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The Forum > Article Comments > Is indexation of fuel excise good policy? > Comments

Is indexation of fuel excise good policy? : Comments

By Alan Davies, published 7/11/2014

Labor and the Greens should send a signal to the electorate that essentially administrative policies like indexation should be above political opportunism.

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Indexation of fuel tax is stupid because it is a driving factor pushing up cost of just about everything, causing more inflation, adding to cost and inability or choice of consumers to consume.

Australia is a big country. There is much greater distance between essential destinations travelled to buy supplies.

Fuel excise is not the fundamental problem.
The fundamental problem is the shortage of cash.
Shortage of cash suit the finance industry because it forces more and more people to borrow money and pay interest.

It is the pockets and purses of people that need stimulus.
Banks in Australia are raking in billions.
Inflation suits the banks that thrive as they deal in bigger and bigger numbers.

Indexation of bank profit would be a better way to fund government than adding the burden of fuel tax onto everyday and would be if they could be consumers.

I think the best solution is to develop new productivity focussed on export.
Significantly expansion of the Australian dairy industry could result in more and more milk protein export on a scale similar to that now creating a virtual boom for the New Zealand economy. Australia is supposed to be a food producing nation.
Aquaculture could be harnessed in wild fish production, marine-culture instead of having production and feed cost using cages and tanks.
Quality timber and QUALITY steel production could generate and save significant export revenue.

Indexation of fuel is not good policy because there are better alternatives for government to generate essential revenue.

Instead of selling the farm and draining cash away from consumers to 'balance the budget'.
Posted by JF Aus, Saturday, 8 November 2014 7:46:30 AM
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Yes JF Aus I agree we have allowed the banks to run wild, & they should be tamed. When I was a boy they paid 3.25% on savings account deposits, & housing loan interest was capped at 4.5% I think it was. Only loan sharks charged 8% on loans.

I don't know how much you know about the dairying, but around here it is just a slow way to go bankrupt. We have just one of 12 left, A 4Th generation farm. When the 88 year old father can no longer help, it will close, as even with 300 cows, it is not viable if any labour is required.

I gave up trying to do anything useful on the land years ago. I was trying to breed better cattle, but found plants for the nursery trade was the only thing that paid the bills.

I have watched them all go. Hell even a very hard working Vietnamese family gave up market gardening. The land stops being worked when the father retires. Kids won't work so hard for so little, as their fathers did.

Some people are still running cattle, but really only because they don't know how to stop. Most of them love it too much to stop anyway.

One neighbor, who still farms makes most of his income doing repairs for hobby farmers on their 10 acre blocks, was telling me his net last year was just $13,000. His kids wanted him to give up, but he wasn't quite ready yet.
Posted by Hasbeen, Saturday, 8 November 2014 10:11:24 AM
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Hasbeen, a good example is a clothing manufacturer, that took on Asia and won.
Computer assisted cutting was just the start, and direct sales to customers who found it difficult to buy of the shelf, another.
Their vital details were filed and routinely undated, and when they asked for this or that from the catalog, it was delivered in days, and made to measure/perfect fit/fair price.
Today we are still in some cases rolling out an NBN, which should assist more of these direct sales/entrepreneurial approaches!
And a simple unavoidable stand alone expenditure tax, would quite dramatically lower the average tax burden and relieve it of the unproductive parasite class, who seem to think the world and complexity owes them a living!?
We have profit demanding importers, who make Asian sourced textiles and footwear, nearly as expensive as that we used to make here.
And others live off of widows and mums working all hours, at piece work, in their garages, for the garment trade!
And which farmer do you know is waxing fat supplying wholesalers or grocery chains?
Not so at any farmer's market dealing direct with the public, where both are better off!
Typically you refuse to see the big picture, but like a nit picking housewife, want detailed minutia!
And just for the sake of argument and winning, which is all that seems to matter to you!?
I would have thought a man in your position would have loved a substantial reduction in tax related costs, and all for farmers markets, on the grounds they make farmers just like you claim to be, price fixers, as opposed to price takers!
And trade painters just love buying direct from a Melbourne manufacturer, and for half what they used to pay the shop owner!
A very wise man once said, "at some point complexity always becomes fraud"!
Rhrosty.
Posted by Rhrosty, Saturday, 8 November 2014 10:27:58 AM
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Hasbeen, my definition of an underprivileged whinger is one who openly accepts the gifts provided by others (welfare) then whinges because it's not enough. Then, as if that's not enough egg on face for the contributor, they then have the hide to shot them down for what they have achieved. People have to understand that fir every dollar they draw from the system, someone else has earned a high income to pay that net dollar in tax.

As fir our situation I share your concerns that we are headed fir a train wreck, and it's my opinion that the only thing that will save us is a better, more efficient and fairer tax system. I just hope it's not another case of too little too late if and when they do act.

As for the banks they are legalized criminals in that the only reason they exist is because of other people's money, as they borrow this for pittance, then lend it to make billions. Talk about super profits, but notmone mention about a super profits tax from that sector.
Posted by rehctub, Saturday, 8 November 2014 10:32:47 AM
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I'm sure buying direct from a factory is great for painters who live & work close to that factory, but not much use for one 100 kilometers away.

I have mentioned some of the economics of this before. I had to switch to importing an Item I used to make for $7.00, when competitors started importing copies from Taiwan.

I could land the item into store for $2.00 made to my specification. So the machinery gathered cobwebs. I hated it as much as you probably do, but the brass to make the thing cost $4.00 here in Oz, before manufacturing & chrome plating costs.

That was not the worst of it however. It cost me $13,00 average to send the damn things to our wholesaler in WA. It cost $18,00 each to send just a few to a builder or retailer in WA.

Perhaps it is the truckies, or the truck companies you should hate.

Even more, you should hate the unions that destroyed our coastal shipping industry, with ridiculous pay & conditions for ships crew, & wharf laborers.

In the early 70s a mate, a sparky on coastal shipping, told me he had just seen his job die, in the arbitration commission. The judgment meant no new ships would enter the trade, as it could no longer be viable. How right he was.
Posted by Hasbeen, Saturday, 8 November 2014 10:55:38 AM
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Hasbeen,
The milk quota buy-up comes to mind.
Compare the milk industry in Australia to the following, we could be living of a different planet.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/companies/fonterra-ramps-up-china-dairy-hubs/story-fn91v9q3-1226985276574

There is even history of the boom in milk industry development in Pakistan and Bangladesh but not Australia.
http://www.tetrapak.com/about-tetra-pak/food-for-development/dairy-development

Australian farmers lack government assistance.
In fact government and media is hindering Australian farmers in general by keeping them dumbed down about collapse of whole world ocean protein sustainability and need and opportunity to produce affordable alternative supply, such as from milk.

It seems it's easier to increase tax than to understand and develop relevant opportunities.
Posted by JF Aus, Saturday, 8 November 2014 2:49:38 PM
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