On Monday 3 May our PM and Treasurer announced increased taxes on the mining industry – ostensibly to help pay for higher superannuation for all.
So far this week many $Billions have been knocked off share prices right through the materials sectors as the market digested the new conditions they must operate in. The already high risk mineral exploration industry was made even higher risk at the stroke of a pen as future profit projections must now be trimmed.
I wonder if our political masters allowed for the fact that thousands of super funds invest in the mining and exploration sector already – and their investments have taken a solid loss this week.
Anybody has the right to invest in shares so if you think the mining sector is making easy money – one answer is to invest in it. The Govt could have done that and the Govt could form a National Mining Co or buy some existing companies – if it thought it was all too easy a pathway to make money. I recall a few decades ago Labor dabbled in that area through a Cabinet Minister, Rex Connor.
Viv Forbes of the Carbon Sense Coalition has a good article on the new tax.
Apologies for my OT post.
here’s a copy of a comment of mine published in the on line Australian on 4/5
I have a number of concerns about this Govt but first and foremost is the monetary waste for which it has been responsible; Aust is number 19 of the world top 20 debtor countries; we owe $71,657,702,948.44 and the interest on that is $162 million per day; the Govt praises itself for getting Aust through the GFC in good shape but Aust would have achieved that without the wasteful splurging of this Govt; our banks were in good shape; we had a strong economy and a budget surplus; now we have one of the highest debts in the world (ahead of the USA) which had huge bank bail outs; now no 19 in the world’s top debtor nations and all this in just one term; now the Govt is spruiking itself for boosting Aust’s superannuation savings by taxing the mining industry whereas in reality it is Australian businesses large and small that will have to pay for the increased superannuation guarantee; the NBN is another disaster and boat people are arriving well ‘by the boatload’; the health reform is another case of over spruiking; there’s nothing historic about it; just a shifting of money; I’m so over this Govt;
(end of quote)
this is a Govt with a deritus of mistakes and wasted money in its wake; now looking to the miners to fund its next lot of wasteful expenditure