Endnotes
Table 1Taxation
statistics by Commonwealth electoral division
Table 2Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by taxable individuals
Table 3Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by total taxable income
Table 4Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by mean taxable income
Table 5Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by total net tax
Table 6Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by mean net tax
Table 7Commonwealth
electoral divisions ranked by net tax ratio
Bibliography
List of
Maps
Mean Taxable Income by Commonwealth Electoral
Division
Net Tax Ratio by Commonwealth Electoral
Division
Maps are available in hard copy (Senators and
Members only) or PDF version.
Imputation credit. Tax paid at
the company rate is allocated to shareholders by way of imputation
credit attached to the (franked) dividends they receive. An amount
equal to the imputation credit is included in assessable income of
the shareholders, who are then entitled to a (franking) rebate of
tax equal to the amount included in their
income.
Mean
net tax. Average (mean) amount of tax paid per taxable
individual and equal to total net tax divided by the number of
taxables.
Mean
taxable income. Taxable income divided by the number of
taxables, i.e. the average (mean) amount of taxable income per
taxable individual.
Net tax ratio (previously known
as effective rate of
tax). The percentage of total taxable income paid in tax and
equal to total net tax divided by the total taxable
income.
Non-taxables. Individual
taxpayers who, after taking into consideration the amount of
income, deductions, rebates, credits and levies, are not required
to pay tax.
Taxables. Individual taxpayers
who, after taking into consideration the amount of income,
deductions, rebates, credits and levies, are required to pay
tax.
Taxpayers. Taxable plus
non-taxable individuals.
Tax deduction. An amount that is
deducted from assessable income to arrive at the taxable income on
which the gross amount of tax to be paid is calculated. Each dollar
of tax deduction only reduces tax by the percentage of the
taxpayer's marginal rate of tax.
Tax rates scale,
2000-01
|
Taxable income
|
Tax payable (a)
|
|
From
|
To
|
|
$0
|
$6 000
|
Nil
|
|
|
|
|
|
$6 001
|
$20 000
|
Nil
|
+
|
17c
|
for each $1 over
|
$6 000
|
|
$20 001
|
$50 000
|
$2 380
|
+
|
30c
|
for each $1 over
|
$20 000
|
|
$50 001
|
$60 000
|
$11 380
|
+
|
42c
|
for each $1 over
|
$50 000
|
|
$60 001
|
|
$15 580
|
+
|
47c
|
for each $1 over
|
$60 000
|
(a)
A Medicare
levy of 1.5 per cent of taxable income is also payable. Also the
tax-free threshold is increased for certain taxpayers with
dependent children.
Tax rebate. An amount that
reduces tax (i.e. tax offset) that is subtracted directly from the
income tax payable. Each dollar of tax rebate reduces tax by a
dollar, but rebates and credits allowed cannot exceed the gross
tax.
Total net tax. Tax payable by
taxable individuals after rebates and credits have been deducted
from the gross tax calculated on taxable income. Net tax includes
the Medicare Levy as well as the amount
equal to the imputation credits, because each taxpayer claiming
this credit has effectively paid the taxthe dividends (income) they
received are already net of tax (paid at the company
rate).
Total taxable income. The income
of all taxables, to which the tax rates scale is applied; it is
equal to total income less deductions.
This paper provides taxation information for
each Commonwealth electoral division (CED). The information shown
includes such categories as the number of taxpayers (taxables and
non-taxables), taxable income and the amount of tax paid. Tables
have also been produced that rank the CEDs against some of these
categories. The paper also includes choropleth (colour coded) maps
of electoral divisions for mean taxable income and net tax
ratio.
The statistics in this brief relate to the
200001 income year and provide updated information to the 199697
data published by the authors in an earlier publication (see
bibliography). However, the statistics are not necessarily directly
comparable because of electoral boundary redistributions in New
South Wales, South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania and the
Northern Territory, and because total net tax data released by the
Australian Taxation Office (ATO) now includes imputation
credits.
The information shown in the following tables
has been derived from data published at the postcode level by the
ATO in Taxation Statistics,
2000-01. The allocation of postcodes to CEDs, or the
concordance, is based upon results from the 2001 Census of
Population and Housing and shows electoral divisions as at the 2001
election. When a postcode falls entirely within a CED, the postcode
is wholly included within the CED. When a postcode is dissected by
CED boundaries the results for the postcode are proportioned
between the CEDs based upon the percentages of the population of
that postcode that reside in each CED. Postcodes specified in the
ATO data that are not Census-derived postcodes have been allocated
to a CED using a map overlay method.
The postcode information published by the ATO
is for the postcode stated in the home address on each tax return.
If a postcode is not stated or, if stated, is not a valid postcode,
i.e. no such postcode exists, the information is classified as
unallocated within the State or Territory where the tax return was
processed.(1)
The tax data shown in the tables were compiled
by the ATO from individual tax return forms for the 200001 income
year. Although the tax statistics were released on 15 December
2003, they only include information from forms which were processed
by 31 October 2002. Therefore, the data for 200001 are not
necessarily complete.
Table 1, Taxation statistics by Commonwealth
electoral division, shows various categories of tax
information for the 200001 income year for each Commonwealth
electoral division, listed alphabetically by
State/Territory.(2) This information shows that the ACT
has the highest average (mean) taxable income ($43 171)
followed by NSW ($41 626) and Victoria ($38 636). The
Northern Territory, which had the second-highest average taxable
income in 199697, has now dropped to fourth. The ACT ($10 922) pays
the highest average (mean) tax; however, the average tax paid in
NSW ($10 649) is only just below the ACT. This gives NSW the
highest net tax ratio, which is probably due to the effect of NSW
paying more tax (proportionately) in the top income tax bracket.
The Northern Territory, with greater access to tax rebates such as
zone rebates, and Tasmania, with the lowest average taxable
incomeover $4 900 below the national average and $9 600 below the
ACTare the lowest net tax ratio jurisdictions (21.8 per cent).
Victoria is just above the average income, average tax and tax
ratio of Australia as a whole, while Tasmania is also the bottom
State in average income and average tax.
Table 2, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by taxable
individuals, shows, as expected, the smallest electorates (by
number of electors enrolled) at the bottom of the
table.(3) Tasmania has four electorates in the bottom
five and all five of its electorates are in the bottom seven, while
the Northern Territory electorates are bottom and eighth bottom.
The ACT electorates of Fraser and Canberra appear at the top of
this table because they are the largest electorates in
Australia.(4)
Although
not shown in this paper, if a comparison is made of the ratio of
taxable individuals to electors, a further picture emerges. The top
ten electorates have, on average, 81 taxables for every 100
electors enrolled, with Sydney (NSW) having 98 and North Sydney
(NSW) and Wentworth (NSW) each having 88. The bottom ten
electorates have only 55 taxables per 100 electors, with the
Northern Territory electorates being at either end of the range:
Lingiari has only 46 and Solomon (i.e inner metropolitan Darwin)
75.(5) The Australian average is 66 taxables per 100
electors.
The top ten electorates are all inner metropolitan (in Sydney,
Melbourne and Canberra). These electorates tend to have lower
unemployment levels and more two-income families. Over half of the
bottom ten electorates are classified as rural, and electorates
such as Cowper (NSW) and Richmond (NSW)both rural electorates on
the north coast of NSWalso include large numbers of retired
people.
Table 3, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by total
taxable income, shows similar patterns to Table 2 and is
influenced by two factors, firstly, the number of taxable
individuals, and secondly, the size of the incomes of those
taxables. The ATO states that:
The source and level of income varies according to
the age and employment status of the taxpayer. For example, among
retirees the main sources of income are government and other
pensions and annuities, and eligible termination payments. As a
result, the amount oftaxable income [is] low among older age
groups.
Level of income also varies widely according to
geographic location. People of similar incomes tend to live in the
same general areas.(6)
An obvious example of the effect of income
sizeswhether incomes are generally higher or lower relative to
other electoratesis the reordering of electorates throughout this
table in comparison with Table 2. At the top of the table, the
generally much higher incomes of the north shore and eastern
suburbs areas of Sydney and the eastern suburbs of Melbourne have
caused these electorates to displace the ACT electorates, which
have higher numbers of taxpayers.
At the bottom end of the table, the smaller
electorates of the Northern Territory and Tasmania are joined by
the NSW north coast and hinterland electorates of Lyne, Cowper,
Page and Richmond and the Queensland rural electorate of Wide
Bay.
Table 4, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by mean
taxable income, shows an income spread from just under
$29 900 in Cowper (NSW) to almost $70 900 in Bradfield (NSW).
Calare (NSW) and Lalor (Vic) are the electorates in the middle of
the table with average incomes around $35 550.
As mentioned above, unemployment levels have
an important effect on the number of taxpayers and the level of
income. In the December quarter 2000, Bradfield (NSW), North Sydney
(NSW) and Wentworth (NSW) were estimated to have unemployment rates
of 1.7 per cent, 2.5 per cent and 3.0 per cent
respectively.(7) At the other end of the rankings,
Cowper (NSW), Fairfax (Qld) and Page (NSW) had unemployment rates
of 12.2 per cent, 12.0 per cent and 10.7 per cent respectively. At
this same time the national unemployment rate was 6.2 per cent.
Cowper and Page are situated on the north
coast of NSW while Fairfax takes in the Sunshine Coast of
Queensland. Apart from having high unemployment levels, these areas
are all rural electorates that also have high proportions of
retired people. The combination of these factors would help explain
their low levels of average taxable income.
Table 5, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by total
net tax, shows the total net individual income tax paid on the
total taxable income in each electorate.
This table is not comparable with the similar
table in the earlier publication because the net tax category
published by the ATO now includes imputation credits.(8)
This particularly affects the electorates at the top of the table
which have high levels of imputation credits reflecting the levels
of share ownership by the higher income groups.
North Sydney (NSW), at the top, paid nearly
$1.8 billion in tax in 200001, Lingiari (NT), at the other end,
paid under $210 million. The effect of marginal tax
rates(9) is evident here because North Sydney only has
3.0 times the taxables of Lingiari yet has 5.6 times the taxable
income and pays 8.7 times net tax. The average taxable income in
North Sydney attracts the top marginal tax rate of 48.5 per centin
199697, it attracted the second top marginal rate of 44.7 per
centthe average taxable income in Lingiari a marginal rate of 31.5
per cent (the electorate of Lingiari did not exist at the 1996
election).(10) This result is further emphasised when
looking at the net tax ratio (or average rate of tax) shown in
Table 7.
Table 6, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by mean net
tax, shows the average tax paid by the taxable individuals in
each electorate. This varied from $5 940 in Cowper (NSW) to
$23 550 in Bradfield (NSW), with the tax paid in the
middle-ranking electorates of provincial Moncrieff (Qld) and rural
Calare (NSW) of $7 990.
Table 7, Commonwealth electoral divisions ranked by net tax
ratio (previously called effective rate of tax), shows the
average (mean) rate of tax paid on the taxable income. At the top
of the rankings 33 per cent, or a third, of income is paid in tax
compared with the bottom where 20 per cent, or a fifth, of income
is tax.
1.
It is possible for a valid postcode not to be a valid
residential postcode, e.g. post office box postcodes. Also, for
confidentiality reasons, postcodes with fewer than 100 taxpayers
(non-taxables plus taxables) are also classified as
unallocated.
2.
The totals shown for NSW and ACT differ from those
published by the ATO. The ATO includes the information for the
postcode 2619 (Jerrabomberra, NSW) in its totals for the ACT; the
figures in this paper include 2619 in NSW.
3.
After
the Northern
Territory,
Tasmania
has the smallest
electorates in the country with an average enrolment of nearly 66
350 electors. The two Northern
Territory electorates have an
average of just over 55 500 compared with the average
enrolment in Australia
in 2001 of
84 725.
4.
At the 2001 Federal election, the number of electors
enrolled for these electorates was Canberra 108 959 and Fraser
112 225. The average enrolment for the other top ten
electorates was 88 525.
5.
A list of electorates and the number of electors
enrolled at the 2001 election can be found in Commonwealth Election
2001 (see the bibliography).
6.
Australian Taxation Office, Taxation Statistics, 199697, A Summary
of Taxation, Superannuation and Child Support Statistics, p.
15.
7.
Estimates of unemployment rates by electoral division
are produced by the Statistics Group of the Parliamentary Library
from data published in Small Area Labour Markets by the
Department of Employment, Workplace Relations and Small Business.
For more information on the methodology involved in producing the
unemployment rates for electorates see A. Kopras and T. Kryger,
Estimated Unemployment Rates by Electorate, December Quarter 1997,
Research Note, no. 46,
Information and Research Services, Department of the Parliamentary
Library, Canberra, 199798. The unemployment rate data can be found
on the Parliamentary Library intraNetavailable only to Members and
Senators at
http://libiis1/Library_Services/electoralatlas/Electorate/SmallArea.htm#division
8.
The imputation credit
is included because dividends received by taxpayers from companies
are assessable income, and although tax has already been paid by
the companies, this amount of tax would have been payable by the
taxpayers. Dividends that are taxed at the company level and then
distributed to taxpayers are also accompanied by an imputation
credit equal to the amount of tax paid. Since dividends are
assessable income but the dividends received are net dividends,
i.e. net of tax, the amount of dividend that is assessed as income
(or added to any existing taxable income) is the net dividend plus
the imputation credit. Tax is calculated on the total taxable
income and then reduced by the amount of imputation
credit.
9.
The marginal rate of tax is the rate of tax that is paid
on the last dollar earned. For the 200001 income tax rates scale,
see the Glossary.
10.
These marginal rates include the Medicare Levy of 1.5
per cent of taxable income (1.7 per cent in 199697).