Upmarket, rather than attacking posters with a different point of view why don't you argue the tax's merits, there was nothing but vitriol in your post.
Plenty of people feel some kind of super profit tax is justifiable but personally I have the following problems with the policy
(1) a return over the risk free bond rate is too low for the "superprofit" threshold - it should be at a substantial premium to the bond rate to reflect the great risks in taking a project from exploration to production...do you think any returns over, say, 6% should cop the 40% tax?
(2) the 40% rate itself is excessive and is likely to spook foreign investment - it will mean many projects that would have gone ahead will now potentially be mothballed or canned altogether e.g. Olympic Dam
(3) the lack of consultation with industry - I hear Rudd is now talking to 80 companies - all well and good - the time to do this was BEFORE the announcement not AFTER - this proposed tax has already damaged Australia's reputation as a place to do business....who knows which sector will be targeted next to paper over a budget black hole?
(4) the retrospective nature of the tax
(5) the fact the revenues are put into a long term fund (as in Norway / Alaska etc) so that pollies from both sides are unable to raid it....what guarantees do we have this supertax won't be use to fund election bribes or to patch budget holes? the Future Fund has already been raided.
that's just off the top of my head - the idea if implemented more fairly and if it was preserved for future generations would have more merit, at the moment I just see it as a free kick for our competitors eg Canada, and a free kick for Tony Abbott and Julia Gillard.
