Complex plan to determine tax residency under microscope miragenews.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from miragenews.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Ever wondered why you’re still collecting receipts on the off-chance the Tax Office wants to see them?
A decade ago, fired up by what he’d read in the Henry Tax Review, Labor Treasurer Wayne Swan promised to end what he said was the “hassle of shoeboxes full of receipts”.
From 2012 onwards everyone would be offered a standard deduction of $500 in lieu of claiming work-related and tax-preparation expenses. It was to climb to $1,000 from 2013. 6.4 million Australians could stop stuffing shoeboxes.
Then a year later his focus changed. He had decided not to proceed because of a separate change to the tax-free threshold he said would free 1 million taxpayers from lodging returns.