Successive governments have overspent, misallocated capital and treated taxpayer money as if it were unlimited.
Now Australians are being drawn into a false argument over who should carry the burden: capital or labour, investors or workers, business or households.
That is the trap.
The real issue is not simply who pays more. The real issue is whether the government spends wisely, disciplines itself, and stops asking the productive parts of the economy to fund waste, duplication and poor policy design.
Without serious spending reform, the debate becomes a zero-sum fight between taxpayers. Capital resists. Labour feels squeezed. Households lose trust. Business delays investment. Productivity stalls.
A country cannot tax and transfer its way to prosperity if the underlying system keeps wasting the money it already takes.
Australia needs a harder conversation: not just how revenue is raised, but whether public money is being used well.
Until that happens, we will keep arguing over the bill, while avoiding the real question: why is the bill so high in the first place?