The Australian Government has recently started dishing out Free Money (in the form of one-off $1000 payment) to pretty much everyone in the country except Single People With Jobs and Couples (Without Dependent Children) With Jobs, as part of their Economic Stimulus Plan to deal with the current “Financial Crisis”.
I think it’s great that all the low income earners, struggling families, unemployed, pensioners, and benefit recipients get a free $1000 (no doubt badly needed by most of them at this time of year) and don’t begrudge them the money.
But how about kicking a little something the way of the rest of us? Even $100 or $200 would be extremely useful for most of us at this time of year (or even in general).
In fact, I’m getting increasingly annoyed that there’s almost nothing, economic policy-wise, for Single People or Couples Without Children here in Australia. The Federal Budget had all sorts of bonuses and incentives and so forth for Families, but nothing for people like my wife and I, unless we want to buy a house.
I can’t muster up the outrage for a full-on invective-laden rant, but it does bother me that the Rudd Government seems unaware that there are people in Australia who gasp don’t have kids and might still be trying to make ends meet.
So, how about some of that Free Money, Kev? Don’t forget the non-family taxpayers and voters in Australia…
Kevin is busy travelling the globe trying to solve the problems of the world. Please forward all your issues to www.msgillardstuckinthetrenches.com.au.
Someone has to pay for it…If you have a job you can pay for it . If you’re single or married with no kids than what good are you? Obviously some sort of loser who can’t attract a mate or, if married, are a yuppie scum because you have no kids so they should be hit up to pay for it.
Seriously, though…what acceptable discriminations are left? Single people and/or childless people are 2 of them…
The reason we got the money is because we are more likely to spend it here, now. Singles and childless couples are more likely groups to pour it into an overseas economy by way of a cheap flight to Bali/China via Ebay or to have enough disposable income to cover their needs so may bank it for later. That does nothing for the economy. Anybody with a kid and a December 24th deadline is a pretty safe bet as are all the poor folks getting poorer and poorer by the second as prices soar.
To set a good example for those children because you can bet they’ll have a huge tax burden to bear when they grow up. They need to see people working and working dilligently. $1000 per child isn’t allowing any parents to retire, I can promise you that. That’s roughly 0.75% of what it takes to raise a child from 0-17 in the US in a middle-class family. Source: USDA report: Expenditures on Children by Families 2007(PDF).
Families spend money, lots of it, on kids. When economists are saying consumer spending needs to stabilize to get the economy healthy again, giving money to single people or people without kids will probably let them pay off bills or save it. Giving the money to families, they’ll probably spend it. That’s the goal of the stimulus, so that’s a reasonable way to ensure the money goes back into the economy instead of into a bank account or to pay off debt.
I think the whole consumer-oriented nature of our economy is pretty fucked up and if I had a magic wand we’d all live within our means. Still, it’s hard to argue with the logic. If you want people to spend your stimulus package, give it to the people who are spending lots of money, and that’s families with kids.
Bit of a side note, but it will be of interest to see whether the one-off payments put some pensioners, especially those on part-pensions over the ‘tax threshold’ and whether the poor buggers will be slugged with a tax BILL come the end of the financial year??
Personally I’m just pissed that the government is wasting money on handouts instead of doing something useful with the money like helping prop up failing regional schools or something.
It’s supposed to be magically deposited into your bank account by the Money Pixies, as far as I can tell.
(Seriously, I think if you get a Family Tax Benefit payment the money has been/will be deposited into your account via direct debit with no further action required on your part, but you might want to check with Centrelink how it all works.)
It’s means tested anyway, so your whine about the money going to “pretty much everyone in the country except Single People With Jobs and Couples (Without Dependent Children) With Jobs” is fundamentally inaccurate. Many people with jobs are not going to get anything whether they have children or not.
My point was that if you have a job, you’re not likely to be getting any of the money anyway, so I’m not sure what you’re getting at… At any rate, I’m also rather fond of hyperbole and humorous exaggeration for effect, which I was using in my OP.
The simple fact of the matter is that rather a lot of people are getting Free Money™ from Uncle Kev at the moment, and that’s great- like I said, I don’t begrudge them the money and I honestly hope it means more people can have a decent Christmas this year. I just don’t happen to be one of the people entitled to some of Uncle Kev’s Free Money™ and frankly, a few of the people I know who are getting it don’t really need it either; certainly no more than I or my wife do.
But the Second Act of my gripe is that people who are employed in a reasonable job, and are either single or a couple without children, tend to get bugger all when it’s time for the Government to look for ways to help Australians.
Obviously it’s because they’re the group that doesn’t need the help as much as, say pensioners, but that doesn’t mean the Government can’t do things like reduce the fuel excise or upgrade the Broadband network or, better yet, eliminate ALL taxes and duties on First Homes and make the First Home Buyer’s Grant a non-means tested $25k. THAT would help a lot of people, IMHO.
Not very means tested mind you. The criterion for families appears to be “anybody who recieved any Family Tax Benefit Part A at all”. Since FTB A doesn’t cut off till around $100k (or higher) that’s a lot of families.
(intending to stick my “free money” in the bank. Why this is meant to be A Bad Thing™ kind of escapes me - won’t the bank just lend that money to somebody else to do some economic stimulating?)
I had the same argument at work today. I begrudge all of the government largess that is aimed at selected groups. A young couple well off enough to buy a new house in NSW can get about $34,000 from the government toward the cost of the place. People with kids get money in the form of cash handouts and childcare assistance.
Single people or even married childless low income couples that can’t afford a house get nothing except the opportunity to pay tax so that those better off can buy a house or raise more kids. Single divorced working people who once owned a home are in the same boat, even if they are now renting.
I used to have similar arguments with my friends who were all advocates of free university education. Never mind that we were a bunch of middle class, reasonably well off, baby boomers who went to schools where most pupils went to uni. No they thought it perfectly fine that the other kids, who went to schools where no-one went to uni, should work jobs and pay taxes to pay their uni fees.
