Our creaking tax system needs fixing, and the most equitable and quickest fix would be to raise the GST from the 10% it's been since inception, to at least 15%. Have the politicians on either side of Parliament the guts to do it? Of course not! Instead, they prefer to play off one group of constituents against another.
The easiest to play are the ones who trusted the tax system and locked their money away until retirement. If they were lucky - or, more to the point, productive enough - they may now be sittting on a multi-million-dollar nest egg which they are not allowed to touch - but the tax man can and will under Labour's proposed 30% super tax on unrealised gains!
This 30% super tax will apply from 1 July 2025 on all unrealised gains over $3 million; in fact, if the Greens, who hold a lot of votes in the Senate post-election, get their way, that threshold will be screwed down to $2 million. Taxing unrealised gains is not only unreasonable and unfair but may be impossible to pay if based on "paper profits" from real estate which doesn't generate enough income to cover the 30% tax.
Not that the authors of this unreasonable and unfair tax hadn't already thought of this by giving those whose superannuation income doesn't cover the tax the option to pay it out of their personal funds. Should we be grateful? I don't think so. Instead, we should all be mounting the barricades against such an oppressive tax. But will we? Of course not.
Because of their convict past, Australians are supposed to have their own particular brand of individualism and dislike having rules imposed on them "for we are young and free". Remember when they made seat belts compulsory? We all buckled up the next day! Remember when they brought in bicycle helmets? We all looked ridiculous the very day after.
And those of us who entrusted their long-term retirement plans to a fair and long-term tax system will be a whole lot poorer after 1 July 2025. Not that I would expect much sympathy from the hoi polloi - click here.
It just proves once again - if such proof was even necessary - that if a government is strong enough to give some people everything they want, it's also strong enough to take from other people everything they have.
P.S. If you need help with your SMSF, check out SuperHelp Australia. I've been with them since 2008, and in 17 years they've never let me down!
