TaxRambling.com

I have worked in accounting firms, as the tax manager for a corporate or two, in the Treasury writing tax law, as a tax lobbyist and trainer for the Chartered Accountants and in parliament house advising the Treasurer on tax…  So I only have one last thing to ad to my tax CV – I have to work at the ATO.

But maybe I should just skip this one. Recently the ATO asked if anyone was happy to take a redundancy and close to 10% of the work force put their hand up. Over 2,100 of the ATO’s 24,000 employees are ready to leave. Leave at a time when there are no new job in other government departments (the normal next job for an ATO employee from my experience).

Therefore, is it that working at the ATO is so bad that getting out sound s good? I don’t think so. People I know who work there like the work they do. And I have work for the current Commissioner before and the staff enjoyed working for him.

Or is it that the redundancy payouts (tax free for the first ~$7,000 plus ~$4,000 for every year worked) is just too tempting.

So I should go and work for the ATO – but only so I can take a redundancy.