The fact is in the USA most people can claim their mortgage payments interest as a tax deduction - which is more bizarre.
I agree it's a stupid strategy, but it's plain foolish to think that negative underpins property investment. If you removed it, in the short term there would be a dip in property investment, but this would only work towards creating a further supply shortage.
Negative gearing isn't a tax ruling - it's an investment strategy. Businesses use the tax deductibility of interest payments as a legitimate expense, so it's difficult to argue why this should be different for individuals.
The problem with negative gearing in the context of a tax deduction on housing investments is that it encourages speculation by reducing the losses on bad investments. This is why we have such a disconnect between housing prices and rental prices.
The healthcare system also manages to tread a fine line between having a public safety net (ie, everyone gets free treatment) but also encouraging private health insurance and private healthcare for those who can afford it.
There are many sensible insurance regulations around, such as compulsory third-party-personal insurance that comes attached to vehicle registration, so that if you're a licensed driver driving a licensed vehicle, even if you run over 50 pedestrians you're covered for their losses and they are all covered for medical insurance, compensation payouts and rehabilitation.
The dividend tax system is also quite good, in that, if you're an Australian taxpayer, you can claim a tax rebate on the dividends you receive from revenue arising from an Australian company. So an Australian company pays tax on it's earnings, then pays some of those earnings out to taxpayers via dividends. The dividend recipient can then claim what is called a 'franking credit' on that dividend which is offset against their own earnings. It sounds complicated but what it essentially means is that Australian corporate income is only taxed once - you don't get double taxed for paying out dividends. As a result, Australian companies pay healthy dividends, which underpins investment in Australian companies by individuals requiring income from shareholdings.
Of course, there are some dumb policies as well, but in general things work pretty well, and, as the article says, quality of life and income spread at ranked very highly in world terms.
That's the case in Victoria with the TAC, but I'm not sure about the other states.
All Australian states have compulsory third party personal insurance attached to the vehicle registration.
Policy blunders like this are par for the course here though, Normally committed by the right-wing/conservative (as in economically, not religious, we don't really give them much space in our national discourse) National Party.
http://www.ato.gov.au/superfunds/content.aspx?doc=/content/3...
In most salaried positions, they drop the charade of 'employer contributed super' and talk about your 'total package' which includes your super payments.
I'm not arguing against the merits of forced investment, but you shouldn't believe your employer is paying it for you. You are paying it.
It is different to salary, because it is taxed differently, and when the superannuation rate increased (which happens occasionally) you never see a reduction in your take-home pay.
But it does reduce the amount they can afford to give you as your take-home pay.
Actually, the really interesting discussion is about superannuation-as-forced-savings vs a sovereign-wealth-fund. They aren't really equivalent, but they have some similar outcomes (eg a large amount of capital available for investment). I've gone back on forth on if we should have a sovereign wealth fund - there are good arguments both ways.