Dear Editor,
Re: BCA: 56 taxes a company curse (The Age “Business Day” 10/4/07)
We hear low overseas wages given as the reason our manufacturers cannot compete with Chinese imports, but we don’t hear of the penalizing effect of the multitude of taxes on our manufacturers. It would be surprising if Chinese manufacturers were similarly penalized. Production wages form only a small proportion of the price paid by the public for overseas products, particularly in these days of automation.
The joint Business Council of Australia and Corporate Tax Association call for a comprehensive review of federal and state business tax arrangements, should receive wide support, however, removal of a number of charges, such as payroll tax, should not await completion of such a review, whilst we have an escalating $500 billion foreign debt, with no end in sight and manufacturers disappearing almost on a weekly basis. These penalizing taxes on production should be replaced with realistic community resource charges on the use of land and all other finite resources including forests, water, oil, gas, minerals and the electro-magnetic spectra.
Yours sincerely,
David Barkley
