MiC FELS 🇦🇺⚙️🌾✏️⚖️ retweeted
The Snowy Hydro 2.0 is 12 times over budget and 8 years behind schedule. Utopia called it before it was even announced.
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"I think it will be a book of disappointment"
Kerry O'Brien on Anthony Albanese
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How long before Chairman Albanese says we have to have the digital duty of care bill passed because of the shocking attack on Helen Haines?
25%A day
71%A week
0%A month
4%He wouldn't stoop so low
28 votes • Final resultsWhat does this precedent mean for Australia's long term security?
It's not us impacted (this time), but this is a wake-up call for Australia outsourcing its own soveriegn communications and technology (including AI) to foreign private companies to save a few bucks.
Starlink is already running much of Australia's export sectors now, as Tesltra and the government sit around watching.
MiC FELS 🇦🇺⚙️🌾✏️⚖️ retweeted
Just in case anyone is wonder who these seventeen business groups are:
Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia
Australian Banking Association
Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry
Australian Industry Group
Australian institute of Company Directors
Australian Retail Council
Australian Services Roundtable
Business Council of Australia
European Australian Business Council
Export Council of Australia
Group of Eight Australia
International Chamber of Commerce Australia
Medicines Australia
Minerals Council of Australia
Property Council of Australia
Screen Producers Australia
Super Members Council
Tourism and Transport Forum Australia
Labor’s EU trade deal: 98% of our exports to the EU tariff-free. Seventeen business groups back it. Let’s get it passed. #auspol
This is why what sounds smart (to a socialist) is actually stupid
this California wealth tax thing is just incredible.
so in October 2025, a California healthcare union proposed a "one time" 5% tax on any billionaire's wealth. the ballot measure will be voted on next month. In early December 2025, California announced that it would be a retroactive tax if passed, applying to anyone with CA residency as of Jan 1, 2026. The objective is to pay for Medi-Cal, California's incredibly dysfunctional healthcare system. (which also functions as a glorified welfare apparatus, but that's a discussion for another time).
polls reveal that the CA electorate is split around 50/50 on the tax, but prediction markets only give Prop 40 a ~23% chance of passing (there are competing measures on the ballet that would nullify it).
there are 200 billionaires in CA, worth collectively somewhere between $2.3 and $2.6 trillion. 5% of that is around $100b, accounting for a small amount of attrition. proponents of the tax forecasted a significant windfall, assuming only a 10% departure rate.
supporters thought they were being clever with the retroactive concept. no billionares would leave CA in the few short months between the tax being proposed and the residency cutoff date, without the tax even having passed yet, right?
well as it turns out, they did.
a new paper [1] from two academics at Stanford called "The Net Present Value of the California Billionaire Tax Act", argues that not only did more billionaires leave due to the proposed tax than its proponents expected, but that the value of the tax, if it does pass, is actually negative.
proponents of the tax only assumed 10% avoidance, that is, only 10% of the taxable base of targeted billionaires would leave CA within the very short Oct-Dec 2025 window. Jaros and Rauh, the Stanford academics, find that a lower bound of 28.6% of the taxable base managed to leave.
just based on known departures, those departures total $577b in net worth, or $28.8b in potential tax lost. this of course does not capture everyone (many left without announcing their departure), so the authors normalize to departure rates estimated from other wealth tax events, and apply other discounts for litigation, arriving arrive at a figure of only $28-$36b in forecasted tax revenues.
but this isn't all! all of the income taxes paid by the departed billionaires are also forsaken. the authors estimate that CA billionaires pay $3.3- 5.8b in annual income taxes. they assume a midpoint of $2b lost in annual collections from departed billionaires. the net present value of that lost income stream is -$68.9 billion.
so when you add it all up you get:
+ $30b one-time tax windfall (estimated)
- $69b in present value of lost future income taxes
= - 38.9b overall net present value of the tax
of course, this analysis is highly estimate driven. the authors simulate the parameters 100k times and find a negative NPV of the implemented tax 85 percent of the time.
and if the tax doesn't pass, which it's not looking like it will, California still ended up losing at least $577b in departed net worth, and they have permanently poisoned the well with entrepreneurs who will now worry about future wealth taxes.
[1]: nber.org/system/files/workin…
From the "methane myth" to protecting landholder property rights—what more could advocacy be doing for WA producers?
WAFarmers President John Hassell pulls no punches on Episode 8 of ON WAFarmers.
Watch the full conversation: The methane myth, property rights & the NFF | ON WAFarmers Episode 8 with John Hassell
#WAFarmers #AgChatOZ #AussieAg #PropertyRights #MethaneMyth #Climate
"I want our kids to get an education, not indoctrination"
Well said @JNampijinpa
Every business owner I talk to, bar none, is fully strung out at the moment.
With the lag time of business confidence to economic downturn, we are in for hard times ahead.
Recruiting less because IR compliance and cost has got too hard means unemployment ahead.
Investing less because of the outrageous inflation on equipment, combined with high financing costs, means lower productivity ahead.
Downscaling to manage stress from all the above means reduced income, and therefore reduced tax revenue for the government.
Market failure from reduced private sector viability means government will invade the market even further - which means they will spend even more.
When small businesses struggle, Australia struggles soon behind it.
There is just no way this government has the will, the capacity or the talent to turn this careering titanic around.
Democracy fails when the majority of voters are insulated by government largesse from the true wreckage happening around them, which is the only explanation I can find for Labor continuing to get elected.
Inexplicably persecuting small business while racking up record government debt is a guaranteed path to ruin.
Who do you believe will turn it around, and more importantly, how are they going to get elected?
Replying to @Mistadamage
Add to that they have "fixed" historical data to fit the warming trend narrative.
The marble Bar heatwave has been removed from BOM history. Can be found on the wayback machine.
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