One Nation has once again found itself under attack for allegedly failing to provide detailed costings for every election policy. The criticism is familiar. Journalists demand Treasury modelling, economists ask for funding sources, and political opponents declare that every proposal is "unfunded." Whether or not every One Nation policy is fully costed is a legitimate matter for public debate. But an equally legitimate question is rarely asked: why is the same level of scrutiny so seldom applied to the Greens?
The Greens routinely announce enormous new spending commitments. They propose expanded public housing, free university education, universal dental care, increased welfare payments, massive renewable energy investment, extensive climate programs, larger public sector workforces, expanded mental health services, and countless other initiatives. The price tags frequently run into tens or even hundreds of billions of dollars over time.
The stock answer is almost always the same: "tax the rich."
That slogan may fit neatly on a protest placard, but it is not a serious economic costing. It raises more questions than it answers.
Who exactly counts as "the rich"? Individuals? Companies? Family trusts? Superannuation funds? At what income or wealth threshold? How much revenue would actually be raised? How would behavioural changes reduce the expected tax take? How much capital would leave Australia? How many businesses would relocate investment overseas? What effect would higher taxation have on employment, wages and productivity? These are not ideological questions but practical ones that any responsible costing should attempt to answer.
Economics is rarely as simple as assuming governments can spend without consequence provided someone wealthier pays the bill. Every tax alters incentives. Higher company taxes may reduce investment. Higher capital gains taxes may discourage entrepreneurship. Wealth taxes can encourage capital flight. Excessively high personal tax rates can alter work decisions or encourage sophisticated tax planning. Whether one supports or opposes such taxes, pretending there are no economic trade-offs is not analysis but wishful thinking.
This is not to argue that wealthier Australians should never pay more tax. Reasonable people can disagree about the appropriate level of taxation and redistribution. The point is one of consistency. If One Nation is expected to demonstrate precisely how every proposal will be funded, then parties advocating vast new spending financed through higher taxation should face exactly the same level of scrutiny.
The media often seem to operate with different standards. Conservative or populist parties are pressed repeatedly for detailed fiscal modelling, while progressive parties frequently receive little more than a passing question before the discussion moves on. Assertions that "the rich will pay" are often treated as though they constitute a complete economic strategy rather than the beginning of a much more difficult conversation.
History provides further reason for caution. Governments regularly overestimate the revenue that new taxes will generate. People change their behaviour. Investors seek more attractive jurisdictions. Businesses restructure. High-income earners employ accountants. The actual revenue often falls well short of the projections that justified the spending in the first place. When this happens, governments are left with a simple choice: borrow more, raise taxes further, cut services, or accept larger deficits.
The issue is therefore not whether One Nation, Labor, the Coalition or the Greens should produce policy costings. They all should. Voters deserve transparency from every political party seeking to govern.
The real issue is whether every party will be held to the same standard.
If One Nation must explain every dollar it intends to spend, then the Greens should also be required to explain every dollar they expect to collect. "Tax the rich" is not a costing. It is a political slogan. Serious fiscal policy requires much more than identifying a convenient group of taxpayers and assuming they possess an unlimited capacity to fund an ever-expanding government.
Democracy functions best when scrutiny is applied equally. Selective scepticism is not accountability; it is politics disguised as journalism. If the media genuinely believe that rigorous policy costings matter, then those standards should apply uniformly, regardless of whether the proposals come from the political Right, the Centre, or the Left.