Jason Murphy

3 weeks ago | au.yahoo.com | Jason Murphy

Thu, 5 June 2025, 1:00 pm 4 min read Soon everyone in Australia will be on the lookout for the same thing: deductions. The more you can deduct, the less you pay in tax and the larger the refund the ATO will send you. But you do not want to go overboard. Only some things are allowed to be deducted. And the taxman uses algorithms these days — if your deductions are out of line for someone in your job, the algorithm raises a red flag.

3 weeks ago | news.com.au | Jason Murphy

ANALYSISAustralians spend a lot of time worrying about their super. I’m going to show you the average super balance for someone your age. Then I want you to forget it. Here’s the chart, it shows that the average 30 year old has well under $100,000, the average person in the early 40s has just over $100,000, the average person in their early 50s has a bit over $200,000 and the average person over 65 has over $400,000. MORE: Can you use superannuation to buy a house? But this is kinda dumb.

3 weeks ago | crikey.com.au | Jason Murphy

Last week, I wrote an article that hypothesised where Australia could establish a new city to accommodate an expected influx of 2 million people over the next few years. The answers you offered could not be more spread out: people have voted for every place imaginable, from Karratha in Western Australia to Thrumster, a tiny town inland of Port Macquarie. The point of the exercise, though, was never to find a single optimal location; it was to draw out the conversation on population in Australia.

1 month ago | crikey.com.au | Jason Murphy

Australia’s cities are crowded — everyone agrees on it. We are about to add another 2 million people in the next four to seven years. Where will they live? In those same crowded cities, is the answer. It won’t be a smooth process. Three things are guaranteed: traffic, backlash, and rising house prices. But the evidence shows that people love cities. So what if we gave people more of what they want?

1 month ago | crikey.com.au | Jason Murphy

Australia is gambling addicted, and this applies to governments as well as gamblers. On gambling, we spend more than any other country across the entire world, with pokies our greatest weakness. The motivation for controlling pokies is that they harm people more than other kinds of gambling. The biggest category of harm from gambling is damaging relationships. A lot of divorces follow from problem gambling.