What a wonderful, generous and patriotic idea that Rod Fountain puts forward (Coast Community News, January 7).
I would willingly contribute $2 a week from my part pension under the following conditions: That all businesses pay the full tax on the income that they earn in Australia and not siphon off their profits to offshore parent companies and tax havens; and that negative gearing be abolished.
Why should people who already have large incomes be allowed to borrow to buy money-making investments, and then get a tax break for doing so? I would want that all people who have received tax breaks by salary sacrificing large amounts into their superannuation schemes stop claiming to be ‘self-funded retirees’, unless they pay back the income tax that they avoided.
I would also want that religious bodies lose their tax exempt status. I am not sure that the education and brainwashing to “want and accept more, more, more” started only six years ago. It was there when John Howard squandered the tax profits of the mining boom on giving large tax cuts to middle and upper income earners to secure an election win. I am also eager to learn what the Labor Party’s “own selfish reasons” are.
Email, 15 Jan 2015
Warwick Hempel, Avoca