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I did see that there is talk that it will be means tested in the next budget, which if correct, totally stinks because working parents already pay a heap more than non working in fees to begin with,. I think the govt would be well advised to leave it alone! If anything, there needs to be MORE help for high income parents and childcare in my opinion.
i tend to think Middle to High income families need some more support - i don't believe CCR should be open slather for everyone - when you have people on 700k plus asking why they can't get it if their partner is SAHP, and then working the system so that she is, on paper anyway, doing work for his business just to qualify for CCR - nope, not a fan of that behaviour:
i don't believe ANY payment should have a hard cut off. personally, i think the 75k baby bonus estimate, the 150k ftbb cut off - it's not reasonable. all payments should have a sliding scale so that an extra dollar in income doesn't make the difference between qualifying and not qualifying. currently the payments deemed as income support have sliding scales - the more you earn the less you get. i don't believe there is a problem with having a similar scheme in place for CCR for those in the 200k plus family income bracket. perhaps at 200k your 50% starts to reduce, by 300k it's at nothing. far more reasonable than 199 999 being eligible for 50%, 200k eligible for nothing
or maybe that's just my personal sense of fairness trying to show through lol
I agree with you BG - I guess my idea of a high income and the reality of high income are two different things! For my service, I look at the ccb% and fees parents who are on the $80000 combined income amount and it doesn't seem fair. They are doing their best to support their families, then there are those who choose not to work (and I mean both parents on centrelink, not sahm)they are seemingly rewarded because they get full ccb and pay next to nothing.
I completely agree with you BG. I do hope that the speculation that it will only be affected for incomes over $150k is right though. DH and I have a combined income of about $85k. I went back to work simply because financially I have to and if our child care tax rebate was cut we'd be absolutely freaking stuffed!:
I'm not sure whether $80K counts as a high income for a couple these days? The average weekly income (ABS figure) was around $67K last time I checked. So $80K isn't even 1.5 average incomes and yet many families report that they both need to work (to some extent) to make ends meet.:
I hate how they keep on taking things from SAHM's... I stay home because I want to be there for the boys whilst young... it doesn't mean that it's an easy ride or that we're rich or anything... but if I was working, for what I'd get paid working FT and having to pay fees for both boys in childcare... wow, so would not be worth my time working and missing out on so much with them... we pay currently... $510 per month for Oskar to go to kindy 2 days a week... yep 2 days a week and that's out of our pockets... so without the CCR that would just make it even harder for us!! We barely get any CCB. I'm hoping that I'm not going to be losing out on it in the budget!
There was a good point on Sunrise, that being " just because you look rich on paper, you may still be cash poor"................where do we draw the line in deciding who is better off. I'm sorry that is just my opinion, but just because you get more doesn't mean you deserve less help in instances such as a rebate - I (again just IMO) believe with things like that & the baby bonus it's all or nothing, available to everyone or no one.
And yes, as unpopular as this may make me I do get a little upset that because my partner and I work VERY hard, or have done extra study etc to make a good amount of $$$ we are entilted to nothing but others out there can choose to sit around and do nothing (I'm not talking SAHM), I mean neather couple wants to work and they get $$$ etc here & there.
I hear you Erin, it gets frusrating with the way these things work and how they are calculated!
I just worked out that two children in care three days per week would cost me $26760 per year without the rebate. Makes working seem not that worthwhile....
We're similiar FabFiona! The rebate has made it way more worth going to work from a $$ POV. I also agree that there should be more incentives/assistance to return to the workforce. Not sure who will fund everyone's old age and health care in the future otherwise??
Also think that the ideas of a high income family need to be reassessed in line with the average mortgage, bills etc.
It's funny too, because if I stop work we will then be eligible for FTB which we aren't now. So not only am I NOT contributing to the taxation base, but I'm now eligible for a Govt payment.
Le sigh.
What I find laughable is the way child care cost statistics are collected and expressed as an "average" with the CCB and CCR adjustments already made:
Which would lead a casual observer to assume families are paying $100 a fortnight for care (AND THE REST)! I keep wondering why, based on our new improved income since i returned to work, we still seem to have diddly at the end of each fortnight...then I remember that I spend nearly half my pay on childcare (!!) and suddenly it all makes sense.:
The average net cost to parents for formal care (taking into account the Child Care Benefit and Child Care Tax Rebate entitlements) was $53 per week.
When I start my new job in a week I am looking at $10,000 a year after CCB, but before CCR, for 1 in care 4 days per week. We have chosen to not think about CCR and just treat it as a nice little bonus when it does come in (well I hope it works out like that for us).
I don't think an annual income of $150k for a couple is high. I would think it is middle income!:
One of the latest articles:
Tearful parents protest as up to 64,000 may face childcare rebate cuts in federal Budget | News.com.au
In line with what md said before if 67k is average anything over 134k would be considered high.
That's per person. So for a couple it doubles. So 150k would be middle income.
Eta:.sorry misread your post...still think it wouldn't be classified as "high" though!
Actually I think the middle income is usually taken to be 80 - 120% of some magic figure that is not actually the average weekly earnings - it has to do with your earnings after tax and medicare levy is paid and then it's equivalised based on the extra expenses involved in having children - so the answer to the million dollar question is - after lots of reading - I still can't work out exactly what "middle income" refers to :rofl::