Toby Ralph April 15, 2013
Menzies House welcomes a new contributor, Toby Ralph (no relation to our Toby Jug.)
Readers should tighten their seat belts and brace for excitement on the Monte Carlo Rally of journalism with a fearless driver who laughs in the face of his critics. GC.Ed.@L.Since Labor came to power in 2007, Commonwealth debt has accumulated at an average rate of around $150,000,000 per day, including weekends. That’s about $100,000 a minute, twenty four seven.
To maintain political undertakings it is now apparently imperative to tax earnings on the accumulated life savings of people whom Treasurer Swan deems ‘fabulously rich.’
By astonishing happenstance very few of the victims of this embezzlement are Labor voters.
These soon-to-be-mugged have, of course, already been the major donors to Federal coffers. The top 1% of earners contribute 17% of all tax, the top 10% tip in 45%, in fact after adjusting for handouts, only the top 20% of earners actually top up our $120bn tax reservoir while the other 80% drain it.
Is it fair that those who have underwritten our national prosperity should now stump up even more? I think not, and have a more equitable policy alternative that Government might consider.
Kill the poor.
In contrast to the fabulously rich, the enormously poor make little
useful contribution to society. They consume more than they contribute,
putting tremendous strain on the national budget.
A modest cull would strike at the root of our fiscal dilemma. If the least productive 20% of citizens were decommissioned it would directly release a recurrent $25bn, which would almost cover overspending by the Gillard Government between now and September 14th, assuming Mr Swan maintains his long-term average rate of profligacy.
But there are other benefits. Innovative industries would spring up, creating exciting new jobs in processing camps, traffic would move faster unhampered by windscreen cleaners, streets would be cleared of pavement artists and beggars while homeless shelters in our better suburbs could be turned into agreeable gastro pubs, cafes and wine bars. Think of the inner city investment opportunities.
Were 30% of our poorest eliminated we’d become a new tiger of Asia. This bold initiative would rid us of indolent students; hapless single mums, lower order drug dealers, social workers, performance artists, Greenpeace supporters and the remaining processing personnel in our collapsing yet heavily subsidised manufacturing industries.
Hospital waiting lists would plunge, reality television would evaporate due to shabby ratings and social benefits could be distributed as a short term safety net only, with six weeks dependency triggering automatic termination in the broadest possible sense.
With an audacious and admittedly politically complex stretch target of expunging the underperforming 50% of Australians, the country would become the Switzerland of the South. Our tax rate could drop to 13%, we’d evolve into the regional financial centre successive Governments have aspired to become and there would be no need for any tax on superannuation whatsoever.
The policy would be environmentally sound. The remains of the fiscally challenged could be recycled in a more useful way, perhaps as premium pet food, or blood and bone to speed growth in new National Parks reclaimed from redundant suburbs such as Rooty Hill.
Naturally there would need to be some exceptions - my gardener, my cleaner, kitchen staff, attentive waiters, attractive airline stewardesses and some of the better limousine drivers spring to mind - but as for the rest, we need to take an uncompromising, rational and economically prudent stance.
In enacting this initiative it is important not to create a whole new layer of bureaucracy; we need systems for ready identification and neutralisation of the underprivileged. Complex asset tests would be too cumbersome, so a simple device such as the automatic elimination of anyone unable to produce a crisp $100 bill or a membership of the Chairman’s Lounge on demand should suffice.
Killing the poor is the obvious and impartial way to redress the budget imbalance.
The only other solution to raise the $900m Mr Swan’s super tax will provide over the four year Forward Estimates period would be for Government to spend within its means for six days.
And that’s clearly just daft.
Toby Ralph calls himself a marketing bloke and sometime propagandist. He has run advertising agencies, controlled or had input to more than $500m in communications campaigns and sits on several small boards. He has worked on over forty elections across three continents, including all of Australia's federal elections since 1996, when John Howard became prime minister.
Toby has also been a Special External Adviser to the United Nations. Penguin published his diary from one such project Ballots, Bullets and Kabulshit, an Afghan Election.
toby@tobyralph.com.au
http://www.menzieshouse.com.au/2013/04/kill-the-poor.html
A modest cull would strike at the root of our fiscal dilemma. If the least productive 20% of citizens were decommissioned it would directly release a recurrent $25bn, which would almost cover overspending by the Gillard Government between now and September 14th, assuming Mr Swan maintains his long-term average rate of profligacy.
But there are other benefits. Innovative industries would spring up, creating exciting new jobs in processing camps, traffic would move faster unhampered by windscreen cleaners, streets would be cleared of pavement artists and beggars while homeless shelters in our better suburbs could be turned into agreeable gastro pubs, cafes and wine bars. Think of the inner city investment opportunities.
Were 30% of our poorest eliminated we’d become a new tiger of Asia. This bold initiative would rid us of indolent students; hapless single mums, lower order drug dealers, social workers, performance artists, Greenpeace supporters and the remaining processing personnel in our collapsing yet heavily subsidised manufacturing industries.
Hospital waiting lists would plunge, reality television would evaporate due to shabby ratings and social benefits could be distributed as a short term safety net only, with six weeks dependency triggering automatic termination in the broadest possible sense.
With an audacious and admittedly politically complex stretch target of expunging the underperforming 50% of Australians, the country would become the Switzerland of the South. Our tax rate could drop to 13%, we’d evolve into the regional financial centre successive Governments have aspired to become and there would be no need for any tax on superannuation whatsoever.
The policy would be environmentally sound. The remains of the fiscally challenged could be recycled in a more useful way, perhaps as premium pet food, or blood and bone to speed growth in new National Parks reclaimed from redundant suburbs such as Rooty Hill.
Naturally there would need to be some exceptions - my gardener, my cleaner, kitchen staff, attentive waiters, attractive airline stewardesses and some of the better limousine drivers spring to mind - but as for the rest, we need to take an uncompromising, rational and economically prudent stance.
In enacting this initiative it is important not to create a whole new layer of bureaucracy; we need systems for ready identification and neutralisation of the underprivileged. Complex asset tests would be too cumbersome, so a simple device such as the automatic elimination of anyone unable to produce a crisp $100 bill or a membership of the Chairman’s Lounge on demand should suffice.
Killing the poor is the obvious and impartial way to redress the budget imbalance.
The only other solution to raise the $900m Mr Swan’s super tax will provide over the four year Forward Estimates period would be for Government to spend within its means for six days.
And that’s clearly just daft.
Toby Ralph calls himself a marketing bloke and sometime propagandist. He has run advertising agencies, controlled or had input to more than $500m in communications campaigns and sits on several small boards. He has worked on over forty elections across three continents, including all of Australia's federal elections since 1996, when John Howard became prime minister.
Toby has also been a Special External Adviser to the United Nations. Penguin published his diary from one such project Ballots, Bullets and Kabulshit, an Afghan Election.
toby@tobyralph.com.au
http://www.menzieshouse.com.au/2013/04/kill-the-poor.html
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