Posts by Paul Campbell
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Interestingly a Dunedin blogger will be in court soon over what may be just this issue, after apparently republishing something she thought was OK.
Actually I think that ODT article may itself be possibly in breach of the law, or is at least skirting it extremely closely.
The issue mentioned by the ODT article is around a council employee who was caught embezzling millions through the sales of used council vehicles. It’s an important local issue about corruption within a local body – however because of the circumstances it has resulted in a general gagging of public discussion of this wider issue – you’ll notice that the ODT has disabled public discussion on that article, and in fact has on all articles to do with this corruption scandal.
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seems like the solution is for the countries come up with an agreement good transparency rules for international transactions .... and to unconditionally tax all transactions through countries that don't join the agreement as "income"
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I want to know why National changed the law in 2010 to make this possible. Who's bright idea it was? Who lobbied the gov ernment for this change? which cabinet ministers championed it? was Key's 'lawyer' involved? if so did he lobby Key?
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I sort of like that - but it does screw me over - in a bunch of ways:
I worked overseas for 20 years and saved a lot for my retirement (and paid my taxes rigorously in both countries), when I bring that money back to NZ I don't particularly want to lose 20% of it.
Equally I run a small company, it mostly earns overseas currency, most of which comes into NZ, is paid to me and I pay tax on, however a small amount is kept in overseas funds (to avoid changing currencies twice) and is used to purchase supplies or capital equipment for the company (and show up on the balance sheet for tax purposes) - that equipment is equivalent to Key's "gift" above ... it does show up on my (corporate) taxes, but at the end of the financial year.
I manufacture in China - that essentially involves sending money overseas to a random entity, often in Hong Kong (nominally another tax haven), I'm not sure how this looks different (to say the Reserve Bank) from someone trying to hide money from the IRD.
Really I simply think that the all the countries need to get their act together, and change their laws so that money stored in a tax haven is still taxable - that means agreeing on a common, fair tax regime that applies to all - Apple gets taxed on its NZ profits in NZ, US profits in the US, etc exporting profits to avoid tax is simply made illegal.
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Hard News: How the years flew by ..., in reply to Glenn Pearce,
Another factor is that the children of Boomers are quite happy for it to perpetuate because who do you think benefits when their parents eventually pop their clogs?
Our kids have been tolds not to depend on it in their live's plans, we're planning on spending it all, anything that's left when we go will be gravy
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Hard News: How the years flew by ..., in reply to Glenn Pearce,
This property bubble won’t burst until interest rates go up.
Yes this - what's really scary is that there are people buying into this bubble who don't have any experience of paying 10% interest rates .... and don't have a plan for what they'll do when they come back
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Yes #notallboomers (somehow I qualify even though I always think of them as being the hippy generation rather than the punks) - I own my house free and clear, have owned it for 13 years now - but I'll be quite happy if we sell it for what we bought it for +inflation - after all free rent for 13 years is a great return on investment
But the I'm all for a capital gains tax, I like the US way of doing this - all income, incuding capital gains, are taxed as income - the govt makes some exemptions - the family home, long term investment in companies (no pump and dump).
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so to sum it up, if you really want to vote you simply need to escape from prison and head down to your polling place (maybe you can get a day release).
Does one get automatically removed from the rolls when you are imprisoned? (and automatically reenrolled when released?)
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Polity: Geography and housing options, in reply to Moz,
You think that if used correctly fracking technology could encourage Rangitoto Island to fill in one of them, allowing it to be used for housing?
Moz:: just the other day we were talking about faking a Rangitoto eruption to do something about the housing bubble - building a large city on top of a geologically recent volcano seems to be asking for trouble .... that's a pretty bubble you have there, it would be a pity if somewone broke it ....
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Polity: Geography and housing options, in reply to Moz,
DPF's point is, I think, very valid. We should find a big area of flat land and build a city in the centre to replace Auckland. That way the new city can expand out in all directions as required. For a city of 2M you probably want plains at least 100km across, which means building it.... in Australia :)
I don't konw, Auckland's only really using one of those harbours ....