Prosper Australia

Dr David Headon has put together a revealing document entitled ‘Those Other Americans’ to celebrate Canberra’s early history and their upcoming 2013 centennial. This is a superb introductory document to Georgism (and Australia’s early history), with many references to the influence of Henry George throughout. Griffin’s New Nationalism As early as September 1912, in a [...]

photo credit: Fabrice ROSE The Senate Select Committee on New Taxes is pondering the implications of the Mineral Resource Rent Tax, holding a hearing yesterday in Perth. Here is a new tax measure that, even diluted for the election, will still raise over $10 billion a year. This is a beautiful tax: it doesn’t distort [...]

photo credit: itmpa Last week Treasury made public its Red Book – the economic advice it gives to the incoming government. In it, Treasury lays out a big, bold reform agenda.  On housing, the Red Book is scathing: “Access to adequate housing affects all Australians and is integral to a decent life. It is part [...]

photo credit: Grégory Tonon   This week’s backdown by the federal labor government on the Mineral Resource Rent Tax will cost Australian taxpayers $35 billion over the next ten years. The shortfall in government revenues will be made up from taxes on work and taxes on business.  That means it is coming out of your [...]

“Gillard must come out strongly and call the lobbyists for who they are. She must assert control over the RSPT rather than negotiate with each and every individual company.

    photo credit: Schaffner Sometimes the ignorance of experts makes my blood boil.  Why can’t they do the arithmetic, the sums plainly before them? The Victorian Transport Plan will cost $38 billion and produce benefits of $180 billion, according to a state-commissioned report by Ernst and Young.  If these numbers are right, the Plan [...]

photo credit: loungerie The Henry Tax Review recommended a resource rent tax to the Australian government, carefully designed to maintain incentives and reward risk. The miners responded with apoplexy and a campaign of deliberate misinformation that has left the economically literate gobsmacked. Let’s get a few things straight.  Searching for ore-bodies is not done by [...]

photo credit: jcarter   The Commonwealth of Australia was built on the sound principle natural resources are part of every Australian’s endowment. The Henry Tax Review recommended and the Rudd government has accepted a new tax system for mining that builds on this idea.  The Super Profits Resource Tax (SPRT) provides the community a share [...]

photo credit: 10b travelling   Clear-eyed media commentary in the national interest is rare and sweet. Alan Mitchell’s analysis of the Henry Tax Review in the Australian Financial Review -  A tax on all your economic rents  – is such a creature. He opens with a broadside at entrenched interests pretending the changes will affect the economy: [...]

  photo credit: raminders We follow the glitter of celebrities and our football teams and let others do the dull work of government. Our dreams are about homes, cars and holidays. But sometimes an issue is so important it deserves our undivided attention, if only for a short while. The big issue is tax – [...]