Back in 2007, [1] then Prime Minister John Howard proclaimed that Australian home owners should welcome high immigration driving up the property value of their homes. In saying this, Howard seemed indifferent to the plight of other Australians who had to pay much higher rent or who faced the struggle to pay off even higher mortgages in order to have a roff their head.
Now, in 2018, those Australians who supposedly gained from housing inflation, have now found their property rates, based on the valuation of their homes, are expected to climb an extra $100 per year which is above the supposed Victorian state government rate cap of 2.25% per annum as reported (behind a paywall) in the Herald Sun. [2]
Whilst property values increases are the excuse for the imposition of rate increases, the real reason is the ongoing increase in costs per capita to maintain existing services - footpaths, roads, power, garbage disposal, transport - for a population that has long since exceeded its optimum size.
So, not only is our quality of life being eroded through greater traffic congestion, loss of open spaces, native fauna and flora and loss fo social cohesion as a consequence of imposed population growth, but we also are losing in hard economic terms.
Much of the supposed economic prosperity is because services we did not need at all before population growth, or if we did, we needed much less of, creates opportunies for the provision of those services.
Footnote[s]
[1] I am not certain if this was said in 2007 or as early as 2005, but I did have this confirmed in a copy of the Age of Victoria
[2] See Rising property values to push rates above 2.25 per cent cap (3/6/16) (or "Rates about to rise" in the printed version) | Herald Sunby Ian Royall.
Victorian rates to rise as China no longer accepts our recycling
From Victorian councils expected to raise rates as China recycling crisis takes hold (21/4/18) ABC News :
Victorian homeowners will ultimately bear the brunt of China's decision to ban foreign waste, with the state's peak local government body estimating ratepayers will be stung an extra $60 a year to cover recycling costs.
The Municipal Association of Victoria is expecting ratepayers across the state to fork out an extra $1 a week to keep up their kerbside recycling services.
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Comment: From the above, it seems that Victorian ratepayers are now expected to bear more of the cost for the disposal of non-reusable containers in which food and beverage producers store their products
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