Next time you see a News Corp employee or contributor, or a News Corp editorial, opining about fiscal policy in Australia, or how tax revenue should be spent, or how the economy should be run, there’s a simple question to bear in mind.
How much tax has the foreign-owned Coalition propaganda arm paid in tax in Australia in the five years to 2018-19? During that time News Australia Holdings has earned more than $360 million in profits from nearly $13.1 billion in revenue.
The answer, of course, is zero. It hasn’t paid a single cent in tax.
It’s a different story for News Australia Investments. In 2017-18 it reported $291 million in taxable income, on which it paid … $201,000 in tax. And no, there isn’t a zero missing.
Admittedly News Pay TV Financing — the vehicle for News Corp’s takeover of Foxtel and Premier Media Group nearly a decade ago — reported a $27 million profit way back in 2015-16. It paid tax on that that year: $8.2 million.
So, including everything, in five years News Corp has paid $8.5 million in tax on more than $680 million in profits and $13 billion in revenue.
In that time the Coalition has handed $40 million to it in untied grants, swamping even the miserable $8 million. The net position is that off revenues of more than $13 billion, taxpayers have actually paid the Murdochs more than $30 million.
All this is because News Corp is one of the worst tax rorters and dodgers in the country. That’s why, in 2015, the ATO deemed it the highest tax risk in the country.
The recently released ATO corporate tax data for 2018-19 — well before the pandemic — shows that the US-owned News Corp earned $2.1 billion in revenue, down from $2.4 billion the previous year, but claims to have made no profit at all — in contrast to previous years when profits where sneaked away offshore.
The numbers illustrate the extent to which News Corp has nothing to do with Australia and Australians. It is foreign-owned, Rupert Murdoch is a foreigner, and the company pays no tax in Australia.
Of course, that doesn’t prevent the company’s outlets from lecturing real Australians who live here and pay tax here about what they should do, how they should live and vote, and what fiscal and economic policies we should follow.
The data also show just how little fossil-fuel companies contribute by way of tax. Revenue from the petroleum resource rent tax fell from $1.16 billion to $1.06 billion in 2018-19, while coal companies (excluding Glencore, which handles a number of commodities) paid $467 million, more than half of which was BHP.
Most coalmining and coal services companies paid no tax; National Party-controlled Coalition donor Whitehaven Coal paid just $15.6 million in tax on nearly $300 million in taxable income.
Major gas and oil companies paid just $203 million in tax on more than $820 million in taxable income, off $28 billion in revenue. The great bulk of the tax was paid by Origin Energy, which paid pretty much full freight — $179 million in tax — on its $634 million in taxable income.
Perhaps the fake Australians at News Corp could follow the example of at least one of the fossil-fuel companies they champion so much.
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So, essentially, the LNP have been subsidizing News Corpse to undermine democracy.
To “stack the deck” in their own favour – and the Limited News Party hasn’t been subsidising News Corpse to undermine our democracy : we tax-paying voters have been paying taxes to be directed to Murdoch, to undermine our democracy, the LNP has just been funnelling the funds….. “The price of PR campaigns”.
Yes, using public money to undermine public institutions.
And how much of that comes back as “donations” to the Limited News Party.
No wonder the government wants to keep us like bile battery bears, with a catheter to our wallets – someone has to pay to run the country, and subsidise Rupert’s ventures?
Imagine what tax we’d be paying if interlopers like Rupert paid their dues.
Tax avoidance is perfectly acceptable nowadays to any government. “Entrepreneurs who create jobs” must be worshipped, not charged tax.
The later, but not latest, thing is of course to be a “tax spender”, one whose effective tax rate is negative because of receipts from the public purse. Richard Branson was the first I became aware of internationally, trend setter that he was. Take money from government and pay no tax; among other things payers are losers obvs.
Both these groups – avoiders and spenders – suffer terribly from timidity.
The thing now is to “do a Packer” or “do an Adani”, i.e. get government to guarantee the success of your enterprise, not simply make cash gifts to it. Establish a business, like a high-roller casino or a coal-mine that employs so many people and has such a high profile that no government can countenance the thought of it going under. What passes for government in Victoria will not consider twiddling Crown’s casino licence, regardless of any outcome of the NSW enquiry, because it’s too big to stop adoring. Likewise the Adani project that can’t get funding from professional lenders.
The problem is we have a regressive tax system. Politicians fear electoral defeat if they tax – that’s why they borrow to make up the income and expenditure shortfall. What makes it worse is that the govt borrows from those who don’t pay much tax, if any.
If MMT was applied, the RBA would lend to govts – state and federal- and then cancel that debt, as opposed to gifting interest paid on govt bonds purchased by private banks etc. In the current crisis the RBA has followed the Bank of England’s lead in the mid year and has been buying some state govt debt. It’s not clear if this was a quasi MMT experiment and / or testing the water for fear of global credit markets could dry up. Lowe has denied all of the above, probably because there is no govt appetite for turning off the corporate welfare for banks the govt is beholden to.And don’t forget that each of the “big 4” so called Aussie banks are all majority o’seas owned. For a illuminating critique of the RBA’s not wanting to upset the private credit markets – code for private banks that buy govt bonds – see eminent aussie academic Bill Mitchell’s blog (bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/) article “RBA governor adopts a political role…”August 18, 2020.
Ah, that picture of the big merde, in a comic nazi salute.., To whom, himself?