Whilst Australia newspapers are blaring the headline, "Australians flattened by biggest Tax Increase in World", if you look at the OECD figures released yesterday from its publication called, "Taxing Wages" (where that Aussie headline was sourced) it reveals a startling fact. Whilst Australia had the biggest increase in the tax wedge (i.e., the amount of taxes taken from your wage as a proportion of gross wages) for the average worker out of 40 developed countries (NZ is third highest) when it comes to families, NZ had the largest increase of all. If you look at column (4) in Table 2 below, the annual change in the 2022-23 year in the Family Tax Wedge in NZ was over 3%, with Poland second at 2.8%.
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So what's going on? It was all due to tax bracket creep. The Worst Prime Minister Ever & his side-kick Finance Minister, Grant Robertson, hiked family taxes by more than any other developed country by throwing hard-working Kiwi families into higher tax brackets. Why was this happening? Since our out-of-control money-printing Reserve Bank engineered high inflation (and a recession), which eroded our standard of living and pushed more salaries into being over $48,000 (so starting to pay taxes at a rate of 30%) and over $70,000 (so starting to pay taxes at a rate of 33%), and so on. Of course our higher wages didn't keep up with inflation, even though we were being taxed more on them.
Former PM Hipkins & Finance Minister Robertson, now VC of Otago University on $629,000 per annum and so insulated from the problems of ordinary people, punished hard-working Kiwi families, reducing their incomes by more than any other country, as they tried to trick us into thinking our taxes were not being raised, whilst doing the opposite with insidious tax-bracket creep. Why is the MainStreamMedia not featuring this fact on its front pages? Since it makes the previous Ardern-Hipkins-Robertson Labour government look awful - terrible managers of NZ's finances - and vindicates National's decision to reverse the effects of tax-bracket creep by giving tax relief to Kiwi Families, which the Main Stream Media has attacked. Why Big Media declared war on decent families that make up the backbone of NZ & won't recognize our new democratically-elected government as legitimate - even as it begs it for a bail-out - is beyond me.
Sources:
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/australians-flattened-by-biggest-tax-increase-in-world-20240425-p5fmgf.html
https://www.oecd.org/tax/tax-policy/taxing-wages-brochure.pdf
Professor Robert MacCulloch holds the Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics at Auckland University. He has previously worked at the Reserve Bank, Oxford University, and the London School of Economics. He runs the blog Down to Earth Kiwi from where this article was sourced.
Former PM Hipkins & Finance Minister Robertson, now VC of Otago University on $629,000 per annum and so insulated from the problems of ordinary people, punished hard-working Kiwi families, reducing their incomes by more than any other country, as they tried to trick us into thinking our taxes were not being raised, whilst doing the opposite with insidious tax-bracket creep. Why is the MainStreamMedia not featuring this fact on its front pages? Since it makes the previous Ardern-Hipkins-Robertson Labour government look awful - terrible managers of NZ's finances - and vindicates National's decision to reverse the effects of tax-bracket creep by giving tax relief to Kiwi Families, which the Main Stream Media has attacked. Why Big Media declared war on decent families that make up the backbone of NZ & won't recognize our new democratically-elected government as legitimate - even as it begs it for a bail-out - is beyond me.
Sources:
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/australians-flattened-by-biggest-tax-increase-in-world-20240425-p5fmgf.html
https://www.oecd.org/tax/tax-policy/taxing-wages-brochure.pdf
Professor Robert MacCulloch holds the Matthew S. Abel Chair of Macroeconomics at Auckland University. He has previously worked at the Reserve Bank, Oxford University, and the London School of Economics. He runs the blog Down to Earth Kiwi from where this article was sourced.
5 comments:
The real enemy of 'we the people' is the state.
Hipkins worse than Ardern ?
Ardern destroyed democracy in NZ, Hipkins destroyed our financial situation, which at least can be rescued.
Democracy may never be fully recovered, especially with Luxon in charge.
Goldsmith will take over the Broadcasting portfolio. Expect " no waves."
If Luxon is hoping to appease the MSM and receive better media coverage, he must de delusional.
The MSM is firmly in the Opposition camp - and determined to bring down the Coalition.
Whilst I get your point in this article, the honour of worst prime minister EVER in New Zealand goes to Chris Hipkins' predecessor. I can't even abide writing her name. She was absolutely the most hideous leader to have walked the corridors of the Beehive. That woman never had the interests of this country within her, she was a self-serving, self-centred, attention-seeking, lover of herself, and was only interested in how she appeared on the world stage. My disdain of that woman knows no bounds. As the worst ever PM, she led the worst ever government this country has ever had the displeasure of suffering through. I think my point is clearly made.
According to the latest tv1 poll, a majority of New Zealanders now want a return of the worst government we have ever had. Is this because the current Coalition are putting up too much window-dressing with not enough substance, or is it because every year that goes by, produces more & more of the indoctrinated generation, who believe the planet can only be saved by Marxist Communism ?
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