I just received a receipt from the Australian Taxation Office. It included a breakdown of how my tax dollar would be spent. It showed that 39% was dedicated to welfare, of which the aged (including Mrs SG and me) are easily the largest category of beneficiaries.

Another 18% of my tax dollars went to the 2nd biggest expenditure category: health. I don’t want to pick on the aged, but I think it’s safe to assume that we end up taking a disproportionate share of that too.

Given that the aged benefit from a proportion of all the other kinds of expenditure (education, defence, transport, public order etc) I reckon, very roughly, that the aged are getting 30% of my taxes. That seems a lot. I wonder whether the rest of my fellow-Australians can afford us.