Bringing in a negative income tax would reduce income tax revenue by about $30 billion.
For interest, note the secular party estimate that just cancelling religious tax exemptions will bring in the whole amount—$31 billion—without having to do anything else. I’d say that’s optimistic, but by extension we are being quite pessimistic.
I’ve just had a realisation – I was thinking ‘you can’t count carbon tax to plug the NIT gap’ because of
Pirate Party Australia will also support a tax on carbon emissions so long as the revenue is entirely offset by reduced taxes on savings and work.
But I have my causality mixed up, the NIT gap is 100% ‘reduced taxes on savings and work’.
When we update the rest of the numbers we should include this detail in the policy text.
Edit to add a new thing: regarding the ‘advancement of religion’ exemption, the PBO did some modelling for the LDP and found it would save all of 350 million…
What would basic income mean in practical terms for the various Job Search Agencies?
Consensus in my other online communities is that they add minimal value for maximal public expense.
They’re axed as a savings measure to make basic income more affordable. The ones that are actually value for money will do fine in the private market.