Letters To Editor: Misconceptions over tax plan

Misconceptions over tax plan
In reply to Ralph Harrison's letter July 20, regarding capital gains tax (CGT), which contains many assumptions, presumptions and totally incorrect statements.
He assumes all proponents of CGT are economists, financial commentators and politicians of the left. Wrong. I know many like myself who support CGT who are none of the above and no, we don't vote Labour either.
He writes, "not many coal face operators", wrong, we all run our own businesses.
He "assumes" it will be inflation adjusted. If he bothered to read what Labour proposes, he'd find out that it won't be.
"Cullens saving fund" as he puts it, will not be subject to CGT. Business assets sold for retirement and payouts from retirement savings schemes, including KiwiSaver, will be exempt.
He says "small businesses are started using capital from residential property. Tax that restricts start-up capital and consequently the business and therefore jobs". What a load of rot, What's that got to do with the price of fish! Most business financed in this way is usually though a mortgage added to residential property, not through selling it. CGT only applies when the business is sold and in no way restricts start up-capital or jobs. A small business worth under $250,000 being sold for retirement reasons, in fact, will not be subject to CGT.
He assumes/presumes that "The values of farms are based on production and profit". That statement is so wrong and couldn't be any further from the truth. It shows he has no idea about what has been happening around him. More recently there has finally been a correction because the lending institutions also gambled on capital gains on farms they lent on and finally the bubble has burst and they've lost money. It is still being fuelled, though, by overseas investors, not so much for profit, as guarantee of produce/product supply. Our land is perceived as cheap and the world is clamouring to buy it.
We don't have death duties. Capital gains on inheritance passed on after death will be rolled over to the heir, and not payable until the gain on the asset is realised.
Regarding Mr Harrison's assertions of more trusts and companies being formed to avoid tax. This Government is already clamping down on this.
Finally, he writes "taxing with one-rule fits all will not work or be fair". What a stupid thing to write. We already have many "one-rules fits all" tax policies. All those who work pay tax, we pay rates on our properties which is really a tax, we register our vehicles which is a tax, we buy diesel/petrol which is heavily taxed and we pay GST which is a tax, all "one rule" taxes and they work. Of course there are many more.
Yes to Capital Gains Tax.
D Carter, Onga Onga
Kids come first
Re: Call for crossing after Taradale boy's death: I agree there should be a controlled pedestrian crossing, there are two blind spots on both sides of this road, and I travel past this crossing daily and it's a death trap waiting. Who is next to be killed before council is going to jump in and put one in?
It takes a death before they move: Save our children, councillors, stop worrying about where money for the next art deco is going to come in for profits. Let's get back down to earth, kids come first before profits.
Put a controlled crossing in, guys, to avoid the black spot accident.
Murray Whittington, Napier

No dolphin haven
I am absolutely fed up with those who persist in perpetuating the myth that Marineland was a haven for dolphins where they lived "... healthily and energetically far longer than in the wild ...". I refer to Mr Russ Spiller's letter of July 28. Whatever figure we accept as the normal life expectancy of a wild dolphin (estimates range from 20 to 40 years), the fact remains that just two of the 70 to 80 dolphins which survived capture and actually made it into a Marineland pool lived for more than 20 years. My mathematics isn't great, but two out of 80 suggests to me a "success" rate of just 2.5 per cent. With Mr Spiller's historical connection with the Aquarium and Marineland I would have thought he would have been more aware of the animal mortality rate at Marineland. And to compare taking dolphins from the wild to that of keeping birds or dogs is just ludicrous.
But the main point of Mr Spiller's letter was the suggestion that Marineland should be used to ensure the survival of the endangered Maui dolphin. At first reading, this doesn't seem like such a bad idea, but unless a captive breeding programme was designed to replenish the wild population, what would be the point? In 40 years Marineland never bred from any of the four dolphin species held, so the chances of producing dolphins in the numbers required to enable a viable population to be released into the wild must be considered slim to say the least.
While I support every effort to save the wild population of Maui dolphin, I cannot agree - as Mr Spiller suggests - that captive preservation is preferable to wild extinction. Who/what is it preferable for? Certainly not the dolphins.
Robin Stewart, Greenmeadows East