Ol fart, I too am now on a fixed income, I can't say as I like it either, but if any govt were to bump up pensions to a level where those receiving it were wealthier and so on, where would the money come from? We are already deeply in debt as a nation, everyone hated the asset sales but that money has offset some massive spending in healthcare and education without increasing our debt, but to increase pensions to the comfortable lifestyle option, where would that money come from?
For a start, I would say it would need to be asset tested, anyone with an income from investments over say the median income would not get a pension, and all others would get a pension sufficient to raise them to that level....sound ok to you? Great, so why bother to save at all? And where do you set the median level....once you have increased the lowest earners up to what was the median, it is a constantly shifting bar.
But still, the cost would be enormous, and we do not have a productive population large enough to pay for it.
You would need to cut....what? Working for families to be axed? All this bs about the rich not paying enough, when those on lower incomes with families actually get back their tax contributions in credits from the working for families program, their net contribution to the tax pool is nil. But cuts to this would place poorer families in very hard times. Childhood poverty (another line of bs) would skyrocket, in order to increase pensions.
How about clamping down on stuff like the DPB? make the new rule from now on that one unsupported child to a single parent can get social welfare assistance, but no more for any subsequent kids. All those mothers with multiple kids to frequently multiple fathers would sure squeal then, and there would again be some real child poverty then. So that can't happen.
Cut spending on education? Increase the need for student loans so that instead of the govt paying 50% of the courses and supplying interest free loans, those students need then to pay their educations more fully, and with loans at commercial rates, so we can free up that massive slice of tax spending to increase pensions? I don't think so, the riots would cripple the country.
Ok, so education can't be cut....next guess is the spend on health care. Hah! That will really nail one group badly....pensioners! So that is a no go too.
So, no major cuts to any major taxpayer funded programs are really possible without massive social dislocation (and political suicide) ...so the only option is obviously to raise tax rates, obviously only for those richb astards,
Anyone earning over...ummmm, let's say 80k a year are obviously wealthy, so let's just nudge their income tax up a little, say to 40%. Sound fair? And if they are getting over 100k, then those rich swine can pay even more, let's make that 50%. In the interests of fairness of course.
Do that and just watch the economy collapse as anyone with any brains and income earning potential flee to somewhere where they can actually make and keep some money.
Everyone wants the gummint to pay more for their own version of the most needy. Pensioners. The poor. Young kids, school kids and students. Solo parents. Universal medical care. Free education. Environmental action such as banning dairy farming and stopping commercial fishing. No mining at all ever. No logging at all of native wood.
Just where the hell is any govt, national, labour, green, manamarxist, conservative, whoever, ever going to find enough money to please everybody? Ain't gunna happen.
It is only my overwhelming natural humility that mars my perfection.
Captain Asparagus, Superhero, Adventurer.
Capt Asparagus wrote:
. The shift in the average age of our population is a major challenge.
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