Welcome to the forum Scootergirl, and seems as though you may already be familiar with the
Australian Taxation Office Homepage but if not it has all the taxation details and also some references to superannuation regarding administration of self managed superannuation funds, government incentives like Co-contribution, choice of funds and taxation of them.
Super Preamble
Superannuation is a complex field and the field regularly of late gets reploughed and reseeded - I suppose the government is attempting to make the public less reliant on old age pensions, especially seeing as the population average age is always increasing - forget what forecast figures are but say in fifty years time we could have 50% or more of the population at a non working age.
So whereas before the last couple of decades Super was mainly something for Public Servants and Professionally employed people, legislation was introduced so as it became compulsory for all employers to have it for employees but not as a payment into a Government Pension Plan.
The Old Age Pensions still exist (for now) and at age 65 people with Superannuation can still be eligible for Pension or part pension payments and there is no contribution for that other than through regular income taxation, pensions like all government payments being funded as part of general expenditure from revenue received.
There is a means test on assets and income and the rules for that also keep get changed.
But back to Superannuation and at moment the % of Salary (an ammount on top of salary, though some jobs can be advertised as a package deal that includes Super) is 9%.
There has been talk of Unions pushing to have that raised to 12-13% and with wall to wall (All States and Federal) Labour Governments at the moment anything is possible.
Anyway, initially the Salary% was administered by an employer with them managing Super funds though some woukld have contracted it out and that has led to a huge number of financial institutions offering Superannuation services.
With some changes that have been gradually introduced by legislation, employees are now given a choice of where their Super Money goes - a choice of funds and that can include:
. Industry Funds like HESTA and
. Self Managed Funds.
Some industry funds have not performed too well and ironically they may have had a heavy or light fingered union hand involved, but in the way of poor investment decisions.
This site -
Superannuation - australia.gov.au will explain more of all the legislative and managerial scenarios.
In essence it is probably something like your RRSP and there's a heap of taxation rules and ability to contribute money from your salary as well as the 9% - that being called Salary Sacrificing and a bit of an investment angle if you are on a higher income, say where you are paying 40c/$ or more of tax on additional income, for if you sacrifice it to Superannuation you will pay only 15c/$ in tax, but obviously for the time being you make do without the 60c/$ spending capacity.
Money that funds earn is taxed at 15% and then when you get to retirement age or even 55 or 60 there are also sorts of conversions into annuities and what not that you can have take place to have the $$$$$ structured to minimise taxation and maximise pension eligibility.
Your wealth in a Superannuation fund is not guaranteed for funds are invested in shares (local and international), property and cash accounts and ultimately how well a fund will perform will depend on how well the managers have invested/structured for taxation mimimisation, how well the global and local economy has been and how much the managers and staff have to be paid.
And then you have something like the US Prime Motrtage meltdown scaring the pants off the world and/or investment managers who have decided that an investment in some developing country looks good only to find lack of regulatory control and/or corruption sees their money kissed goodbye - many examples about of even major banks writing off billions as is occurring now - so what do they say "nothing is certain in life other than death and taxes".
At the end of the rainbow, hopefully all is well enough for investment monies to be meaningful and/or the government is raking in enough to still be paying pensions.
The only other taxes/fees that are of any real note in Australia are:
. Medicare Levy - read tha ato info but think it is 1.5% of taxable income if you have private insurance, and maybe more without.
. Private Medical Insurance - around $650(me) - ?(a lot more for full private cover)/year for a single -
Health Insurance, Private Health Cover, Home & Contents Insurance, Private Health Insurance - Australian Unity (probably also have a super scheme) and a good organisation I am with.
. Car registration which is normal for any country but about $500-$1000 depending on size of car and state and then some more for insurance that can vary from ~$200-$1000+ depending again on type of car, level of insurance and age/rating of owner/drivers.
. Local Government and Water/Sewerage rates if you are buying or own a property - anywhere from~$1000/Y in a rural area up to tens of thousands if you own something ritzy somewhere ritzy, but normal urban house could be around $2000-3000/y
. Electricity and Phone you can pay a nominal service connection fee/deposit of about $100 and then useage and line rental for phone which could ammount for both to about $1000/y.
. You could also have gas depending on where you are
. Internet could be another $500/y but most telecom companies have packages where you get landline phone, internet and mobile all rolled into one with discounts applying.
. Cable TV?, depends on package and could be packaged with Telco, but add another $500/y in.
And of course Banks love to have fees for this and that but if you're smart and finacial enough to be paying up a credit card balance each month, you can keep their fees down to ~$100/y (other than housing loans interest), and probably get more than that back in points awards.
That about covers most living costs other than eating and drinking, and yes, just about everything you pay other than interest on loans, local government rates and fresh food has GST of 10% but you tend not to be concerned about it unless you're broke as it is built into advertised prices.
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