Frogblog has posted a very useful table comparing Labour's announced extension of the Working For Families package with a generous estimate of National's tax-cut plans - which shows that families earning up to $75,000 are better off with Labour. A useful statistic to keep in mind when looking at this is the median household income of the target group. According to the latest Household Economic Survey,
Thirty-five percent of 'one-family, couple with children only' households had an annual before-tax household income of $87,600 and over.
Digging through the supplementary tables gives a rough median of around $75,000 for that group (the overall median being around $42,000 with only 30% of households earning over $70,000 - which shows just how skewed an average figure can be).
Of course, if National is not as generous as Frogblog supposes, even more families will be better off. but we'll have to wait until Monday to find out.
Being a childless person in a gay defacto household all there will be in it for me, by voting Labour, is to pay for all that growing generosity towards lifestyle breeders. But if I chose National all I will be left with is a mortgage rate that will gobble up many times over any across the board tax cuts they will offer. It must he be real meaning of "mainstream" when you are being courted/bribed by both main parties.
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