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Economics
- Banking & Finance
- Employment & Unemployment
- Future of Work
- Gender at Work
- Gig Economy
- Industry & Sector Policies
- Inequality
- Infrastructure & Construction
- Insecure & Precarious Work
- Labour Standards & Workers' Rights
- Macroeconomics
- Population & Migration
- Public Sector, Procurement & Privatisation
- Retirement
- Science & Technology
- Social Security & Welfare
- Tax, Spending & the Budget
- Unions & Collective Bargaining
- Wages & Entitlements
- Young Workers
- Climate & Energy
- Democracy & Accountability
- Environment
- International & Security Affairs
- Law, Society & Culture
March 2020
The Budget Surplus Objective
December 2019
Airports
November 2019
Tolerate Unemployment, but Blame the Unemployed
For the last generation macroeconomic policy in Australia has been based on the assumption that unemployment must be maintained at a certain minimum level in order to restrain wages and prevent an outbreak of accelerating inflation. Now, after six years of record-low wage growth – which weakened even further in the latest ABS wage statistics – it is time for that policy to be abandoned.
October 2019
Adequacy of Newstart – Submission
‘Everyone has the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself and of his family, including food, clothing, housing, and medical care and necessary social services’. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, Article 25
September 2019
Monetary policy is spent: It’s fiscal policy or bust
Monetary policy is recognised as being less effective as official interest rates approach zero. There are two main reasons. First, spending in Australia on investment is not very responsive to reductions in interest rates. Second, any reduction in official interest rates is mediated by the banks and other financial institutions. For practical reasons deposit rates
May 2019
February 2019
Inquiry submission: Abolish the cashing out of franking credits
Dividend imputation was introduced by the then Treasurer Paul Keating in 1987 with the aim of eliminating the so-called double taxation of company income. Under dividend imputation the individual who receives dividend income is taxed but receives credit for company tax paid by the company. Company tax paid by the company is imputed to the
January 2019
The Costs of Market Experiments
October 2018
Australia, we need to talk about revenue
Introduction The debate in Australia about the Federal Government’s Budget has too often focused on what spending will get cut to fund what tax cuts. Australia has also obsessed which Treasurer will deliver a budget surplus in which year. What has been lost in this simplistic debate is that tax is the price we pay
September 2018
Review of the rate of return guideline for energy
This submission responds to the call for submissions on the draft rate of return guidelines as set out by the Australian Energy Regulator (AER). The consumer groups have complained that the regulated entities are very profitable and attribute that to flawed methodology on the part of the regulator. We want to support that and follow
July 2018
Submission to the Senate Inquiry into electric vehicles
While electric vehicles are associated with zero emissions it is often said that they are no “cleaner” than the electricity source. It is suggested that electric vehicles using high emissions-intense sources of electricity offer little improvement and may even be worse than internal combustion engine vehicles. This argument is widespread but we argue it is
June 2018
Inquiry into the competitive neutrality of the national broadcasters: Submission
Competitive neutrality policy aims to ensure that government business activities do not have unfair advantages over private sector competitors, particularly in relation to cost or pricing advantages. Price-setting and user-charging are necessary criteria for a competitive neutrality issue to arise. These are not relevant to the ABC or SBS which provide services by which, for
Submission: Personal Income Tax
This paper examines the government’s 2018 personal income tax proposals by presenting a distributional analysis of the tax cuts and then looking at some general tax principles and considerations that we can use to assess the present proposals. We begin in the next section by outlining exactly how the government intends the tax cuts to
May 2018
National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) funding in Budget 2018
Leading up to the budget there has been a good deal of concern over the status of the NDIS, also known as DisabilityCare Australia. It is important to understand just what is going on and how secure the funding might be.
The arbitrary 23.9 per cent tax revenue to GDP figure
A new report from the Australia Institute shows the recently announced 23.9 tax-to-GDP cap is entirely arbitrary, and that a strict tax cap with no policy change will severely limit choices in Government spending. The report shows 23.9 per cent is the average tax-to-GDP ratio between the introduction of the GST and the Global Financial
April 2018
Inquiry into the BCA Commitment to the Senate
The present submission questions the Business Council of Australia’s (BCA) Commitment to increasing investment, employment and wages in the event that the outstanding tax cuts are legislated. We looked specifically at the 10 corporate CEOs who made the commitment on behalf of their companies and found some half of those paid no tax. One wonders what their commitment could possibly mean.
March 2018
Big 4 banks gift from company tax cuts: $9.5 billion
Over the ten years to 2026-27 when the total benefit to companies is estimated at $65 billion, The Australia Institute estimates the big four banks will receive a ‘gift’ of $9,500 million with Commonwealth Bank alone to receive $2,800 million.
To those that have, more shall be given
Over the last two years the average tax paid by the companies calling for the Senate to pass the tax cuts was 12.35%; half of them paid no tax last year.
Executive Pay in Australia
On the 10 year anniversary of Bear Stearns collapse, Wayne Swan, with the GFC+10 project, launches report on executive pay in Australia. GFC+10 is a research program and series of events marking the ten-year anniversary of the Global Financial Crisis. It was launched by then Economic Secretary to the Treasury in the UK, Ed Balls,
Submission: Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry
The Australia Institute welcomes the opportunity to make a submission to the Royal Commission into Misconduct in the Banking, Superannuation and Financial Services Industry. We expect the Royal Commission to be swamped by submissions that relate to specific examples of misconduct. Our submission tries to take a step back and consider the extent to which
Submission to the review of the rate of return guidelines
The Australia Institute made a Submission to Review of the rate of return guidelines. As an appendix we have attached a paper, The equity premium in Australia, that should be read in conjunction with this submission. This paper was prepared for the 2017 Conference of the Society of Heterodox Economists at the University of New
November 2017
Trump’s tax plan – Australian perspective
This paper reviews the implications of the latest Trump tax plan for Australia; in particular that part of the plan that involves changes to the company tax arrangements. The present plan would bring the tax rate down to 20 per cent at the national level. With state taxes, that means that the total American rate
October 2017
Consumer protection in the banking, insurance and financial sector
The Australia Institute made this submission to the Senate Economics Legislation Committee’s inquiry into consumer protection in the banking, insurance and financial sector. Our main concern in this submission is to look at the deeper issues and ask what are the forces that drive ‘bad behaviour’ in the finance and insurance sectors. We start with
July 2017
Electricity costs
The Australia Institute released a report Electricity Costs which finds that electricity prices have increased at three times the rate of CPI. The report finds that companies have been ‘gold-plating’ financial assets and passing those costs onto consumers. Between December 1996 and December 2016 Australian electricity prices increased by 183 per cent—almost three times the overall increase
Trusts and Tax Avoidance
A new report released today from The Australia Institute’s Senior Research Fellow, David Richardson shows that, according to ATO data, the equivalent of 21.6 per cent of Australia’s national income was run through a trust. The latest ATO figures show there are 823,448 trusts with assets of $3.1 trillion, and total business income of $349.2
Gambling on the future
The Tasmanian Joint Select Committee on Future Gaming Markets is currently considering the future of poker machines in Tasmania, including a possible reduction in the number of machines and whether to retain the monopoly position of Federal Group (set to expire in 2023). The Committee has received 148 submissions and held six days of public hearings. This paper looks
June 2017
Levy on the Major Banks
The Australia Institute welcomes the opportunity to a submission to the Inquiry into the Major Bank Levy Bill 2017 and the Treasury Laws Amendment (Major Bank Levy) Bill 2017. This submission should be read in conjunction with some earlier submissions to Senate Inquiries. In particular we refer to our submission to the Senate Economics Committee
A progressive Medicare Levy
A new report models the impact of an increased Medicare Levy in comparison to a progressive Medicare Levy, more like income tax, on the spread of Australian income earners. The Government proposes to increase the Medicare levy to 2.5 per cent of income from July 2019. That would mean a gradual switch in the tax