Oct 27, 2017 | Free Resource
“Nothing is certain except for death and taxes.”
– Benjamin Franklin 1789
In many business forums and groups I am a part of, the topic of paying taxes often comes up.
Our account told me a loooong time ago that, as a business owner, tax is a good thing, it means you have made a profit. 🙂
Now, I don’t know about you, but while I do arrange our business finances so that we legally minimise our income tax as well as we can, I seriously do not object to paying my fair share of tax.
While I can most certainly object to some of the ways our politicians spend our taxes, I do accept the fact that our tax helps to fund schools, hospitals and aged pensions (among other things)
I know that our tax amount comes nowhere near close to even paying for my mother’s pension!!
I got into a “discussion” with a lady one day who swore that her husband paid over 50% of EVERY dollar he earned. When I pointed out that the top tax rate in Australia is only 45%. Still, she was adamant. Many others pointed out that her effective tax rate would be much less than even 45% as we have a sliding tax scale and the 45% is only on amounts over $180,000.
On further discussion, it turns out this lady is a stay-at-home mum of two toddlers and is being paid the maximum in Family Tax Benefits. She could not understand that a large portion of her husband’s tax was in fact coming back to her directly in the form of Family Tax Benefits., and that her husband’s effective tax rate would be quite low. ( some guessed at less than 15%)
My husband also complains occasionally about the apparent high tax rates, so I created an excel spreadsheet to show him what his actual tax percentage is.
We don’t have Family Tax Benefits anymore but I have added it in so you might get a better idea as to what your effective tax rate is.
I hope you find this interesting.
Download the Effective Tax Rate sheet here.
Oct 23, 2017 | Free Resource, Personal Development, Vision Board
In today’s busy world, I see so much written about passion and having to find your passion or purpose in life to get ahead and be successful.
Sadly, we see this “requirement” as early as high school when 13-year-olds are expected to know exactly what courses they are going to do to set themselves up for the rest of their lives.
How many of you are in jobs professions or businesses that align with your 13-year-old self? .. my guess is not many ☹
My 13-year-old self had no idea what I wanted to be when I grew up and to be perfectly honest I still don’t.
With the help of teachers and my parents my high school education was quite broad with a number of different subjects that would cover most jobs that were available for an 18-year-old girl that didn’t want to go to university.
In my last year of high school I was sent to a large photographic lab for work experience. While there I met people that would become longtime friends and eventually business associates, but it was not really a passion.
A few years later, I was offered the opportunity to purchase my own store and so my business ownership career began.
When I sold my stores in the early 2000’s I spent a lot of time and even more money trying to decide what I really wanted to do with my life.
In the early 2000’s the internet was most certainly not what it is today and there was not a lot of easily accessible information. The library had a number of books that I greedily read hoping to find the answer.
Over and over I read the “Secret to Success” is to carve out a niche. I became more and more frustrated with this concept. What is my niche? What is my purpose? I would start blogs, Facebook groups and even businesses based on what I thought was my “greatest passion”. Sadly, I quickly became bored or distracted and moved on to find the next “greatest passion”
After reading and reading and reading and even more reading, I finally determined that I do not have just one passion, and you know what…
THAT IS OK !!!
I have many things that interest me and fire my determination to do more.
Often these things seem to be at odds with each other.
For example –
- I love helping business owners expand their businesses to create more profitable outcomes. I have a knack for being able to spot lost opportunities and can create a solid plan to implement these opportunities within the business with the least amount of cost and upset to current operations
So, it would appear that my passion in that regard is to create more money for spending BUT
- One of my other passions is almost making a game of how far I can stretch my money.
This does NOT mean being a scrooge or miserly. Money is meant to be circulated, it does not serve anybody by being trapped in a savings account.
- Another great passion is food after all who doesn’t love the satisfaction gained from the deliciousness of a perfectly cooked and presented meal? I love gleaning inspiration from café and restaurant menus and creating equally gorgeous meals for my own table and enjoyment.
Sadly though, I do NOT have a passion for exercise, so I do need to keep my food passion in check somewhat.
Perhaps my greatest passion is learning about myself. How do I really think and how can I make myself better?
I truly believe that our greatest gift to ourselves must be a positive mindset, without that positivity nothing else can come to pass.
Whether you call it the “Power of Positive thinking”, “The Secret”, Mindset or just Blind Faith you must believe that you CAN. (no matter what your niche or passion)
I hope I can share each of my passions with you. In my Free Resource Library, I have a growing list of freebies relating to each niche.
Please keep checking back regularly..
