ssmagus posted:

Who the gently caress uses hommus as a sauce?

quote:

The Reserve Bank has expressed concern about negative gearing and the tax concession for capital gains, saying any change that discouraged negative gearing might be "a good thing" from a financial stability perspective.

Labor has come under sustained attack from the Coalition for promising sweeping changes to Australia's negative gearing and capital gains tax regime to save $32 billion over 10 years.

But an internal bank memo released under freedom of information laws runs counter to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's warnings that Labor's proposal to ban negative gearing except for new properties would deliver "a massive shock" to the property market.

Mr Turnbull repeated those warnings on day one of the campaign, saying that Labor's policy would hold back the Australian economy.

The Reserve Bank memo says negative gearing and capital gains tax rules affect property more significantly than other investments "as it can be purchased with higher leverage than shares".

A move against negative gearing, the memo says, would trigger a large-scale sale of negatively-geared properties "only if the changes were not grandfathered".

Labor's policy plan would grandfather its changes, meaning properties that are negatively geared would remain so until they were sold, preventing a rush of sales as negative gearers offload homes.

The memo is a "Q&A" brief dated December 2014, meaning it was written before Labor announced its policy to wind back negative gearing and before the government pledged to continue it.

Since the December 2014 memo Sydney house prices have climbed a further 11 per cent. Loans to investors account for 46 per cent of all money lent for housing.

The Coalition has positioned itself as the protector of Australia's existing negative gearing and capital gains tax regime, which it argues is largely used by average, "mum and dad" wage earners, and signalled its willingness to launch a scare campaign over the issue.

But Labor argues its proposed changes will improve housing affordability, particularly for first home buyers, while also improving the budget bottom line.

In Brisbane on Monday, Mr Turnbull stepped up pressure over Labor's capital gains tax policy as he described it as an attack on all investments and said it would make Australians invest and employ less.

"Bill Shorten wants to have less investment in Australia, can you believe that? He wants Australians to invest less and if they invest less, they'll employ less. That's why he is putting up the tax on capital gains. That's why he is seeking to ban negative gearing, standing in the road of entrepreneurship," he said.

Last week, Mr Shorten said he could not understand why the Turnbull government "was happy to give a tax cut to a millionaire, happy to give a tax cut to a billion dollar company, happy to die in the ditch over the ability of property speculators to get paid by the taxpayer to subsidise their property investment. But there is no plan for housing affordability."

In Cairns on Monday, Mr Shorten hammered the government for wanting to hand business a $50 billion tax cut over 10 years - a key promise in the budget it released last Tuesday - and argued that more money should instead be spent on education funding.

The Opposition Leader was on the back foot, however, after his candidate in the seat of Melbourne contradicted party policy on turning back asylum seeker boats and offshore detention, insisting five times that the ALP's policy was clear and would not change.

The Reserve Bank memo says property is more impacted than other investments by negative gearing and the capital gains tax discount "as it can be purchased with higher leverage than shares".

A move against negative gearing, the memo says, would only trigger a large-scale sale of negatively-geared properties "if the changes were not grandfathered".

Labor plans to grandfather its changes, meaning properties that are currently negatively geared would remain negatively geared until they were sold, ensuring against a rush of sales as negative gearers tried to offload homes.

The Labor policy would restrict future negative gearing to investment income, meaning new investors would still be able to write off losses on properties and other investments, but only against investment income rather than wages. Investors in new properties would be exempt and the discount on capital gains tax would be cut from 50 to 25 per cent, but only for new investors.

In a boost for the ALP, the bank says in the memo it isn't concerned about negative gearing in its own right, but about its interaction with the capital gains tax discount introduced by the Howard government in 1999.

The change meant "only half of any capital gains are taxed at your marginal rate, however the loss on the investment initially is 100 per cent tax deductible".

The lopsided arrangement "may encourage chasing of capital gains" and "investors bidding up housing prices".

The memo says negative gearers are more of a threat to the stability of the financial system than owner occupiers because they are more likely to have interest-only loans and so won't have "as much of an equity buffer in the situation where prices fall".

The bank has made its views known previously in submissions to the financial system inquiry and House of Representatives home ownership inquiry, although not in such blunt terms. Q&A briefs are prepared by senior officers to arm officials such as Governor Glenn Stevens with answers to questions likely to be asked in parliamentary hearings or public functions.

A spokesman for Treasurer Scott Morrison said the note cited was a briefing memo, not an official RBA document.

"It was prepared in late 2014, well before the Australian Prudential Regulation Authority instituted measures that slowed housing credit growth considerably," the spokesman said.

"Nowhere has the Reserve Bank endorsed Labor's policy and Bill Shorten and other opponents of mum and dad investors who use negative gearing should be careful not to verbal the RBA."

Touring the inner-Sydney electorate of Grayndler on Monday Greens leader Richard Di Natale said he would go further than Labor and abolish the capital gains tax discount altogether.

WhiskeyWhiskers posted:

Who the gently caress doesn't? What do you have on a kebab?

MaliciousOnion posted:

MaliciousOnion posted:

tithin posted:

Didn't Di Natale say just yesterday that this wasn't happening?

this just reads like a stitch up - though if it does happen, I'll be amused.

Solemn Sloth posted:

hahahhaah apparently the DLP has split yet again? John Madigan splitting off to form the John Madigan Party

SKY COQ posted:

freebooter posted:

How many people actually vote according to parties' how-to-vote cards? Do preferences really change much?

You Am I posted:

I thought that happened a while ago. And wasn't the Motoring Enthusiast Party upset with Ricky Muir and was going to dis-endorse him? Looks like his popularity has changed their minds

Dude McAwesome posted:

i'm going to assume the content of that lady's "article" is pretty fuckin racist.

like beginning a sentence with "i'm not racist, but"

iajanus posted:

If you disagree with me ... you’re a racist

Laserface posted:

Hahaha holy poo poo

https://www.facebook.com/browncardigan/posts/1148025308594442

iajanus posted:

If you disagree with me ... you’re a racist

DID you know you have to be a dark-skinned, transgendered Muslim in order to voice an opinion publicly these days? Nor did I, but according to some on the far Left, or “Twitter” as it’s otherwise known, that seems to be the minimum requisite for expressing a view in 2016.

I would’ve thought as a woman of Singaporean, eastern European and Jewish heritage, I’m already among the more diverse of columnists gracing the pages of mainstream publications like this one.

But apparently my fair skin and “heteronormativity”, whatever that means, rules me ineligible for comment on a range of issues. Suddenly, whiteness is something we should be ashamed of. Apologise for. Fill ourselves with self-loathing about.

It’s now deemed a valid insult among the social justice warriors who fling around accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia and, the trendiest of them all, transphobia like they’re freebies on Oprah.

“You’re a racist, you’re a racist, EVERYBODY’S A RACIST!”

The irony, though, is those who preach it most vehemently are the very same people who can’t tolerate it in opinion.

Don’t agree chapter and verse with our new Gold Logie winner Waleed Aly’s grandstanding on The Project?

Racist!

Think the fact SBS World News’ weekend host-turned-cult heroine Lee Lin Chin pulls in less than 150,000 capital city viewers (Saturday night’s episode was ranked 66th in the most-watched programs, behind Scared Shrekless on 9Go!) makes her nomination for the biggest gong somewhat absurd?

Racist and sexist!

Maybe you believe fundamentalist Islam may have, I don’t know, a little something to do with Islamic terror?

Islamophobe!

Troubled by the growing movement encouraging gender-confused children to undergo mutilation in order to find peace with themselves?

Transphobe!

And on and on it goes. But it’s this fear about being branded with monstrous labels that is fuelling a full-blown paranoia about diversity.

In the past week we’ve seen new boss of the taxpayer-funded ABC Michelle Guthrie call for greater diversity in content and staff as her predecessor Mark Scott lamented his big failure was hiring “too many Anglos” during his time at the helm.

ABC Radio staff members have been directed to put more “difficult” accents to air, which is all well and good until the average listener at home has difficulty understanding what’s being said, surely a basic tenet of public broadcasting.

No word on whether Aunty’s new diversity policy will extend to hiring journalists with diverse voting preferences, though I suspect not.

In the UK, the BBC has pledged that within the next four years half its staff will be women, 15 per cent from black, Asian and other minority ethnic groups, 8 per cent disabled and another 8 per cent lesbian, gay or transgender. What about the intersex? Prejudiced Pommy bastards.

But defining diversity isn’t as ­simple as matching skin tones to paint swatches, as I have personally experienced.

In my final years of university more than a decade ago, I was twice shortlisted for a journalism cadetship at SBS, and twice knocked back.

When I rang the station after the second failed attempt to find out what I could improve on, the person on the other end of the line told me that the network was looking for a more ethnically diverse candidate.


Caroline Marcus.
I almost choked on my chilli crab and latkes.

Now SBS bulletins are facing criticism for featuring too many white faces, particularly those belonging to young women.

The concern should be that workplaces so focused on meeting quotas for skin colour or sexual orientation (now that’s an awkward, not to mention illegal, question to ask in a job interview) risk moving from a recruitment policy based on meritocracy to one of pure tokenism.

How will human resources cope should a black lesbian in a wheelchair punt up for an interview? Which pigeonhole will they shove her in?

The hysteria over diversity has become so extreme it is now socially acceptable to attack someone purely for being white or straight.

When I wrote in my previous column about the ridiculousness of the “white privilege” argument in the 60 Minutes furore, espoused by one Fairfax commentator (she was so incensed I’d named her, I won’t do her the courtesy this time) I was accused of being “racist and ignorant”.

My biggest crime, according to her? Being white myself. Oh, and using “scare quotes” (quotation marks to you and me) around the words “white” and “privilege”.

Who knew punctuation is now considered racist? What next, homophobic semi-colons?

Another piece critical of the Greens’ anti-sniffer dog policy earned me accusations of “internalised misogyny” and had me referred disparagingly to as yet another “white, hetero and cis” voice by one gay blog.

For those not fluent in the language of gender politics, “cis” essentially means someone who identifies with the gender they were born with and, yes, it is now considered a verified slur. Of course diversity is worth promoting, but never at the expense of demonising those who don’t fit your particular definition of it.

Caroline Marcus is a journalist with A Current Affair

Skellybones posted:

It was very brave of them to voice this opinion publicly in spite of those lefties on Twitter

quote:

Caroline Marcus is a journalist with A Current Affair

SynthOrange posted:

Lmao Dennis Jensen is going independent.

Anidav posted:

"In Australia, we have a system where the worst thing that could happen for working people, for middle-class people, that is that the progressive vote splits," he said.

iajanus posted:

Caroline Marcus is a journalist with A Current Affair

iajanus posted:

If you disagree with me ... you’re a racist

DID you know you have to be a dark-skinned, transgendered Muslim in order to voice an opinion publicly these days? Nor did I, but according to some on the far Left, or “Twitter” as it’s otherwise known, that seems to be the minimum requisite for expressing a view in 2016.

I would’ve thought as a woman of Singaporean, eastern European and Jewish heritage, I’m already among the more diverse of columnists gracing the pages of mainstream publications like this one.

But apparently my fair skin and “heteronormativity”, whatever that means, rules me ineligible for comment on a range of issues. Suddenly, whiteness is something we should be ashamed of. Apologise for. Fill ourselves with self-loathing about.

It’s now deemed a valid insult among the social justice warriors who fling around accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia and, the trendiest of them all, transphobia like they’re freebies on Oprah.

“You’re a racist, you’re a racist, EVERYBODY’S A RACIST!”

The irony, though, is those who preach it most vehemently are the very same people who can’t tolerate it in opinion.

Don’t agree chapter and verse with our new Gold Logie winner Waleed Aly’s grandstanding on The Project?

Racist!

Think the fact SBS World News’ weekend host-turned-cult heroine Lee Lin Chin pulls in less than 150,000 capital city viewers (Saturday night’s episode was ranked 66th in the most-watched programs, behind Scared Shrekless on 9Go!) makes her nomination for the biggest gong somewhat absurd?

Racist and sexist!

Maybe you believe fundamentalist Islam may have, I don’t know, a little something to do with Islamic terror?

Islamophobe!

Troubled by the growing movement encouraging gender-confused children to undergo mutilation in order to find peace with themselves?

Transphobe!

And on and on it goes. But it’s this fear about being branded with monstrous labels that is fuelling a full-blown paranoia about diversity.

In the past week we’ve seen new boss of the taxpayer-funded ABC Michelle Guthrie call for greater diversity in content and staff as her predecessor Mark Scott lamented his big failure was hiring “too many Anglos” during his time at the helm.

ABC Radio staff members have been directed to put more “difficult” accents to air, which is all well and good until the average listener at home has difficulty understanding what’s being said, surely a basic tenet of public broadcasting.

No word on whether Aunty’s new diversity policy will extend to hiring journalists with diverse voting preferences, though I suspect not.

In the UK, the BBC has pledged that within the next four years half its staff will be women, 15 per cent from black, Asian and other minority ethnic groups, 8 per cent disabled and another 8 per cent lesbian, gay or transgender. What about the intersex? Prejudiced Pommy bastards.

But defining diversity isn’t as ­simple as matching skin tones to paint swatches, as I have personally experienced.

In my final years of university more than a decade ago, I was twice shortlisted for a journalism cadetship at SBS, and twice knocked back.

When I rang the station after the second failed attempt to find out what I could improve on, the person on the other end of the line told me that the network was looking for a more ethnically diverse candidate.


Caroline Marcus.
I almost choked on my chilli crab and latkes.

Now SBS bulletins are facing criticism for featuring too many white faces, particularly those belonging to young women.

The concern should be that workplaces so focused on meeting quotas for skin colour or sexual orientation (now that’s an awkward, not to mention illegal, question to ask in a job interview) risk moving from a recruitment policy based on meritocracy to one of pure tokenism.

How will human resources cope should a black lesbian in a wheelchair punt up for an interview? Which pigeonhole will they shove her in?

The hysteria over diversity has become so extreme it is now socially acceptable to attack someone purely for being white or straight.

When I wrote in my previous column about the ridiculousness of the “white privilege” argument in the 60 Minutes furore, espoused by one Fairfax commentator (she was so incensed I’d named her, I won’t do her the courtesy this time) I was accused of being “racist and ignorant”.

My biggest crime, according to her? Being white myself. Oh, and using “scare quotes” (quotation marks to you and me) around the words “white” and “privilege”.

Who knew punctuation is now considered racist? What next, homophobic semi-colons?

Another piece critical of the Greens’ anti-sniffer dog policy earned me accusations of “internalised misogyny” and had me referred disparagingly to as yet another “white, hetero and cis” voice by one gay blog.

For those not fluent in the language of gender politics, “cis” essentially means someone who identifies with the gender they were born with and, yes, it is now considered a verified slur. Of course diversity is worth promoting, but never at the expense of demonising those who don’t fit your particular definition of it.

Caroline Marcus is a journalist with A Current Affair

Birdstrike posted:

you should take that dude's advice