Paul

Rational optimist.

[Chris Brycki @chrisbrycki]

The big surprise in last night’s Federal Budget wasn’t just the move from the 50% CGT discount to inflation indexation (which was already flagged weeks ago) ... it was the hidden minimum effective 30% CGT floor layered on top.

That’s an extraordinary change because it effectively moves long term capital gains from being taxed more concessionally than earned income to being taxed more heavily! In practice it pushes Australia’s effective tax rate on capital returns to at least double comparable global markets, making Australia completely uncompetitive for growth investments.

That fundamentally changes the economics of long term investing, entrepreneurship, innovation capital, R&D and high growth assets where much of the return comes from long term capital appreciation.

The impact won’t just fall on wealthy Australians. It will also hit many lower and middle income Australians who rely on long term capital growth from shares and ETFs to help fund retirement outside super.

If long term investing becomes less rewarding after tax, more households will choose to consume rather than invest, adding even more pressure to inflation and interest rates over time.

It will also affect thousands of small business owners who spend decades building businesses like physio clinics, dental practices and family businesses expecting the eventual sale to help fund retirement. If a much larger share of that sale proceeds disappears in tax, more Australians may end up relying on the age pension instead.

The Government also seems to underestimate how sensitive capital and talent are to tax settings. If the after tax reward for investing, building businesses and taking long term risks falls by this amount, capital doesn’t just magically stay put. Some of it will move offshore, some investors simply won’t sell assets and others will reduce risk taking altogether.

Ironically, that may mean the actual tax receipts end up far lower than Treasury expects, while Australia becomes less internationally competitive for investment, entrepreneurship and innovation.

It’s a tax policy that doesn’t properly consider what should be obvious second and third order consequences for capital flows, entrepreneurship, retirement funding, inflation and long term economic competitiveness.

And how exactly is a modest fall in house prices (Treasury modelling suggests house price growth will reduce by 2%) supposed to help younger Australians if rental supply dries up because private property investors leave the market? What’s the long term plan for housing availability if the economics of providing rental housing become completely unattractive?

This doesn’t seem like a serious long term economic growth strategy.

We’ll be updating our CGT change calculator today to reflect:
• the new transition timeline
• the post 1 July 2027 split treatment
• the surprise minimum 30% CGT floor
https://t.co/WFVQzYuMnt

In the meantime, here are our thoughts on what these changes mean for investors:
https://t.co/s0O8OrBXHB

[Tzeetch @Tzeetch]

@craigkellyAFEE The @LiberalVictoria party are now so full of shit they needed a candidate with experience serving it to the public.

[Shoshana🦁🌞🇸🇨🪬🇮🇷 @Shoshana51728]

Read this if you want to understand why Trump decided to strike Iran along with Israel...

[ISD @ISDeptJP1]

@babybeginner

[Elon Musk @elonmusk]

Those who pushed this evil will pay dearly

[Rachel Gur @RachelGur]

For all those who asked, here is a clip of @havivrettiggur responding to masked protesters interrupting his lecture at Haverford College on February 1, 2026. Enjoy and learn.

[Paul @jimiricard]

@MarkOgge You’re jumping at the shadows of your own ancestral tribal prejudice . What’s truly staggering is that you think it signals your virtue not your complete ignorance.

[Camus @newstart_2024]

Melanie Phillips delivers a chilling diagnosis of the West's intellectual crisis: Ideology has replaced knowledge, and reason itself is under siege.

Key points from her 4:37 clip:
- Modern orthodoxies (multiculturalism, lifestyle equivalence, etc.) are treated as absolute moral goods.

- Challenge them → you're not just wrong; you're evil, standing against human/planetary betterment.

- Dissent must be silenced: no platform, no debate, no hearing.

- Evidence contradicting the ideology is dismissed as lies or "not facts."

- Universities—once crucibles of reason—are now engines destroying it, while claiming moral superiority.

- Result: Civil discourse dies. Replaced by insult weaponized to shut people down.

This isn't just about politics—it's the erosion of objective truth, evidence-based reasoning, and the ability to disagree without demonization.

We're witnessing the destruction of reason itself.

4:37 clip laying bare how ideology has become inimical to rationality 👇

When ideology trumps evidence and disagreement becomes "evil," what survives of open society?

Where do you see this dynamic strongest right now—in academia, media, politics, or everyday life?

[Paul @jimiricard]

@PeterWMurphy1 One of Irish ancestry should be a little more cognisant of where hate can lead don’t you imagine?

[Paul @jimiricard]

@MaryKostakidis Mary on Iran 🦗🦗🦗🦗

[Paul @jimiricard]

@davegraney So even Dave’s riding the trendy anti semitic wave? Also , the Mullahs are butchering their own young in Iran.🦗🦗

[Paul @jimiricard]

@SerkanTheWriter Meanwhile the people actually sacrificing their lives in Iran get crickets from the Writers on the gravy train…

[Paul @jimiricard]

@DavidShoebridge I trust you will rapidly be boots on the ground to defend your land David? Maybe Albo could lend you his wet lettuce…

[Nova Peris OAM OLY @NovaPeris]

Cathy Wilcox — one word: ‘Pathetic’

We are not mindless drones.
We are independent, critical thinkers who love Australia 🇦🇺 Our Australia.

Many of us spoke publicly after this national tragedy out of a commitment to justice and a determination to confront terrorism, not excuse it.

To portray Australians from across professions who call for accountability as agents of Jews or Israel is vile, dehumanising, and deeply insulting to families who watched their loved ones & innocent people hunted with military-grade weapons by Islamist terrorists.

These families did not lose loved ones to a cartoon. They lost them to real violence. Real hatred. Real evil. Here. On our shores. At our iconic Bondi Beach.

This is how it has always begun.

With the lies. With mockery. With cartoons that strip Jews of humanity and agency, insinuating that Jewish suffering is exaggerated, manipulated, or politically manufactured.

This is the language of libels. And libels have always preceded pogroms.

For centuries, Jews were depicted as schemers and manipulators, as bribers, controllers, sub-human caricatures blamed even for their own deaths. These lies were never harmless. They created permission. And permission led to violence.

This cartoon sits squarely in that tradition.

It mocks the dead, grieving families, and Australians who stand up by portraying calls for accountability as obedience, corruption, and manipulation. Depicting supporters of a Royal Commission, including grieving families, next to a dog holding a sign ‘Dogs for RC’ being “rewarded” by unseen hand giving a bone is unmistakable dehumanisation. It’s sickening.

Mockery in the face of terror is not political insight. It is moral collapse.

History has seen this before. And it never ends well.

Do better for goodness sake and importantly for the safety and love of this great nation.

#RoyalCommission #Antisemitism #Terrorism #extremism #radicalislam

[Paul @jimiricard]

@BarnsGreg Democracy is such a bitch….

[Paul @jimiricard]

@PeterCronau At what point will you be required to wash the blood of Australians off your hands? The next massacre or the one after that?

[Paul @jimiricard]

@boganintel @ChrisMinnsMP No. It was the gullible demonstrating their delusional stupidity….

[Paul @jimiricard]

@QuentinDempster @sussanley Straining out a gnat and swallowing a camel…

[Paul @jimiricard]

@deniseshrivell There’s one. Islamic terrorism.

[Paul @jimiricard]

@angelar68197975 Ahh the smug deflection of an evil personality. Banality at its finest…