earn that amount of money.
It is not the governments role to equalise pays across industries, that is the markets role.
If as your wife may have chosen to, you get into a particular role for other benefits (love of the role, satisfaction, helping others etc etc) not money, and you get paid a fair rate in that given role, then to me everybody is winning.
But to use your wifes role as an example if she is getting effectively
1 day per week No tax
2 days per week - equivalent of 20% tax
3 days per week - equivalent of 25% tax
4 days per week - equivalent of 30% tax
5 days per week - eqivalent of 35% tax
add on the extra dmg taking more days of childcare once you go over your 7.5k she is disadvantaged incentive wise to work days 4 and 5. What kind of society disadvantages those going to work??
Or equally, if her co worker only worked one day a week was under the threshhold and does not have to pay any tax. IE zero tax. so your wife is working harder and therefore she gets the privilige of kicking more in the can to make up for 1 day a week co worker kicking NOTHING in the can.
Yes the person earning 200k can contribute more and should do so, but not at a higher rate then a lower income, they should kick in 60k.
The simple fact is this country for years has been motivating people to do less by redistributing wealth to those who do less, and then as those who do less become more numerous they have more vote and continue the vicious cycle.
For the record, there is no magic with tax, you can risk a lot more claim a lot more Bull but no matter how fancy your accountant is you are taking the risk on yourself same as if you use a cheap accountant and get them to claim a **** more.
to repeat an earlier point, I agree with you that it takes all types to take the world go around, I welcome the efforts from the lowest paid worker to the highest paid worker, but the more you disincentivise working the more you will see people taking less days and working less there is no way around this.
IMO whether a child goes to day care or not isn't really going to work out for them or go against them in the long run, if a stay at home parent wants their child to socialise more they can organise play dates with other kids in there mothers / fathers groups, hang out with cousins kids etc etc.
Also my argument about everyone paying the same, isn't a personal thing, whilst I appreciate your personal circumstances, every single person on the planet from you to clive palmer can give a woe is me and make an argument for more government assistance. It is just about making payments and opportunities equal.
