Media Release
“We have the means at hand to liberate the citizens of our great country from their current financial difficulties,” Prosper Australia’s Karl Fitzgerald said today. “The answer lies in reforming our tax system.
A major petition to the Australian Parliament calling for the reintroduction of a Federal Land Tax is currently being circulated by Prosper Australia.
“While voters await the release of Ken Henry’s Tax Review, it is worthwhile to consider the enormous economic benefits this reform offers Australia.
“Taxing land will provide real incentives to spur land use to the best and highest purpose. That means a boom in investment and vastly improved access to land for all – a tidal wave of economic progress.
“The Great Australian Dream of home ownership – now impossible for a whole generation of Australians – would quickly become reality.
“It is impossible for me to overstate the potential benefits of re-basing tax onto land holding. Yes, this means introducing a tax, but many others can and would be eliminated.
A Federal Land Tax would allow the halving of income taxes, the end of the much hated GST and the elimination of around 123 other regressive, unfair and exemption-riddled tax mechanisms.
It must be noted that Prosper Australia’s call for a Federal Land Tax is not a proposal to increase the government’s tax revenues as a proportion of GDP or its powers or to advance the interests of any group over another.
“We value that Australia is a low tax country and want it to stay that way. Land Tax aims squarely at further improving our quality of life through discouraging the hoarding of land by attaching a cost to it.
Fitzgerald called on all Australians to sign the petition, in the interests of an equitable and just society.
“Land Tax is beautiful. It is impossible to avoid, is transparent to all and cheap to collect,” Fitzgerald concluded.
The petition and background information can be found online at www.prosper.org.au
Media Comment: Karl Fitzgerald (03) 9670 2754
