Dear Sir/Madam,
In connection with State taxation, I support:1.
2.
abolishing the various inconsequential and inefficient State taxes to which “Securing Victoria’s
Future Prosperity” alludes.
reducing payroll tax and stamp duty on conveyances, in favour of increases in land tax.
As Victoria currently relies less upon the tax shown to be the most efficient, i.e. land tax, than other
states do, it stands to reason that Victoria’s payroll taxes and stamp duties therefore grant a basis
for superior economic performance to the other states.
Victoria has failed, almost certainly to its disadvantage, to act upon earlier reports (viz, by Fordham
and Harvey) which also pointed to the efficacy and efficiency of land taxes. It has become something
of a fad to wind back land tax comparative to other taxes, presumably as a sop by weak politicians to
voluble real estate interests. Therefore, there is enormous scope to seize this opportunity to reform
what has become a bad application of an excellent principal by:1.
2.
bringing a greater number of properties into the land tax net.
removing exemptions, thresholds, multiple rates and aggregation provisions relating to land
tax – as the wealthy own more properties than the poor and middle class, and the most
valuable properties anyway – a flat rate in the dollar will therefore pick up wealth differentials
nicely.
The website www.thedepression.org.au forecast the current global financial collapse in 2001 (here).
It saw it as a natural corollary of the west’s inadequate capture of the economic rent of its lands,
society’s surplus product, for revenue. By providing Victorians with the right tax signals instead of
permitting land rent to be privately capitalised into skyrocketing land prices, the government would
be setting Victoria on a far more productive course than it has done in recent years.
Bryan Kavanagh, AAPI