If one wants to talk about Govt waste, then they should really look at the massive policy failures that the Libs badly let us down with - not just in nominal values but also in terms of costs-benefits and opportunity costs...
Their reverse-means-tested Superannuation Tax Concession scams alone totally dwarf the BER in terms of fiscal madness...
http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/tax-concessions-fiscal-madness-academic/2006... Quote:Tax concessions fiscal madness: academic
Adele Horin
July 8, 2006
THE Federal Government's huge tax concessions for superannuation mainly benefit high-income men and will soon cost as much as the total expenditure on the age pension, an economist says.
Rhonda Sharp, a professor at the Hawke Research Institute at the University of South Australia, told the feminist economics conference at the University of Sydney that Australia's retirement incomes policy was biased against women because it was linked to lifetime earnings in the workforce and associated tax concessions. "We are funding high-income men at an increasing cost to the public purse," Professor Sharp said.
The new tax concessions would exacerbate gender inequalities, contrary to the Treasurer, Peter Costello's earlier statement that he wanted to "create the most female-friendly environment in the world".
Female baby boomers will spend 35 per cent less time in paid employment than their male counterparts because of family responsibilities, and will earn on average less than men, she said.
A Federal Government report this week showed women in the forseeable future will accrue half the superannuation of men.
Professor Sharp said the push towards private provision of retirement income was based on fears of the ageing population.
It was argued that as baby boomers retired, the cost of the age pension to the Government would be unsupportable.
"The self-funded retiree is being held up as saving the Government a fortune," she said. However, tax concessions for super represented a large and growing amount of forgone revenue. Treasury's own estimates showed that before the 2006 budget the cost of superannuation tax concessions would be $19.3 billion, compared to $24.6 billion spent on the age pension.
"The cost of the tax concessions for superannuation could be expected to overtake the total cost of the government age pension within a few years," Professor Sharp said. Yet only 25 per cent of the pensionable-aged population, according to Treasury, was forecast to be self-funded retirees by 2050 - "It's fiscal madness."
Professor Sharp said New Zealand's universal superannuation scheme was women-friendly, providing 65 per cent of average weekly earnings to a retired couple, with the payment made separately to the spouses. It was not related to paid employment, and extra contributions were not given preferential tax treatment.
That was in 2006 - where the
annual waste was
approaching $20B and their subsequent 'Biggest Changes to Superannuation Ever' made matters far worse...
They were not the smartest, not the fairest, nor most cost-effective - just the smacking 'Biggest' - and those wasteful fools claimed to be good economic mangers - pffft!
If the Labs hadn't subsequently put caps on the benefits to high income earners, we would have much bigger Federal deficit and debt for right whingers to confect outrage over! smacking hypocrites!
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