A cartoon adventure through 40 years of New Zealand tax policy β meet the doctors, teachers, landlords and tycoons, watch the coins flow, and see how each government changed the plumbing.
π Tap an era to start. Watch the pipes change.
Every NZ tax dollar starts in someone's pocket and ends up paying for someone else's MRI scan, kid's classroom or pension. Here's who's in the show:
In 2023 the IRD ran the first real study of how much tax the 311 wealthiest NZ families actually pay. They make most of their income from untaxed capital gains β which is why the line on the right is so small.
Source: IRD High-Wealth Research Project 2023.
Slide the levers. Watch the pipes update live. (This overrides the selected era β click an era again to reset.)
NZ is one of the only developed countries with no comprehensive capital gains tax. Buy a house for $500k, sell for $2M β keep it all (outside the bright-line window).
Park income at the trust rate (used to be 33%, now 39%). Splitting income to lower-bracket beneficiaries still legal.
Route income through a 28% company instead of paying 39% personally. Draw it down later as dividends or loans.
Borrow to buy rentals, claim the interest as a deduction against other income. (Removed by Labour 2021, restored by National 2025.)
Only 7% of the top 311 families' income comes from wages. The other 93% lives in capital structures the IRD struggles to even see.
The LTC regime replaced the abolished LAQC. Losses still flow to shareholders β only rental-loss ring-fencing slowed it down.