Let’s see how Gerry Harvey would like it if we started a campaign to lobby the Australian government asking them to single out Gerry Harvey and his Harvey Norman stores to pay more tax.
Do you think that darling of the mainstream media would approve?
Would he be delighted if the government passed a law saying that Gerry Harvey and Harvey Norman, but no-one else must pay an extra 10% tax?
Mainstream commentator, Peter Switzer calls Gerry Harvey a “business great”.
Really? How have those Harvey Norman [ASX: HVN] shares been doing lately? Here’s a chart just in case you haven’t followed them:
Source: CMC Markets Stockbroking
Apparently Mr. Harvey has been whinging about the fact that Australians can buy stuff cheaper from overseas than they can from one of Mr. Harvey’s shops.
He was quoted by The Age as saying:
“The government can’t just ignore it. They can’t just say it is too hard, it is too much money… it is sending retailers broke.”
His whinge is that imported items worth less than $1,000 are exempt from GST and import duties. He wants that to change. Mr. Harvey wants you to be slugged for GST on stuff you buy from overseas…
Mr. Harvey is lobbying the government to convince them that YOU should pay more tax. Just so his business can make more money. So that you’ll be less inclined to shop online and instead will buy from Harvey Norman stores instead.
So, while you’re shopping online to try and save a few bob on household items or clothing, just remember that the “business great” Gerry Harvey pocketed a cool $725,139 in salary last year.
Although we will be fair, because it seems as though $411,928 worth of his share options expired worthless. The annual report states:
“The performance conditions in respect of the 2007 EOP Allocation were not satisfied.”
We’re guessing that means the share price stayed below a certain level, or other performance objectives weren’t met therefore Mr. Harvey and the other senior management didn’t get a stack of shares. Maybe one of those other performance measures was not meeting sales targets, but who knows.
But fear not. According to the same annual report, the directors trousered a wad of “Performance Cash Incentive” instead. In Mr. Harvey’s case $400,000… which by our reckoning nicely covers the amount forfeited from not meeting the performance conditions.
Here’s the proof from the latest annual report:
Source: Harvey Norman
Didn’t meet your performance targets? Don’t worry, here’s a bunch of cash anyway.
Isn’t it great when powerful business leaders are able to cosy up to government and advise them that you, the ordinary Australian should pay more tax, just so the same powerful business leaders can cop an extra few thousand dollars into their back pocket?
And surprise, surprise, it’s working. The Age reports this morning that:
“Shorten considers taxing web shoppers”.
Oh joy. Your mortgage has just gone up. Price inflation is running close to 3% on the official figures, and probably a lot more in real life, and now business and government are getting in to bed with each other to connive a way for you to get taxed even more.
As if the government taxing over 40% of the private sector wasn’t enough. Now it wants even more.
But hang on a minute. Isn’t that price collusion? Wouldn’t it be the case of one organisation (government) colluding with another organisation (Harvey Norman) to forcibly increase the price of products?
It sounds like it to us. But of course, when you’ve got the government on your side, the idea of colluding to harm the consumer is set aside for the supposed greater good of protecting Australia’s business interests.
We know that Mr. Harvey is a “business great”, because Peter Switzer tells us so. But here’s some free advice for Mr. Harvey… rather than lobbying the government to increase the tax bill of Australians perhaps it would be a good idea if Harvey Norman joined in on the online shopping age.
Have you ever tried to buy anything online from Harvey Norman? That’s right, you can’t.
The best the Harvey Norman website can offer is the option to add items to a “Wish List” which you then… erm… can print out!
We’re not quite sure what you’re supposed do with it then… close your eyes really tightly and make a wish? Send the Wish List to Santa perhaps? Or leave it under your pillow for the tooth fairy? Ooh, ooh, that’ll do it, that’s an online shopping experience for you.
Give me a break.
There’s your problem Mr. Harvey. Get yourself an online presence… a real online presence, not a half-baked one, and do you know what, you’d probably attract a whole bunch of business you’re missing out on.
But, that would require innovation – albeit an innovation many retailers discovered about twenty years ago. Why bother spending money on that when you can just kick up a fuss and get the government to do the work for you by taxing imports.
At least that way it won’t cost Harvey Norman a cent. Maybe that’s why Peter Switzer calls Gerry Harvey a “business great”.
But while we’re on the subject of buying online, we’ve frequently used the example of buying books in Australia. Amazingly as it sounds, you can go to bookdepository.co.uk and buy books, shipped from the UK for roughly half the price of what it costs you to buy the same book from an Aussie bookshop.
And it’s not just due to the higher Aussie dollar. Even when the Aussie was 20% lower it was still much, much cheaper to buy books from overseas and have them shipped half way across the world than it was to buy them locally.
The fact is, many Aussie retailers are taking Aussie consumers for a ride. They need to be taught a lesson. And that lesson is in seeing sales go overseas. Once they take a hit to the bottom line they’ll figure out they need to be more competitive and then they’ll drop their prices… or go out of business.
Or in Harvey Norman’s case try to get the government to prop up their ailing firm.
If they go out of business, tough. That’s not the consumer’s fault. Although to be fair, in some ways it’s not all the fault of the retailer either. Government intervention has a lot to do with it. Such as onerous regulations and business-killing policies such as the minimum wage.
That’s why shoppers are shopping online. Because Aussie retailers just aren’t competitive enough.
Until then, our advice to you reader, is to boycott Harvey Norman stores. Do you really want to line the pocket of a company that’s lobbying the government to increase your tax bill?
I know I don’t. And you shouldn’t either.
Speaking of manipulation, the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) has made it to the headlines in the last few days. Yesterday we noticed this press release from the RBA:
The press release states that the RBA has decided to sale its 50% interest in corrupt plastic money-maker Securency.
You know those fancy coloured notes you carry around in your wallet or purse? Those are made by Securency, an Australian business. The RBA is half owner and has a few seats on the board.
Well, you may have seen the recent scandals surrounding the business where allegations have been made that senior officials at the company bribed foreign officials in order to secure contracts to print plastic notes.
It was even claimed that current RBA governor Glenn Stevens spruiked on behalf of Securency when he was deputy governor at the RBA.
Now, the RBA wants to get rid of the business, because clearly the whole thing stinks. Not that the RBA should be throwing any stones. Revelations were made this week that in the early 2000s the RBA actively intervened in government policy in order to create a housing bubble.
Can you believe it?
The Australian newspaper puts it another way, it’s headline was, “RBA intervened to avert housing slump”.
Either way, it means the same thing. Propping up the housing market. Only of course, by not letting it pop then they’ve made it ten-times worse now.
The Australian newspaper has gained access to a bunch of emails and documents from the Treasury and the RBA under Freedom of Information rules. The most interesting part of this will be revelations about the influence of external parties on RBA decisions and what communications were sent and received between government bodies and private individuals.
Communications they no doubt expected to remain secret.
But what stunned your editor when we read the report in The Australian was this:
“Ms Ellis [RBA official Luci Ellis], in a private email to Mr Richards and several colleagues, insisted there was no evidence the boom in the early part of the decade was caused by changes in supply-side conditions, more the price and availability of credit…”
Got that? This is the same Luci Ellis who said in a speech earlier this year:
“Recent data suggest that we do not have a credit-fuelled speculative boom on our hands.”
Really? Didn’t Ms. Ellis in a private email state, according to The Australian, “there was no evidence the boom in the early part of the decade was caused by changes in supply-side conditions, more the price and availability of credit…”
Is that the same Ms. Ellis? We think it might be.
Look, we haven’t been lucky enough to see the full email correspondence. But boy are we looking forward to getting our hands on it when or if it becomes available to the rest of the public.
But the behaviour of central bankers shouldn’t surprise you. They’re often portrayed by the mainstream press as being conservative and thoughtful. In reality, central bankers are as corrupt as you’d expect them to be. After all, think about the power they have – the power to determine the price of money.
There aren’t too many more influential roles in the economy than the ability to determine the price of the dollar in your pocket.
Therefore it shouldn’t be a surprise to learn that central bankers are prone to manipulate markets. As they did with pumping up the housing bubble, as revealed by The Australian newspaper.
Look no further than the US Federal Reserve and what it’s doing.
Look no further than the claim by Lord James of Blackheath that his:
“Biggest client was the IRA [Irish Republican Army] and I am pleased to say that I managed to write off more than £1bn of its money… I hasten to add that it is no good getting the police in, because I shall immediately call the Bank of England as my defence witness, given that it put me in to deal with these problems.”
Central bankers – conservative? Thoughtful? We wouldn’t have thought so. Corrupt? Yes. That just about does it. And there’s no reason to think the RBA is less corrupt than any other central bank.
People who are put into power by the favour of a government will do all they can to honour and return that favour… using any method necessary. That’s just a fact of life. Public service attracts a certain type of [ahem] person.
The type of person who thinks they know best and whose sole purpose in life is to tell others – including you – what to do – “It’s for your own good, just do it!”
The government and public sector are bad enough by themselves, but when you get collusion between the public sector and influential business people then the result is usually even worse…
With the ultimate victim always being the individual.
Cheers.
Kris Sayce
For Money Morning Australia
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dc – I will check out that link in a moment, but wanted to share a thought. You may well be correct. We need to keep evaluating and ever doubting our sources of information. If Jones, Assange and the like are all control points, their information is still valuable, just like Murdoch’s current campaign against Soros is a good source for gaining glimpses of what’s going down behind the scenese. Not being insiders, we largely rely on snippets of information slipping out as those on the inside tell and let slip on each others’ misdeeds and crimes.
dc – I looked at the link. Much of it looks rather dubious. Just because I don’t support some cause, it does not mean that I am against it. It might simply be that my interests lie elsewhere and my funds are limited, etc.
Jones’s support of Ron Paul, a Constitutionalist, and his call for Americans claiming back their Republic, abolishing the Fed, and indicting the miscreants are all healthy signs and speak clearly in his favour. I am not sure what else, and what more, he should be expected to do, but I am open to further discussion and information you may wish to point to.
Brother Nathanael’s criticism of Jones largely seems to go along the fact that Jones is never an open critic of Zionism and Israel as such. Many would consider that to be excusable, given the fact that no network will survive long if it displays and maintains an openly hostile attitude towards Zionism and Israel. Even Max Keiser, who on occasions has made some telling points about the treatment of the Palestinians on his shows has shut up about the subject. It is still a taboo, given the Zionist stranglehold on MSM, political parties and thus public opinion.
It is repression of legitimate criticism that should be allowed to be made in public. If the repression continues, history tells us that the resistence is going to build up under the surface, and will one day emerge in an uncontrolled and potentially violent and destructive form through a similarly repressive dictatorship.
That may not happen for a very long time, but the thievery, the looting, the political bribery and the countless ways of scamming and living off of the productive segments of the economy will only serve grow the resentment of the skinned and dispossessed and the end result is going to be a Putinisation (I just invented that word) of the political landscape, where a strong armed dictator, or the military, will be seen by people as the only way of ridding society of the corruption and scourge.
Unfortunately, the backlash will once again catch more innocent people in its net than the guilty, as the miscreants will largely make off their loot, even though they should consider the fact that the world is shrinking very rapidly, and they should accellerate space travel technology to be assured more reliable escape routes.
cb – I must admit that might not have been the best link, but it outlines Jone’s behaviour which (if you look at it from a controlled opposition perspective) is to hook in the folk who are starting to realise that something ain’t quite right, then diverting them in the direction that his handlers want…
Many people have also accused him of unneccessary fearmongering, Alex Cooper who predicted 9/11 and was assassinated
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAgTFWglHrc&feature=related
Sure there’s a lot of good quality information mixed in there too, there has to be to gain people’s trust.
what Alex Jones does say is good stuff and I’m also not suggesting that he is not worth watching as there are some real pearls mixed in there…
but you should bear in min what Alex Jones DOESN’T say, for instance he will squirm and dodge any question relating to the Jesuit Order and the Vatican connection, who a growing number of people think are on top of the power pyramid and were behind 9/11. Is it true? I don’t know, but did you notice the uneasiness in the room when Lord James said “Vatican Bank”, it seemed telling.
…or I may be looking way too much into it, which I’m also open to
but with all that’s been going on so far, it is easy to imagine that something big is going down and it’s following a script that has been planned for decadesy…
time will reveal
I hate to say it but I think Ron Paul is just more controlled opposition, this time wearing the “claiming back their Republic” hat, the power elite fund and control both sides of the equation and have always done things this way. infiltration of the system is extensive
Do a google search for “rothchild’s timeline” for some insights into some of the divide and conquer tactics that are used
Can anyone explain to me why an Australian Retailer has to tax an item and an overseas Retailer does not? It is a Goods and Services Tax and that matters not where the goods come from, surely?
Kris,
Glad to see you sticking it to Gerry Harvey, he is right up there on my list of despicables.
He is the same creature who also believes Australia should have a permanent underclass on pitiful wages, India-style, to do the middle & upper classes’ dirty work!
A right scumbag.
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