Government should focus on the economic levers it can control to boost business productivity and company tax
CPA Australia Media Release
– Mid-year economic update failed to connect the dots between Australia’s increasing deficit and the nation’s desperate lack of business productivity
– CPA Australia urges government to focus on the levers it can control to boost productivity and revenue – reduce regulation and encourage business growth
– Young Aussies should be encouraged to start their own business or purchase an existing one as part of efforts to improve the nation’s economy, productivity and dynamism
While Australia’s economic prosperity is undoubtedly influenced by the price of commodities and global markets, the government should be looking closer to home for solutions to the economic challenges identified in the Mid-Year Economic Fiscal Outlook, says CPA Australia.
“The government cites a reduction in company tax and unavoidable spending as the main reasons behind expected increase in deficits over the next four years, but with the right policies and incentives it has the power to boost business productivity and confidence to help make up the decline in revenue from companies,” says CPA Australia Chief of Policy, Standards and External Affairs, Elinor Kasapidis.
“The expected fall in company tax revenue is not helped by Australia’s ongoing productivity crisis. This is where the government must connect the dots and use the levers it has to influence an upturn in fortunes of the economy. This means cutting existing red tape, improving the design of new regulation, encouraging business growth with targeted incentives, and supporting businesses to incorporate new technologies to drive efficiency.
“The government should also be incentivising more young Aussies to follow their entrepreneurial instincts and create or buy businesses. As our annual Asia Pacific Small Business Survey routinely shows, small businesses in Australia trail in the adoption of new technologies compared with other markets in the region – partly because businesses in other countries are more likely to be owned by young people.
“Getting more young people into business – and nurturing their entrepreneurial spirit – will help boost our productivity crisis and can only be a good thing for the economy in the long-run.”
Ms Kasapidis says businesses are desperately searching for positive signs from the government to inspire greater investment in 2025.
“While business confidence is low, businesses still want to invest and grow where they can. They need a government that supports them and encourages growth and entrepreneurialism, rather than creating roadblocks,” says Ms Kasapidis.
“This means properly engaging with the business community and focusing on easing the regulatory and cost pressures that are holding investments back.
“Businesses are looking for effective and appropriate regulation which requires government investment in technology, federal and state law changes, and an ongoing commitment to good regulatory design in consultation with business.
“A concerted effort from government to implement growth incentives for businesses would not only be well-received, but could have a tangible impact on productivity and business performance.”
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2 comments
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Steve Davis -
Bert Hetebry
Return to home pageThey want the govt to be “focusing on easing the regulatory and cost pressures that are holding investments back.”
Yeah, right.
That’s straight out of the free market wish-list.
And yet they want more govt intervention in the economy to promote the business sector.
The regulatory pressures they want eased are measures to protect the community.
Intervention to protect the community is of no interest to them.
These people are not accountants — they are ideologues.
Young Aussies should be encouraged to start their own business or purchase an existing one…. so that CPAs can help them deal with the financial and legal obligations, tax minimisation ….. it all sounds very self serving and does not come near the equality imbalance, the divide between the haves and have nots.
The article is completely self serving, depending of government to ease the restrictions on business, I guess that includes the fair work commission should step aside when considering workplace safety so that wage workers can be monitored like robots to achieve AI generated productivity targets, that environmental considerations be put aside, as with cultural elements such as sacred sites, except of course if they happen to be Christian cathedrals.
Some of the positive signs that businesses are looking for could include that consumers have more money to spend, like when the government increased wages in health care and child care jobs, but how quickly that was swallowed up by rapacious landlords with exorbitant rent increases, subsidised power bills so the burden of flexible, but extortionist power prices placed by the privatised power generators are less onerous, or the supermarket giants price gouging to increase the weekly grocery shopping bill so that the wage increases amount to nothing, but offering greater profits to spread among the shareholders, or the RBA which looks sideways at that blatant profiteering but inflicting more pain on households by leaving interest rates on hold for a little while longer…. maybe till after the next election, hoping that Dutts and his bunch of miscreants gain the keys to the treasury.
Business confidence is low, not because the current government has not done the right things, it has, it lowered the tax rates most workers have to pay, it has increased wages to more than the CPI but those ‘born to rule’ have taken every opportunity to undermine those efforts, seemingly to blame the ‘Cost of living crisis’ at the feet of the government instead of the greed of those in the boardrooms of the major businesses.