Troy Bowker: Labour Capital Gains Tax Is Actually a Tax On Inflation

Labour governments tend to boost inflation. Chris Hipkins now wants to tax inflation as well.

Labour’s proposed Capital Gains Tax risks taxing inflation rather than genuine wealth creation. By applying a 28% tax to nominal gains on residential and commercial property acquired from 1 July 2027, the policy would tax increases in asset values caused by rising prices as well as real investment returns.

Peter Williams: Hurricanes fans, TJ Perenara - Troy Bowker is not racist

The insipid cancel culture is doing a lot of damage to NZ.

What do we make of this carry on with the Hurricanes rugby team and one of their owners Troy Bowker? Now regular listeners to this show will know of Troy Bowker. We’ve had him on here quite often because he’s a man of ideas and opinions. We’ve had him on here talking about the capital gains tax, the hypocrisy of electric vehicle manufacture and on allowing high net worth individuals to come and live in New Zealand as long as they bring a big chunk of their money. Opinions which I thought were eminently sensible.

He’s an entrepreneur, a type A personality who takes risks and has made a decent amount of money in his time, and along the way employed a good number of people. He’s the kind of guy who, in that respect, should be encouraged in our community.

Troy Bowker: Why argument of Capital Gains Tax fairness is based on unreliable data

The Tax Working Group (TWG) used an unreliable survey by the Department of Statistics as the basis for its argument that the majority of the proposed capital gains tax (CGT) will be paid by the top 20 per cent of households measured by wealth.

Repeatedly, since the final report was published, Sir Michael Cullen has quoted the "statistic" to the media that 82 per cent of the assets that will be subject to CGT are owned by the top 20 per cent of New Zealand households measured by net worth.

He goes on to state (as factual) the second 20 per cent of wealthy households will be responsible for another 11 per cent , then only 4 per cent for "middle" New Zealand.

In reality, this information is based on what most reasonable people would describe as little more than guess work.

Troy Bowker: Capital gains tax 'valuation day' will cost Kiwi businesses billions of dollars

If the Government manages to push through the recommendations of the Tax Working Group (TWG), the 450,000 or so small business owners in this country will be hit with massive compliance costs.

Small business, meaning all sole traders and including businesses with up to 20 employees, are the back bone of the New Zealand economy.

Their contribution to our economy is enormous. Together small businesses employ roughly 30 per cent of our entire work force and contribute roughly $65 billion to New Zealand's annual gross domestic product.