Stop Squeezing Australians While Big Money Walks Out the Door

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Treasurer Jim Chalmers want Australians to accept another tax shake-up. This time, the debate is focused on capital gains tax and negative gearing. The government says this is about fairness, housing, and budget repair.

But there is a harder question.

Why does government keep coming back to workers, small businesses, and mum-and-dad investors before it chases the money already visible in its own corporate tax data?

That is the question this site exists to ask.

The Same Old Stones

PAYG workers are easy to tax. Small businesses are easy to audit. Mum-and-dad investors are easy to track. Australian-owned businesses are easy to regulate. They live here. They bank here. They employ here. They cannot shift a local shop, trade, farm, factory, or family home offshore.

So when government needs more money, these Australians become the easy targets. That does not make the tax system fair. It may just mean government is choosing the simple targets before the harder ones.

The Tax Debate We Are Being Handed

The current tax debate is being framed around housing and fairness. From 1 July 2027, the government plans to limit negative gearing for residential property to new builds. It also plans to change capital gains tax rules by replacing the 50 per cent CGT discount with indexation and a 30 per cent minimum tax on capital gains.

These changes may be sold as housing reform. But they also raise revenue from Australians who already sit inside the tax net. The question is not whether property tax settings should ever be reviewed. The question is why this comes first.

Before government reaches deeper into the pockets of Australians, it should explain what it is doing about large companies that report huge income, little taxable income, and little or no tax payable.

The ATO's Own Data Shows the Problem

This is not guesswork. This is not rumour. The ATO's corporate tax transparency data shows which large companies report income, taxable income, and tax payable in Australia.

Yet many still paid no tax. Some will have valid reasons. Some will have losses. Some will have timing issues. Some will have deductions allowed by law. But when large companies report high income and little or no tax, year after year, Australians have the right to ask what the ATO is doing about it.

The ATO data makes the issue visible. The question is whether government is willing to act on what its own data shows.

This Is Not Just About Tax Avoidance

The bigger problem is the direction of the country. Australia exports enormous value. Resources and energy exports are counted in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Large multinationals operate in our market. Government contractors earn from the public purse. Foreign-owned groups benefit from our workforce, courts, infrastructure, customers, and stability.

Yet ordinary Australians keep being told to pay more. That is the part that no longer makes sense.

If Australia is rich enough to export huge value, and large enough to support trillion-dollar revenue flows through major companies, why does government keep going back to the same households, workers, and local businesses?

Australia is not poor. The question is whether Australians are getting a fair return from the value leaving the country.

The Government We Cannot Afford

There is another issue. Government itself has become expensive. Across Commonwealth, state, and local government, Australia had millions of public-sector employee jobs in 2025. Public-sector wages and salaries now cost hundreds of billions of dollars each year. That is not a small overhead. That is one of the largest costs Australians fund.

Government debt is also rising. Gross debt is forecast to pass the trillion-dollar mark. Inflation keeps pressure on households. Rents, electricity, medical costs, insurance, and basic living costs keep biting. In that environment, every dollar matters.

So Australians are entitled to ask whether government is still the servant of the people, or whether the people are now expected to serve the government machine.

Government Was Meant to Support the Country

Government has a proper role. It should protect the nation. It should provide order. It should support fair courts, basic services, health, education, safety, roads, defence, and essential infrastructure. It should protect people who genuinely need help. It should help commerce work, not smother it.

But that balance has shifted. Government is now inside almost every part of daily life. Every new problem seems to create a new programme, a new department, a new agency, a new compliance burden, or a new layer of reporting. And each layer needs funding.

So taxes rise. Charges rise. Fees rise. Fines rise. Debt rises. Then government tells Australians more reform is needed.

Business Is Being Forced to Adapt

Australian-owned businesses are under pressure. Wages are higher. Rent is higher. Power is higher. Insurance is higher. Finance is harder. Compliance is heavier.

Many businesses are now looking at AI and automation because they have no choice. They are trying to do more with the same team. Some are trying to survive with fewer staff. That is the pressure of the real economy.

A private business cannot keep growing its cost base without discipline. If it does, it fails. Government does not face the same test.

AI for Business Means Survival. AI for Government Must Mean Savings.

The Australian Public Service now has an AI plan. That may be useful. Better tools can improve services. But every new tool given to government should come with a public savings test.

If AI makes a department faster, taxpayers should see the benefit — through lower cost, fewer duplicated functions, better service, or less red tape. If AI only helps government write more policy, create more forms, expand more programmes, and monitor more citizens, then Australians should ask who the technology is really serving.

Private enterprise is using AI to survive. Government must not use AI to grow faster.

The NDIS Lesson

The NDIS should support Australians who genuinely need help. That principle should be protected. But weak administration, loose rules, and bad operators put that purpose at risk.

When shady providers exploit the system, the people hurt most are genuine participants. They are the people who need the support. They are the people who should be protected from waste, fraud, and weak oversight.

This is the same pattern. Government builds a large system. The rules are loose. The cost blows out. Bad operators move in. Then ordinary Australians are asked to fund the gap. That is not compassion. That is bad management.

Public Projects and Private Pressure

Government-backed projects also compete with private enterprise. Major public infrastructure work can be needed. But when government borrows money, launches huge projects, and competes for the same workers, materials, engineers, trades, and contractors, private businesses feel the squeeze.

They are not competing with another business. They are competing with the state. That state can borrow, tax, regulate, and spend. A small business cannot. An Australian-owned manufacturer cannot. A local builder cannot. A family business cannot.

That is why government growth must be tested. Not every public project is bad. But every public dollar should face a hard question: does this build national strength, or does it just feed the machine?

The Money Already in the Data

Before Albanese and Chalmers ask Australians to accept more tax pressure, they should answer a simple question. What is being done with the corporate tax transparency data?

If the answer is no, then the system is failing Australians. This is not theory. The patterns are visible in the data.

Australia Should Not Be a Cash Cow

Companies should be welcome to do business here. They should be able to invest, hire, compete, and make money. But the deal should be clear. If a company benefits from Australia, it should make a fair tax contribution in Australia. That is the social contract.

If a company says it earns huge income here but makes no taxable income year after year, the public should ask why it is still here. If it is not making money, why keep operating? If it is making money, where is the benefit going?

And if the law allows that benefit to be shifted away from the Australian tax base, why is government not fixing the law before it comes after Australian households again?

The Easy-target Economy

This is the danger. Government keeps growing. The bureaucracy keeps expanding. Spending keeps rising. Debt keeps climbing. Then the political class looks for new revenue. But instead of starting with the hardest and largest leaks, it starts with the people already trapped in the system.

That is how a country loses its productive base. That is how local businesses get weaker. That is how families lose faith. That is how Australians come to believe nothing can be done.

But something can be done. The data can be made visible. The patterns can be exposed. The questions can be asked in public. And elected members can be forced to answer.

What Questions Should Australians Be Asking?

What Should Happen Now?

View the Supporting Data

This story is based on public budget material, official statistics, and ATO-published corporate tax transparency data. The data does not, by itself, prove wrongdoing by any company. It does raise a fair question.

Why is government asking ordinary Australians for more before it deals with the money already visible in its own data?