Dr Jim Chalmers at ACCI’s Gala Dinner 2025 – the scene of the crime. Photo: ACCI.
Treasury and the Treasurer might have retreated from their battle to tax unrealised gains on superannuation, but the war to grab as much of your super as they can continues. Jim Chalmers has said as much. And because of undisciplined spending and extravagant promises, the Albanese Government has no choice. They’re out for as much as they can get.
It wasn’t meant to be this way.
When superannuation became mainstream in the early to mid-80s, it was barely taxed. It helped get workers on board – when you tell them they have to give up some of their income today on a promise of a nest egg on the never-never, you’d better sweeten the pot. So Hawke and Keating did.
As the pool of funds has grown and grown, though, federal governments of both stripes have looked at that giant pot of dosh as not just your retirement fund that you are forced to contribute to, but a lifeboat to plug nest egg-sized holes in their budget. So, every few years, the rules are changed, and not in your favour (they never are, but you knew that already).
The government doesn’t feel guilty about it, of course, because superannuation’s taxed at a ‘concessional rate’, so the argument can always be made that they’re just making the system ‘fairer’ (again, never in your favour).
At this stage, you’ve probably realised that should a politician ever say they’re doing something for ‘fairness’, it’s a warning you’re about to get robbed … and in a way, you have been. But in a way, they’re right.
Because superannuation has tax advantages over other investments, it is susceptible to ‘abuse’ and is therefore often abused.
This brings us back to the government and your super (and don’t ever forget, it is your super – not theirs).
There’s about $4.3 trillion in super at the moment and it is growing at an astounding rate.
Just one per cent of that $4300 billion total is a whopping $43 billion. The Treasurer would love to get some of it. The more the better.
But he has a problem.
Practically every person of voting age has super, so if he goes after the big pot, he can piss off a lot of people all at once. Which is why in the past few years the Treasurer has sought to ease his Budget pain (caused by overspending, not undertaxing, BTW) by hitting small groups with big balances in the hope he can ride out their complaints and spread some love with their money to salve concerns that the rest of us will be next.
Remember, when he said he would go after unrealised gains of ‘the rich’ with balances above $3 million? One appeal of that since-ditched policy was that it would almost certainly not affect you – just 0.5 per cent of people would be affected in the first few years, and those people probably vote Teal anyway, so why would Dr Jim care?
But his greed hasn’t abated even though they ditched that tax grab.
They’ve found another way to get their paws on your loot, which is arguably far worse.
If you had nothing better to do last week, you might have caught Dr Jim’s speech to the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Buried in the 2700-words of self-praise, Dr Jim told us he still wants our money.
“Treasury is starting a new round of consultation on the superannuation performance test. We’ve made it clear we’re open to considering responsible changes that maintain very high standards and the super funds’ responsibilities to members, which is why we’ll ask industry and experts for their ideas.
“Treasury will stand up an industry working group to help find consensus. The goal is to refine and strengthen the performance test to make sure it isn’t creating unnecessary obstacles to investment, particularly in key areas like housing and energy.
“It’s about better aligning and unlocking investment that also boosts productivity, while maintaining a robust test and a primary focus on member returns.”
Translation: renewable energy (and hydrogen – God help us) and housing aren’t attractive investments for super funds at the moment because they’re investment dogs and a bottomless pit of pain for the government, so he wants your super to go to sub-par investment vehicles to get the government out of a hole entirely of its own making.
Essentially, he wants your retirement future to pay for promises he and his boss made to get re-elected – promises regarding housing and renewables that they knew they couldn’t afford but made anyway.
And yes, they are bad investments.
Renewables rely on tax breaks, cheap loans, subsidies and forcing customers to buy renewable energy. Without all that, they would fail.
‘Housing’, such as build-to-rent schemes, relies on government subsidies we’re never told about because the deals are ‘commercial in confidence’.
Here’s the test: if renewables and housing were good investments, Dr Jim wouldn’t need to change the rules. Money without subsidies would be flooding in at breakneck speed. But they suck (technical term).
That’s why they need government money (aka, your money), but that hasn’t been enough – so they’re looking for ways to get more of your money and hope you don’t notice.
But it’s about to get worse.
To make these unattractive investments attractive to your super fund, they’re going to pour your tax money into the target sectors to justify using more of your super money in those sectors. They’re not investments, they’re money-go-rounds.
No wonder we’re going broke. And we deserve to.
