PSA Muppets.

I've been a Public Service Association member almost as long as I've been working in the public Service.
I'm torn between the knowledge that it's in my best interests as an employee to be in the PSA, and the PSA pays only lip service to political neutrality.

The PSA has been so far up Labours Arse at times, I can almost hear Brenda Pilots voice when Labour spokesperson on Public Service Grant Robertson makes another end of the world announcement about the latest departmental or ministerial restructuring.
Mind you, the poof whines like a girl anyway.

But the March 2010 PSA journal has three articles about taxation and the Tax working group. Tax is something that we all have to pay, so it's one of those things I have in interest in.
Now having articles about what the goverment should do in the public service is pretty understandable, but read those articles for yourself (page 20 onwards) and please tell me the answers to the following questions;

1) WHAT THE FUCK DOES BEING SEVEN MALE ECONOMISTS & ACCOUNTANTS GOT TO DO WITH SENSIBLE SUGGESTIONS?
2) WHY IS INEQUALITY SUCH A BIG DEAL? I WORK HARD AND I'LL BE FUCKED IF I'LL BE HAPPY TO GIVE A BIG CHUNK OF MY MONEY TO A LAZY PILLOCK WHO DOESN"T.
3)WHY IS SUSAN ST JOHN STILL AN ASSOCIATE PROF AT AUCKLAND UNIVERSITY? IS IT BEACAUSE SHE IS TOO SHIT TO BE EMPLOYED IN THE PRIVATE SECTOR?
(sorry for the caps rage).

I respect Don Brash. He is one of the most boring former public servants New Zealand has ever had, but he knows his stuff.
Susan St John wants me and everybody else to help raise other peoples children by giving them money taken from me by taxation. Somehow they will be better off and become better citizens. Maybe Susan, but maybe they might just be better welfare reciepients instead of independant economic contributers to the national good.

The last article was written by Brian Easton. He's the 2009 NZIER Economist of the year award winner. I know this since the article tells me that.
After reading some of the worst arguement, again alluding to the membership of high-income older men, I hope he does the decent thing and hand his award back.
Brian seems to belive that the Tax working group can magically report outside their brief. He also thinks that if higher income earners get a bigger tax break than lower income earners, that's bad. News for you Brian, It's something like the top 15% of income earners pay over 50% of the total Income tax take.
That's not fairness, that's the politics of envy, and that IS bad.

Now before I get accused of being in a position of benefiting by tax breaks and being on a high income, I'd like to state I don't pay the top tax rate as my income is not that much. I've never voted on who benefits me most by being in power and I've always thought that 39%+ ACC levies is too much tax even when I wasn't even paying 33%.
I've also been unemployed and when I was, I was getting a benefit. But while I was unemployed I looked everyday and applied for jobs. I appreciate the assistance, but I don't think the world owes me a living.

and ultimately that's the difference between my beliefs and those of the PSA article authors. I want to stand on my own two feet, and not have my fingers in someone elses pockets.