Blindly cutting away

23 comments on “Blindly cutting away ”

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1. Rich 1

   26 March 2009 at 4:37 pm

   What Rodney calls business, most people call fraud.

   (I see another ACT candidate has been busted. The way they’re going they’ll soon have a higher crime rate than the Mongrel Mob. Maybe yellow jackets will be caught be the patch ban?).
   • Felix 1.1

     26 March 2009 at 7:53 pm

     Jesus. Here’s a quote from the article Rich linked to:

     He described online sexual chat with 12-year-olds as “fun and sexually exciting” but said his activities were “harmless” and the girls could “block” him from their computers if they wanted.

     See, it’s ALL ABOUT CHOICE.
     • Dean 1.1.1

       26 March 2009 at 8:15 pm

       Dover Samuels.

       See, the problem is with you holier than thou lefties is that whatever brown stuff you want to fling, theres an ample suppy of it to throw back at you.

       It’s be funny if you weren’t so goddamn serious about it.
       • Felix 1.1.1.1

         26 March 2009 at 8:35 pm

         Well it is a serious matter, Dean. Might even be a 3 strikes offense.

         What do you think about his assertion that the girls could block him from their computers if they wanted?

         I hope you’re not suggesting that he’s right and that young girls should have the choice to hang with pedos if they want to.

         I really hope you’re not defending this, Dean.
         • Dean 1.1.1.1.1

           26 March 2009 at 8:46 pm

           “I really hope you’re not defending this, Dean.”

           Of course I’m not. I’d rather he was out of the gene pool altogether.
       • QoT 1.1.1.2

         26 March 2009 at 11:39 pm

         Dover Samuels has been convicted of possessing child porn and tried to excuse it by saying his victims could choose not to engage with him?

         Must’ve been asleep that week.
2. Greg 2

   26 March 2009 at 5:03 pm

   What ever your views about R&D, a tax credit is an extremely bad way to promote it. Talk to a few business owners – they just redefine what they call R&D to gain the tax credit. Its an over all loss because of the extra admin required to make the adjustment. An R&D tax credit does not increase R&D (even though it will say so on paper), its just a straight subsidy to business for no gain.
3. Felix 3

   26 March 2009 at 7:42 pm

   Talk to a few business owners – they just redefine what they call R&D to gain the tax credit.

   Would they be time travellers?
4. Dean 4

   26 March 2009 at 8:13 pm

   And if you think that anywhere more than a tiny fraction of small business owners qualified for or took advantage of this credit then you’re truly deluding yourself.

   I realise that Labour abandoned its knowledge wave mentality after a few years in government, and that people’s memories are short – but to actually desperately believe that you’ve just made a point is utterly and totally stupid.

   As an excercise, perhaps you could tell everyone the percentages of small business that benefited from this so-called “tax credit”?

   I await with the most baited of breath.
   • Felix 4.1

     26 March 2009 at 8:31 pm

     Approximately zero percent as it was cancelled by the National/Act govt before it even came into effect.

     That’s why it’s so funny to hear people like Greg, above, telling such blatant lies about how the credits were being misused and abused. Your first sentence is pretty funny in this light too.
     • Dean 4.1.1

       26 March 2009 at 8:47 pm

       You may wish to see where I said “qualified for”.
       • Felix 4.1.1.1

         26 March 2009 at 8:56 pm

         I also saw where you said “or took advantage of” and “benefited from”.

         But that’s ok – I’ve heard National and Act members in the house talk about it this way too and I know that they know they’re lying, but when guys like you repeat it, it’s probably just naivety.
     • infused 4.1.2

       27 March 2009 at 8:24 am

       Funny, you don’t mind applying the same logic to the so called “Fire at will bill”.
       • Felix 4.1.2.1

         27 March 2009 at 10:12 am

         The 90 day bill has been cancelled before it came into effect?

         Missed that, thanks for the update.
   • Stack2 4.2

     27 March 2009 at 4:46 pm

     And it’s “bated breath”, not baited – although I must admit I don’t know what you’ve eaten lately.
5. gingercrush 5

   26 March 2009 at 8:45 pm

   I think National made some mistakes with the R&D credit and they certainly should do something to replace it. But Labour’s R&D credits had obvious problems. But National should have either fixed it or worked through something to replace it. And they haven’t done either. There must be some ability to make it all tax deductible at least.
6. Matthew Pilott 6

   26 March 2009 at 11:04 pm

   Well at least the Righties are being consistent here – people on the dole are bludgers and theiving off the rich, rorting the system, and now all businesspeople will rort a system (it wouldn’t be as easy as asserted here, but I think that’s just a lack of understanding of the policy) when given half a chance.

   I thought the Left were stereotypically meant to be the ones who thought that Business would exploit opportunities unscrupulously – maybe the Right only thinks so when the idea came from the Left.

   So they’ll rort R & D tax credits, but not the 90-day bill or being able to exchange a weeks’ leave for cash – hmm…what do the last two have in common?
7. BLiP 7

   27 March 2009 at 7:43 am

   And then there’s the cancelling of the rural R & D scheme “Fast Forward”. National said it would do this before the election but was surreptitious afterwards because it knew the key players in the industry were less than impressed.

   What – with leaving small communities to fend for themselves in the provision of the fundamental necessity of water and pissing off the farmers as part of their open agenda (let alone the perils of the hidden one) is it possible, is there a glimmer, the merest skerrick of a snowball’s chance this National government could be one term wonder?

   Fuck, I hope so.
8. r0b 8

   27 March 2009 at 8:22 am

   this National government could be one term wonder?

   Nahh “John Key is on record as saying he has no interest in leading a one-term government.” So there you have it.

   On topic – stuffing R&D initiatives seems very short sighted to me. The interview with Taylor is worth listening to – experience from someone in the front line.
9. Observer 9

   27 March 2009 at 2:13 pm

   I work for a LARGE company. Last year we were told to look for Anything that might Possibly be categorised as R&D in our every day routine work and document it so that the accountants could ‘test it’ against their interpretation of the government’s R&D initiative.

   Is that enough evidence that there was a BIG PROBABILITY that the major impact of the initiative would be to reduce government revenue without increasing the country’s competitive positioning.
10. sean 10

    27 March 2009 at 5:03 pm

    Matthew Pillott, do you ever not deal in strawman arguments? It is the lowest form of arguing – sharpen up.
    • Matthew Pilott 10.1

      27 March 2009 at 5:14 pm

      It wasn’t one in the slightest, but you’ve invented some form of new low there yourself. Some form of cross between whining, having a whinge, and having a cry. Go enjoy the sun.
11. r0b 11

    28 March 2009 at 11:39 pm

    Last year we were told to look for Anything that might Possibly be categorised as R&D in our every day routine work and document it so that the accountants could ‘test it’ against their interpretation of the government’s R&D initiative.

    Do you disapprove of that? Do those same accountants look for ways to minimise tax payments and “test” them against their interpretation of the government’s tax laws? Anything wrong with that (in your opinion)?

    Is that enough evidence that there was a BIG PROBABILITY that the major impact of the initiative would be to reduce government revenue without increasing the country’s competitive positioning.

    No it ISN’T.

    First, as above, companies look for ways to maximise their profits within the law all the time, and nobody bats an eyelid, e.g. tax avoidance (not tax evasion).

    Second, your company was exploring its position, that doesn’t mean that an application for R&D credits would have been successful – if it was an obvious rort it should have been spotted and declined. If it was approved, then in the government’s view the activity qualified as R&D, and should have been supported.

    Third, of course you can’t design a perfect system, nobody expects that. The tax system gets rorted by some but we still have a tax system. The welfare system gets rorted by some but we still have a welfare system. Credit cards gets rorted by some but we still have credit cards, and so on. It’s a cost of doing business. Or for government, a cost of achieving its goals. If the government is serious about supporting local business, fostering innovation, a high tech economy and so on, it needs to be offering support. The R&D credits were such a form of support.

    I don’t know the real reason National cut the R&D credits. It seems to be an ideological burp. The argument that they had to go because some companies would abuse them is self evidently pathetic. National is either serious about supporting R&D based industry or it isn’t. Apparently it isn’t. Apparently a cycleway will be much better for our economy than supporting hundreds of innovative businesses. Hmmmm.

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