Let's intern them all.

Let's all just go steal from pink magical money tree

He does by paying taxes, or are you unaware of them? Same as our taxes are meant to pay for our healthcare system etc.

Do you know how much money has been borrowed so far by the current government?

Already been done.

The purple one then

Wow, $30 billion HELP debt, scheduled to rise to $55 billion. That's insane, and some people don't think people should have to repay it..,

No one is pledging to take away welfare and assistance, just the dependence on taxpayer and governments limited benevolence to make ends meet.
The best west welfare is a job.

Who exactly? Some people may be for a free higher education system. But I don't think anyone believes we should just not have to pay a debt.

Has Tony Abbott gone mad?

DateMay 11, 2014
Paul Sheehan

Sweet Budget Time 2014

Budget time: a sweet time for some, much angst and bitterness for others. Rocco Fazzari and Denis Carnahan get us in tune for Tony and Joe's big night.

Is Tony Abbott mad? Or is he brave? Or crazy-brave? On the eve of the day that could permanently define or debilitate his authority as Prime Minister, these questions come to mind given the conflicting signals in the lead-up to his first budget.

Abbott would not be the first recent leader to have his clinical fitness questioned. Mark Latham was defined by anger-management issues. Malcolm Turnbull was described as a narcissist by his predecessor as leader. Kevin Rudd was described as “mad” even by former members of his own cabinet.

A strong case can be made for Abbott’s political insanity, as distinct from any petulant speculation about his clinical sanity, a game which has already worn thin. A strong case can also be made for his political bravery.

First, insanity. Few leaders in modern Australian politics have more effectively refined and repeated the drum-beat of a simple message, hammered home, than Abbott as leader and Mark Textor as pollster. Their message: Julia Gillard misled the nation. Her carbon tax was a big new tax. It would damage the economy. Abbott, in contrast, would introduce no new taxes and no surprises (other than a tax imposed on large companies to pay for paid parental leave). There would be a return to steady, prudent, predictable government.

The latitude for hypocrisy contained in this simple moral message was zero. Now, nine months after the 2013 federal election campaign, the Abbott government, based on multiple clues, will introduce a tax increase on fuel, a new tax on every visit to the doctor, higher costs for university, an increase in the income tax for the 650,000 people earning in excess of $150,000 – or perhaps the threshold will be higher (the agony over this broken promise ebbed and flowed and wobbled, right to the end).

So there goes the no new taxes. There goes no unpleasant surprises. The other dishonesty from the Coalition was to pretend the increase in budget deficits was caused by profligate spending, not by a combination of stimulus spending and a fall in receipts from the resources boom and a hit to confidence caused by the global financial crisis in 2008-09.

Add to broken promises a big dash of political bravado: increasing the eligibility age for the pension to 70, phased in by 2035, plus increasing the cost of university, and the cost of health care, plus increasing the eligibility threshold for family benefits and disability support payments and the age pension. Plenty of potential for electoral blowback in all that.

To compound the broken promises, the regressive tax hits, the false economy on doctors visits (early detection being the cheapest form of health care), and the plethora of cuts to government agencies, the biggest luxury of all, Abbott’s paid parental leave scheme, is not sacrificed even as the prime minister calls for sacrifice.

Crazy. Little wonder the opinion polls are showing a sharp deterioration in support for the Coalition.

Or crazy brave? Whatever you may think of Abbott, he is willing to accept the arrows and opprobrium that will surely come his way, perhaps even at the cost of his job in due course. He will do so because he believes it will be for the greater good, a stronger economy, healthier growth in job creation, and raise the overall productivity, participation and prosperity of women via parental leave.

To buttress the case for bravery I turn to Tony Shepherd, who chaired the National Commission of Audit on federal expenditures and income. Last week he spoke at the Centre for Independent Studies and I also had the chance to talk to him after his talk.

Asked about the contrast between Abbott’s no-surprises campaign rhetoric and the reality of a structural budget deficit – with Commonwealth spending at 26 per cent of GDP while its receipts are 23.1 per cent of GDP, a gap that would see federal debt and deficit blow out to European proportions if sustained – Shepherd replied:

“They did make one iron-clad promise: to return the budget to a sustainable surplus. And in my view that trumps all.

“I think it is something the average Australian would like their government to do … The house is not on fire but if we have another decade of deficits … ” He let that sentence trail off. He believes the Abbott government is betting that the average household understands that life is more precarious when the cost of high debt weighs down on income, and this also applies to governments.

“There is no such thing as government money; it is our money,” Shepherd said. Previous generations of Australians, and most previous governments, have acted on an implicit social compact of generational fairness, and not pushed their cost of living onto future generations.

“On page two of our report we say that every vested interest will say that this is unfair,” he said. “My response is, ‘You want everyone else to suffer, not yourself’.”

He did not accept criticisms that the commission of audit – and by implication the likely federal budget – place too much responsibility on the poor to cut costs. “We certainly tried to protect the lowest 20 per cent. We’ve tried to look after them. Many of our recommendations hit high-income earners and business.”

Whether Abbott is the mad monk his critics portray, or the man who became Prime Minister because he had guts, will be borne out by the big bet he has made. Like all prime ministers who introduce an austerity budget he is betting that a majority of the electorate will see that hard decisions on the economy, with its ageing population, need to be made, and made now, and to act otherwise is the greater hypocrisy.


Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/comment/has-tony-abbott-gone-mad-20140511-zr9io.html#ixzz31VEzWWqz

Don't these two statements mean the same thing?

lol articles like this make me laugh.

All politicians lie and break promises, but the coalition got into power riding on slogans that appealed to the baby boomers in West Sydney like "Stop The Boats" while thanking their privatized stars that the other mob were horrendously shit.

Smart voters wouldn't have voted them in for their fiscal nous.

-PB

I know a lot of people who have a $50k debt and a casual job. It could be years before they even start paying it back. It's a huge problem.

Ask 90% of psychologist graduates in the last 5 years how paying back their HECS is going and you'll be shocked.

Lack of work or not wanting to get a job to pay the HECS?

-PB

The first sentence implies we should give the poor more cash hand outs which won't go anywhere to addressing the underlying problems which create that poverty where my suggestion is we take people out of poorness by putting them into jobs and conditioning them to become self reliant rather than leaning on government. The best form of welfare is creating jobs, I'm all for lowering the minimum wage if it means more taking people out of poverty into employment. Of course any reduction in the minimum wage (we have something like the 3rd highest in the world) should be offset with lower cost of living, ie removing the carbon tax. It's interesting how many people attack America for it's minimum wage, but adjusted for purchasing power it's still in the worlds top ten highest minimum wages.

Let's give them the tools and incentive to go out and earn money to stop being poor. Let's break that cycle.

Bloody hell! Stuff is cheap in America due to the massive market and economies of scale that exist there, hence the strong purchasing power.

Personally I want to live in a country where the lowest paid worker can work 40 hours a week and still live like a human being with some semblance of dignity rather than out of their car like they do in Seppo land. Where if you don't have money you can't go to university and if you don't have insurance you can forget about any sort of medical care. It's a real Utopia the US.

Don't forget millions upon millions of illegal immigrants artificially bump up the standard of living for US citizens because they're doing all the shit menial manual labour jobs for US citizens who won't or can't do the because there's barely a sheckle in it for them..

As for the carbon tax repeal. What a joke.

The libs are going to remove the carbon tax but, and here's the important bit, keep the compensation that everyone got and as well as that they'll pay big polluters billions and billions (OF OUR TAXES) in offsets against their emissions. So instead of polluters paying us (the government) per Labours scheme the government (us) will be paying the polluters.

Yep, that'll drive the cost of living down. (It's borderline criminal.)

Did you hear on Q & A last night that Coles and Woolworths absorbed the total cost of the carbon tax and passed none of it on to the consumer? So don't count on lower food prices for one. And if you think everything is going to magically become cheaper overnight you are dreamin'.

And on minimum wage Rusty I notice you said you're all for lowering it if it brings people out of poverty. How lovely.

Would you take a 50% pay cut? Would you?

I doubt it.

Scrapping the minimum wage is a race to the bottom. Here's an example of why.

Ol' mate is 35 and has 2 kids and a mortgage and works down at the local warehouse. He pulls $25 an hour and clears $800 a week after taxes. ($1000 gross.) After he pays his mortgage, his groceries, his car rego, insurances etc etc.. he's got $50 or $100 bucks a week left over. (Or less, rough numbers for the purposes of the argument.)

Joe Hockey comes along and say hey we're going to scrap the minimum wage and let the market decide. (Or to be fair to you say's it going to be 66% of what it was.)

Ol' mate's boss says fucking beauty more money in the old sky rocket for me and comes up and says hey I need you to take a $333 a week hit to your pay because all of a sudden I can employ an 21 year old bloke on two thirds your wages.

So it's either take a pay cut or tell your story walking.

Ol mate takes the cut because, well shit, the place isn't crawling with jobs and even if he did leave it only be for lower wages somewhere else. Meanwhile the wife now has to work unless he gets a second job, the kids are going to childcare, before and after school, mum and dad are exhausted, the kids spend no time with either parent and the whole thing turns to shit.

On the plus side his kids can look forward to working until they're 70.

Fuck that.

Would you take even a one third cut to your weekly take home pay?

Bullshit you would.



Edited by munrubenmuz: 13/5/2014 11:41:08 AM

Kinda needs jobs for people to go into first.

-PB

Throw on top the changes to workplace reforms that removes a lot of rights and penalty rates and you have a very volatile situation.

-PB

omg you're gullible
find that plane yet?

Still waiting for you to tell me where it is.

I know how you hate facts and all that sciencey stuff.

http://www.smartcompany.com.au/legal/32356-the-carbon-tax-one-year-on-businesses-absorb-costs-as-politicians-squabble-over-impact.html#

I know, I know, I'm a cut and paste merchant.

you do realise that by law they're prohibited from itemising carbon costs in their invoicing to customers dont you

yes you can really trust coles and woolworths :-s :-s ;) ;)

Yay! Now we will have 433, batfink, ricecrackers and rusty all posting in this thread without providing anything other than their own opinion and general invective.

You forgot thupercoach's feelpinions, too.

you have a problem with people expressing their own opinions?
who do you think you are?

I don't mind thuper, he can actually post an argument.

When that opinion hasn't any ration thought behind it? Yes. It is one of the endemic problems with politics in Australia, too many people who cannot acknowledge when the 'other side' has got it right.

Oh, which prestigious university did you earn your master of economics? I'm guessing the University of Armchair.


Edited by rusty: 13/5/2014 02:27:05 PM