Today 2011 national budget was tabled (is 'tabled' even the correct word?). I will not waste time going into the details. As expected, and as it has been for the past 7 years of my working life, the only group of people who would be elated over national budget are:
1) Government servants, especially female, married AND pregnant (or soon-to-be).
2) Those earning less than RM3000 (and thus will not pay a single cent of income tax).
3) Those on the receiving end of the multi-billion projects.
4) UMNO-BN 'patriots' to whom the ruling regime can do no wrong; they still think we need a bigger dick to prove our manhood to the world (seriously, have we even filled up KLCC's 88 floors yet?).
This is becoming a recurring pattern. Monetarily, those who benefit from national budget are always those who are in absolute lower income bracket AND absolute higher income bracket. Middle income wage-earners pay taxes, and in return get peanuts, cheaper handphones and underwear. Ironic.
Hey, I'm no economist. I hardly understand finance and I barely get half of what Personal Money blabbers about (though I still buy it every month for tax exemption, get it?). Yet, is it so hard give middle-income people a small piece of the pie?
Consider a regular fictional Shah (bukan nama sebenar) who make RM50k per-annum. A 1% tax rebate/return/discount (to-may-to, to-mah-to) from his total income would make him an extra RM500 per-annum, equivalent to 2 months of his eldest son's kindergarten fee; or 20 1kg packs of Dutch Lady baby formula for his youngest daughter which can last 5 months; or 2 months' worth of petrol for his hungry second-hand car. Does it cost RM10 billion for this to happen? Nope. But of course, Shah is no Vincent Tan or Ananda Krishnan, and all his cables are electrical.
And don't even get me started about the patriots, zealots and parrots. The PM had barely finished his last salvo and Facebook was already on fire with praises and feel-good status updates! Ah, but who am I, an ungrateful Melayu, a 'saudagar mimpi', to challenge the wisdom of the establishment who have stood the test of time for 53 years? :-)
In the end life goes on. Tomorrow is just another day. Nothing changes. All is well... until the next GE looms, that is... xD
