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28-02-2015, 12:20 PM
An honorable member of the Coffee Shop Has Just Posted the Following:
A tiny tax hike for the wealthy was enough for Senior Minister of State Josephine Teo to wax lyrical that “not many have the courage to raise taxes”. Well, the numbers inside Budget 2015 tells a rather different story.
The PAP government is now caught in the political dichotomy of having to meet increased social and infrastructure spending demanded by an active citizenry but yet continues to favour the corporations and the wealthy with excessively low taxes. Unwilling to go beyond a tiny tax hike but yet equally unwilling to give up the sacred cows of high defence spending and an expensive government apparatus, it is increasingly dependent on the Net Investment Returns Contribution (NIRC) from the reserves.
Let us summarise.
- The PAP’s control of the nation’s finance works by keeping the middle and lower income groups in their place, e.g. propagandise “self-reliance” to deny social entitlements.
- Excessively low taxes for corporations and the wealthy and the sacred cows of high defence spending and expensive government apparatus made the onus on regressive taxes inevitable but hurt common voters.
- Once common voters get pissed off enough to agitate for their fair share of the economic pie, i.e. more social spending in return for giving up much time, effort and money, the neat equation begins to unravel. The resulting dependence on the NIRC becomes politically untenable if it is not specifically used for social spending.
This is not to say the government is insolvent; far from it. But the changed political environment confronts the PAP with the Hard Truths that all its cherished policies contain trade-offs and consequences which can no longer be ignored. Much less a show of “courage” or “the responsible thing to do” as Mrs. Teo would have it, it is far more the PAP being pulled by the nose into the reality of democracy. And that is normal.
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/02/28...e-sg-reserves/ (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/02/28/politics-of-tax-spending-and-the-sg-reserves/)
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://sammyboy.com/showthread.php?201619-Chrs-K-on-why-Vase-Jo-Teo-is-talking-cock-again!&goto=newpost).
A tiny tax hike for the wealthy was enough for Senior Minister of State Josephine Teo to wax lyrical that “not many have the courage to raise taxes”. Well, the numbers inside Budget 2015 tells a rather different story.
The PAP government is now caught in the political dichotomy of having to meet increased social and infrastructure spending demanded by an active citizenry but yet continues to favour the corporations and the wealthy with excessively low taxes. Unwilling to go beyond a tiny tax hike but yet equally unwilling to give up the sacred cows of high defence spending and an expensive government apparatus, it is increasingly dependent on the Net Investment Returns Contribution (NIRC) from the reserves.
Let us summarise.
- The PAP’s control of the nation’s finance works by keeping the middle and lower income groups in their place, e.g. propagandise “self-reliance” to deny social entitlements.
- Excessively low taxes for corporations and the wealthy and the sacred cows of high defence spending and expensive government apparatus made the onus on regressive taxes inevitable but hurt common voters.
- Once common voters get pissed off enough to agitate for their fair share of the economic pie, i.e. more social spending in return for giving up much time, effort and money, the neat equation begins to unravel. The resulting dependence on the NIRC becomes politically untenable if it is not specifically used for social spending.
This is not to say the government is insolvent; far from it. But the changed political environment confronts the PAP with the Hard Truths that all its cherished policies contain trade-offs and consequences which can no longer be ignored. Much less a show of “courage” or “the responsible thing to do” as Mrs. Teo would have it, it is far more the PAP being pulled by the nose into the reality of democracy. And that is normal.
http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/02/28...e-sg-reserves/ (http://www.tremeritus.com/2015/02/28/politics-of-tax-spending-and-the-sg-reserves/)
Click here to view the whole thread at www.sammyboy.com (http://sammyboy.com/showthread.php?201619-Chrs-K-on-why-Vase-Jo-Teo-is-talking-cock-again!&goto=newpost).