The Treasurer has just done the books for Australia and many of you will be preparing to do your own as the end of the financial year approaches. Don’t forget that all donations of $2 and above to The Australia Institute are tax-deductible.

Independent ideas can only come from independent funding. While you will be aware of the Australia Institute’s research, you might not know that we do not receive any recurrent funding from any level of government.

Our reliance on a wide funding base means that we can continue to conduct research into areas that powerful groups would prefer we left alone. For example, having highlighted that Australians spend three times more on superannuation fees than they do on bank fees the Institute proposed a radical change to the operation of the Australian superannuation system. We are proud to say that our radical suggestion forms the basis of the Government’s new ‘My Super’ proposal which is tipped to save Australians billions of dollars in fees.

Our work on climate change continues to influence the policy agenda. The argument in our recent paper The industries that cried wolf that the big polluters were exaggerating the impact of a carbon price on their financial viability and downplaying the role of exchange rate movements was recently taken up by the Treasurer. We hope the work we are doing to inform the upcoming tax summit will be similarly influential.

In addition to this, we will continue our work on welfare reform, the need for stronger consumer protection legislation and the need to rein in executive salaries.

The Australia Institute is Australia’s largest progressive think tank, but with a very small annual budget we are financially outgunned by the big conservative groups, yet our track record shows that we really do conduct research that matters.

So if you’ve enjoyed receiving Between the Lines, please consider donating as we can only continue to do this work with support from people like you.

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