u/AsparagusNew3765

Australia is one of the small number of countries that does not allow families to pool income and assets for tax purposes. (It does pool income and assets for income and asset tests for claiming government welfare though - funny, that 😉)

This means that of you have 2 families (say 2 parents and 2 kids), both families have the same income of $160,000, but in one family this is earned by 1 parent and in the other family both parents earn $80,000) the former family pays FAR more tax than the second family despite having exactly the same gross income.

Instead of fixing this and aligning more with what other countries do, the 30% minimum is a move even more extreme in the other direction.

Keep seeing the mistake being made again and again. The discussion normally goes like this: "The 30% minimum on capital gains tax is great because this is just the same as what a low-income person earning $45k would pay!"

Except this is false. A person earning $45k through work pays 30% *marginal* tax. Their *total* tax % is far less than this.

A zero-income person such as a stay at home parent earning $45k through a capital gain would pay 30% *total* tax despite having the exact same income as the last person.

Edit: A user below crunched the numbers:

"Someone earning $45k wage: Tax is $4288+medicare

Someone earning $45k cap gains (under new proposed min tax, on post 1/7/27 gains): Tax is $13,500+medicare."

So there you have it. An unemployed person/early retiree/stay at home parent/person taking time off work, who sells their shares to make a capital gain, pays over triple the amount of tax that a person earning the same income through work would pay.

Just renewing my CTP and trying to find the best price and it asks "Has the registered owner and/or driver of the vehicle incurred any demerit points in the past 3 years and 4 months"

I am the registered owner, I am the main driver* and I have 0 demerit points but the car is also driven by my spouse, who has a couple of demerit points for speeding

*I would estimate I do about 70% of the kms and my spouse does 30% of the kms on the car

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Update: think I have resolved it. The above question was on the NSW green slip price comparison website. But when I went on to the website of an individual insurer the question was more specific - it said "does the main driver have any demerit points". So I can happily answer no to this and save about $200 on the policy. That's good

I know a lot of middle-income families where usually one parent works full time and the other parent is a stay at home parent and/or works part time. Under the old CGT system they were allowed to make investments in shares in the name of the lower income parent to benefit from lower tax. Now correct me if I'm wrong but the same family will now pay 30% tax whereas they could have been paying as little as 0% tax before if they sold their shares within their tax free threshold?

With all the discussions recently about the massive increase in CGT on shares, something that has frustrated me reading a lot of the discussion is people thinking it's an "all or nothing" situation.

With the proposed changes to CGT, a middle income Australian (e.g. $90k-130k/yr salary) investor who has stock market investments, will pay one of the highest CGT in the entire world. This is a bad idea and unfairly punishes people who are just trying to improve their life situation.

But it doesn't have to be like this. For example the UK has a program called a Shares ISA which allows people to invest a maximum of around $40,000/year and the capital gains are tax free. Of course, most people don't hit the limit, but it gives an incentive for people to start investing while also not being much benefit to billionaires because to them it's just crumbs. It's not perfect, but you get a bit of the best of both worlds. Lots of other countries do similar things. Something to consider.

Visiting from the UK. Just cycled from Thirroul down to the lighthouse. Great cycle paths, everything clean and well maintained, the blue ocean, the escarpment, watching the surfers, joggers, yoga groups, all the bustling cafés, delicious food and coffee (got a burger - never seen beetroot on a burger before but it's surprisingly good..). Lots of eye candy on the coastal path too 😂. Great weather. Today was a good day

Calculating the rate of inflation isn't a hard science. The CPI is just one method of calculating an estimate of inflation (among many other methods). Things such as hedonic adjustments are used (among other subjective factors). This means that for example if a TV costs $1,000 but $1,100 the next year, but is slightly bigger or with a higher quality picture, they may actually decide that the effective price of that TV *decreased* despite the fact that the actual price went up by 10%.

All of this is to say that calculating inflation isn't a hard science, and many economists believe that governments tend to put pressure to underestimate the rate of inflation as it is often hugely in their favour to do so (for example, inflation-indexed pensions, inflation-indexed bonds, etc).

By linking CGT to inflation, we have another incentive (on the already huge pile of existing incentives) for the government to underestimate the rate of inflation even more. So while the "true" societal rate of inflation may be e.g. 4%, the government calculates it to be e.g. 3%, and you will pay taxes based on the lower number (making you worse off). I don't know if this effect has a formal name - maybe something like "inflation-estimation drag"

Started working in construction 2 months ago, 29M. On one of my first days was putting up about 80m of temporary fencing (the type with the rectangle-shaped concrete feet with the circular holes you slide the fence panel into). Each concrete foot felt like a slog to lift and carry and the panels were also heavy and awkward. Well today I took down the same fence and it was so much easier. Bit of a pointless thread I know, but any similar stories 😅

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Objects on road, crash ahead, police ahead, roadworks, etc.

The internet says that Waze is owned by Google and they merge all the user reports from Waze into Google Maps. But I feel like when using Google Maps I get a lot fewer user reports

Do they use the same data set? So if someone reports something on Waze, it will go through to Google Maps? I know Waze was purchased by Google and they imported the Waze feature of user reports.

I've used both recently and I feel like I get more user reports with Waze although it might just be my own bias

(For any curious Aussies that clicked this thread and want to know. The UK student loan system is that you need to pay 9% of your gross income above a certain amount, known as the "repayment threshold". Usually around the $60,000 area)

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The repayment threshold last year was around £32,000. I just checked, expecting this year to be around £33,000-£34,000, because cost of living is increasing so much.

Not only have they not increased it, they've **dropped ** it to around £27,000. Which raises the amount that we all pay every month (for those that even pay it).

It's so disgusting - we were promised the repayment threshold would rise in line with the cost of living. Obviously not. Liars

What do you all think about overseas student loan repayments in general - I know a lot of people just ignore the threatening emails and letters.

I am already struggling and really cannot afford these extra repayments.

Every single time I go in there is some drugged up crackhead ranting and raving about something or asking for free shit "I get paid tomorrow I'll pay you back"