How would you improve the Australian tax system?

Originally posted by joewolf: ↑

The fairest tax thats easy to collect is GST (actually although we call it GST the system we use is value added tax as its collected at each level thereby reducing risk of evasion of the tital collected) If you lok to NZ they gave a much higher rate of GST but a lower tax on income. They dont need capitsl gains tax but may well have to collect more if their government carries on spending like there us no tomorrow.

You wanted ideas. The wealthy spend way more and do try to avoid individual tax so as they consume so much more you get the best by having a high GST rate. So I would propose a rate around 14 to 15%. The increase in ratevto go to the Federal government so that you can offset the reduction of personal tax rates. Increase Tax auditing especially GST.

Welfare payments are a growing component so you have to lok at fainess. A person can get the aged pension even if their home us worth into the $millions and more. Any wealfare payment made or Hex debt should put onto an account and recovered from your estate if you hafe an estate over a set amount say $1 million. That way all aged pensioners get treated fairly.

The company tax rate should remain where it is but that government can create tax incentive areas and rebate tax there to encourage development where ut us needed or to nake Australia competitive.

It should be illegal not to declare that you have medical insurance at public medical facilities. Abolish the medicare levy but also abolish the government contribution to private health insurance. That way you force the industry to become efficient and provide a benefit that people want even the young. The risk that it should secure is the unexpected and actual risk - much like car insurance. The safety net in medicare should remain for all.

I don't agree with estate or death duties. There are already tax collections on assets anyway. The CGT tax gets the profit tax so an estate tax is really an envy tax. The person has been taxed on all income, capital gains and consumption tax (via GST) so the only reason to tax an estate is when you are envious of their achievements.

Reality suggests that the more you place into consumption the more you outsource collection. Thus freeing up the compliance to focus on systematic processes of third parties who if they dont pay it over are evaders and not mistakes.

Unless you start having a real compliance department auditing welfare claims the alternative cash in hand economy will remain a real problem. I am aware of people who wanted me to pay them cash in hand and tried to tell me that I would be saving Super contributions. Lying and cheating tax actually is cheating all those who pay tax.

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if gst is increased there must be a credit system where income below threshold pay zero gst. ie they get a refund in the form of a credit. simply because GST is a REGRESSIVE tax. i call it stupid tax. For example , in a year, a high income earner buys the same groceries as homeless joe, both pay $1040 for gst, which is 0.4% of the income by the high income earner but is 9% for homeless joe.