Work-related expenses
At $19.7 billion, work-related expenses accounted for nearly two-thirds of total deductions claimed by individuals in 2012-13.
The most common claims were for car expenses ($8 billion or around 40%), followed by $7 billion in ‘other expenses’ comprising home office costs and tools, equipment and other assets.
Work-related travel expenses counted for $2 billion, uniforms $1.6 billion, and $1.1 billion for work-related self-education expenses. Unsurprisingly, if you follow the money you can see that the pattern of expense claims closely follow the ATO’s compliance focus and activities.
By comparison, New Zealand does not allow work-related deductions (but they have a top personal tax rate of 33%). In other countries, the range of deductions that can be claimed is much narrower. In the UK for example, only certain occupations can claim work-related expenses and then generally this is at a flat rate. Taxpayers have the ability to claim outside of the flat rate but only after passing stringent tests. The tests require that the item must be ‘wholly, exclusively and necessarily in the performance of an employee’s duties’ and be an expense typical for the industry. That is, the item is only deductible if it is likely to be incurred by every holder of that form of employment (it is not enough that one employee, or a subset of employees, happens to incur the expense).
It would be a bold and confident Government that removed the ability for many taxpayers to claim a tax refund. As with investment expenses, it is more likely that deductions will be slowly whittled away.
