The Why not tax the rich? I post has some discussion about the definition of poverty. Fair enough. The problem is whether poverty should be defined in an absolute sense, or in a relative sense. The welfare lobby likes to use the relative sense. That way, as the Christian God suggests, the poor will always be with us. Those in the welfare lobby get to keep their comfy jobs in a first-world environment. Whereas if they really wanted to do something about the poor, they would move to those rather uncomfortable developing countries and take a huge pay cut too.
Jim, in comments, linked to this great BBC article.
Australia is indeed a rich country but the people living in poverty there are by no means as poor as many people living a much less wealthy country – Ethiopia, for example.
Not even the BBC (!) thinks there are poor people in Australia. I suspect the ABC would never make that statement. Here is the thing (emphasis added):
In order to make international comparisons, you need to measure poverty in absolute terms – and the most common measure of absolute poverty is living on, or on less than, $1.25 a day.
Orme says this absolute poverty measure is the best for international comparisons, “because it’s a constant across countries, it’s useful because you can look at that measurement regardless of what country you’re in”.
That BBC article also points to a recent ACOSS report into Australian ‘poverty’. There are some great graphics.
Yep – avoid ‘poverty’ by getting a job.
Be in a relationship – avoid being a single parent as best you can. Having children and getting divorced are choices.
Unfortunately ACOSS doesn’t indicate ‘poverty’ by educational status but I would add get an education (in Australia education is very highly subsidised), save for your old age (ACOSS does have data here).
The one area that I do see where lower incomes are a problem relate to disabilities. But other than that my initial point about Jenny Macklin remains:
The whole kerfuffle arose when Macklin was asked if she could live on $245 a week and said she could. She probably can’t; but that isn’t the point. Jenny Macklin, over her life, has made choices that means she doesn’t have to live on $245 a week. She doesn’t have to live on charity.
Bad choices drives a lot of ‘poverty’.
I have a number of friends who have moved to those ‘uncomfortable’ countries and are doing what they can about it. And yes, it is a vastly different thing to those who stay home and pontificate about it.
But poverty is both absolute – being able to afford to live – and relative – being able to afford to live in the society you are a part of. As societies we make choices that increase the minimum cost of living.
At the root of both is lack of access to the opportunity to provide for yourself, and capacity to do so, when higher order options break down.
Driftforge
5 Jan 13 at 11:14 am
I come from a fairly poor family, with a much poorer, much larger extended family (50 or so cousins). My observations of my family over my life definitely indicates its all about poor choices and instant gratification, being repeated over generations.
Drug and alcohol abuse, poor money management, little education, teenage pregnancy etc etc are all about poor choices and instant gratification.
Antipodean
5 Jan 13 at 11:20 am
They want to be careful, or they’ll get Finkelsteined.
sdog
5 Jan 13 at 11:27 am
“She probably can’t; but that isn’t the point”
In all due respect, I think that was the point. That at $245 per week many are turning to the Salvos etc for help, who have had an unprecedented request for assistance due to rising food and electricity costs (and rent of course).
to be honest, I don’t think Ms Macklin was making a judgment call on people’s “choices”, though obviously she doesn’t know c**p from clay.
candy
5 Jan 13 at 11:38 am
So – study well, work hard, stay married, have some kids and save for your old age.
Who’d think of such a thing, hey?
Ellen of Tasmania
5 Jan 13 at 11:55 am
You flint hearted conservative, you.
Eddystone
5 Jan 13 at 12:09 pm
Sinclair. You are mixing up 2 issues. Taxation is for punishing evil, such as The Rich, smokers, Jews etc.
It is now clear that Govt expenditure in progressive societies does not require govt income. Thus apart from moral taxes as outlined above there is no need to collect taxes at all. And, of course there is no limmit govt expenditure.
As to poverty the simplest way to help the poor would be to make it easier to employ them. Abolish the minimum wage would be a start.
Rodney
5 Jan 13 at 12:17 pm
Rodney – sorry. What was I thinking? I’m so ashamed!
Sinclair Davidson
5 Jan 13 at 12:23 pm
How can it be meaningful to measure absolute poverty in dollars given the very different cost of living in each market? Surely we should measure it in say number of litres of clean water available to each individual per day and the number of minutes it takes them to obtain it? Or grams of protein? Or the number of hours manual labour of others each individual can command?
Ooh Honey Honey
5 Jan 13 at 12:38 pm
The lefties use a definition of poverty based on discretionary income being in a certain lower percentile. This is how we end up with single parents on $550/wk welfare classed as ‘living in poverty’.
By there definition only ‘equality’ of all incomes can remove poverty.
mundi
5 Jan 13 at 1:02 pm
Ooh honey honey, the $1.25 is based on being able to buy a certain amount of rice/grain per month and a peice of cloth per year. People with that tend to live, while those not able to afford it die. The equiavlent price in Australia is probably only about $10 to $15 a week.
mundi
5 Jan 13 at 1:03 pm
Yeah poverty in Australia is a black and white TV and no iphone, just a Nokia..
Ooh Honey Honey
5 Jan 13 at 2:03 pm
Ooh Honey Honey – too harsh. Poverty is only one 42 inch plasma.
Sinclair Davidson
5 Jan 13 at 2:04 pm
Crap. I’m impoverished? My tv’s a CRT that was given to me! I refuse to spend money on a really large flat screen because it’s only a television.
“Poverty” in this country is relative.
Nilk
5 Jan 13 at 2:23 pm
Poor Nilk. I, on the other hand, am rich beyond belief! I have a Blackberry AND an iPhone!! So there.
Gab
5 Jan 13 at 2:24 pm
Surely not. I tried to give one away a few years ago and the various charities wouldn’t take it!
Sinclair Davidson
5 Jan 13 at 2:29 pm
Dude, outside of a museum, you’d be hard pressed finding a black and white TV in oz.
JC
5 Jan 13 at 2:40 pm
Nilk!
You have a CRT?
And you are a single mum?
anti ALP sarc on/ Obviously, poverty and an automatic turn to prostitution was your instant reaction to this and ’twas the welfare-state nannies of the ALP who saved you./anti-ALP sarc off
Yeah had a monster CRT bought overseas until last year, when it finally shuffled off its mortal coil after near 15 years of service. Now have a smaller flatscreen (I don’t watch much TV)
Mk50 of Brisbane
5 Jan 13 at 2:45 pm
Simple get on the Emily list.
stackja
5 Jan 13 at 3:08 pm
Catfeesh?
5 Jan 13 at 4:07 pm
Here we are defining richness as taxable income. But Robert Kiyosaki, a few years back, had a net worth of 100′s of millions of dollars but paid no taxes. Under the taxable income definition of what it means to be rich, rich people pay almost all the taxes. Since being rich is defined as having all this income that is taxable. But truly wealthy people have motherloads of assets and continuous income which is not going to be taxed.
Now Kiyosaki may be poor. But by way of having taxable income he would have been poor even when he was rich. One study of this matter didn’t come to the conclusion that 1% were doing it easy. One study had it that its about 1/14th of the bigshots that have it easy. On the other hand its rich people of all stripes that pull the money creation subsidy, as being the other half of the banks money creation racket. So we have a society where rich people tend to be massive welfare recipients.
Nick De Cusa
5 Jan 13 at 4:08 pm
One 14th of 1%. Not the top 1%. But the top that constituted an elite of one 14th of 1%. The taxable income definition forgets about such characters. There is no question that people with high taxable income are paying too much income tax. I’ve got no problem with that. Income tax rates ought to go down. But this is not the same as saying that rich people ought not pay more taxes. Two different claims.
Nick De Cusa
5 Jan 13 at 4:10 pm
My only TV is a steam-powered analogue 19″ CRT. And I don’t have cable, either.
Flew to Vail on a private jet last month, but.
Go ahead. Pigeonhole me. LOL.
sdog
5 Jan 13 at 4:18 pm
Hey, remember when Birdie was “AngryIrish” and was basically just trolling us to collect material for his blog?
sdog
5 Jan 13 at 4:30 pm
sdog…
I’m sure you went to check how the flowers are doing at the Betty Ford Alpine gardens.
Must be a hippy….
NoFixedAddress
5 Jan 13 at 5:44 pm
Only to a certain point. Someone who gets raped and doesn’t believe in abortion can end up as a single parent. And it only takes one person in a couple to initiate a divorce, so for their ex it may not have been a choice. Or alternatively there are cases of domestic violence where it simply isn’t a safe environment for one of the partners or the children. And there are other cases where one parent simply dies leaving the other as a single parent.
Chris
5 Jan 13 at 7:08 pm
I don’t think there are enough widows and orphans to justify the one hundred and thirty thousand million dollars that gets spent on welfare.
I understand there are hard luck cases and yet I’m not convinced that the enormity of the welfare state is justified.
Yes – I am happy to differentiate between the worthy and unworthy. A matter bets left to private charity.
Sinclair Davidson
5 Jan 13 at 7:27 pm
Gad, I don’t have a blackberry but I do have an iphone (3).It does what I need it to do, and refust to spend the money upgrading.
Mk50, yes, single mother with a CRT, and even get a few shekels from Centrelink. I don’t like to get into those discussions, but as far as I’m concerned if you live frugally there are ways of living on them. Sure I don’t live in South Yarra, but I still have a roof over my head.
The changes that have just come in to payments will effectively halve what I get, but since I do have a job it will make things a bit tighter but not kill me.
nilk
5 Jan 13 at 10:22 pm
Correct Sinclair. Quoting outlier examples as Chris has done, then expanding them to include all welfare recipients just proves that Chris and his ilk know it’s a con.
How much of this money goes to support a massive bureaucratic structure? my guess would be about 40% – 50%.
Winston Smith
5 Jan 13 at 11:09 pm
nilk – an iPhone? Noooooooooooooooo.
Sinclair Davidson
5 Jan 13 at 11:11 pm
“How much of this money goes to support a massive bureaucratic structure? my guess would be about 40% – 50%.”
There’s a project for a Sunday afternoon – find out for us.
Jarrah
5 Jan 13 at 11:16 pm
But those eeeeevil corporations are not paying their ‘fair’ share:
We’ve hit the point where a tiny fraction of society, both individuals and corporations, are paying for just about everything. God help us if they shut shop or decide there are fairer tax climes offshore.
John Mc
5 Jan 13 at 11:18 pm
Marriage is always a good choice, worth working on, whether a first marriage or a later one. With more marriage, there would be more and better families for kids to grow up in. It is the downgrading and denigration of marriage in our culture that has caused much poverty – poverty of the spirit and a poverty of hope and love, as well as a poverty of material things.
As the post says and the figures show, what is needed to resist poverty is a relationship and a job. When two people co-operate in marriage, a job is often more possible anyway, for one or both of them, and they do not struggle alone.
Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.
5 Jan 13 at 11:49 pm
My dad always used to say he wouldn’t mind paying taxes to support welfare payments to single mothers if only he could also enjoy the copulation that got them in the bind in the first place.
Unemployment benefits should only be a temporary measure. Six months max over a two year period before requalifying.
Splatacrobat
6 Jan 13 at 12:05 am
LOL, Sinc, I can always go back to my MotoRazr.
nilk
6 Jan 13 at 6:52 am
Sinclair et al,
An interesting article from a front line fighter of The War on Poverty .
NoFixedAddress
6 Jan 13 at 9:24 am
Fantastic – thanks for that.
Sinclair Davidson
6 Jan 13 at 9:54 am