u/MikeTheArtist-

Through a search project that honestly had a bug in it (long story, happy to tell it in comments), I ended up pulling data on a star nobody had ever studied. Not a single paper. TYC 6884-164-1, a sun-like star about 470 light years away in Sagittarius.

It's disappearing.

Completely quiet from 2014 to mid-2018, then it started dropping huge chunks of its brightness for days at a time. Some years it's fading on 1 in every 3 nights. The average dip takes about half the star's light. The deepest one caught, 92% and that one isn't a lonely data point, three separate cameras caught the star crashed that same week, under dark sky. On the worst nights it drops below the survey's detection limit entirely.

I've spent two days trying to kill it. A comparison star sitting on the *same exposures* holds flat at ±0.02 mag while mine drops nearly 3 magnitudes. The dips ignore the moon (identical phase distribution to quiet nights).

No registry on Earth had this star listed as variable. I submitted it to VSX yesterday. It's still dipping this month.

If it's real, here's where it would sit. This class is called "mature dippers", sun-like stars that suddenly start deep irregular fading, probably from planetary collision debris and every one ever found fits on one hand:

TYC 6884-164-1 = 92% (>98% on the worst nights)

ASASSN-21qj = 84%

TYC 8830-410-1 = >50%

Boyajian's Star = 22%

That 92% isn't one stray point either, three separate cameras caught the star crashed that same week, under dark sky, while a comparison star on the same exposures didn't move.

Some things which may help:

- Anyone who can pull TESS, it's TIC 169213609. Space-based data settles this instantly.

- Anyone with access to ASAS-SN raw images, eyes on the actual frames from the deep nights.

- Southern hemisphere observers, one independent measurement this week would be gold.

- Or just tell me what I've missed. I want this killed properly or confirmed properly. Artifacts can happen for many different reasons.

Check it yourself, it's all public: asas-sn.osu.edu, Sky Patrol V2, cone search RA 292.06268, Dec -27.44410, radius 15 arcsec, source 489626624823. Years of data sitting right there.

If it's real, it's one of the deepest members of a star class you can count on one hand (the ASASSN-21qj / Tabby's Star family). If it's an artifact, I'll post that too. Everything so far has been done in public, corrections included.

Every time the new CGT rules come up, defenders point to indexation: "It protects you from inflation, that's fairer than the 50% discount."

In theory that sounds reasonable. In practice it only works for assets that barely grew.

Chart 1: Tax bill on capital gains, average wage earner ($100k), Assumes the asset doubled. So a $100k gain comes from a $100k investment that grew to $200k. RBA target inflation (2.5%), new rules from 1 July 2027.

For a typical 5-10 year hold, the new rules add roughly 45-55% more tax at every gain level. You have to hold for \~16.5 years before the new rules stop being a straight tax increase.

For context: the average Australian holds an investment property about 10 years. Retail share holdings turn over faster than that. For the vast majority of real-world holding periods, this is a tax hike.

Chart 2: Same $100k investment, but varying the growth multiple, This is where the indexation defence completely falls apart.

Indexation only shields the inflation portion of the cost base. Over 10 years at 2.5% inflation, that's about $28k off a $100k cost base. If your asset doubled, that's meaningful. If it tripled or more, it becomes a rounding error.

The numbers, top marginal bracket, 10-year hold:

(1) 1.5x growth (slow asset):

indexation shields 56% of the gain, new rules slightly better

(2) 2x growth (asset doubled):

shields 28%, new rules 44% worse

(3) 3x growth (typical strong ETF decade):

shields 14%, new rules 72% worse

(4) 5x growth (good individual stock or property):

shields 7%, 86% worse

(5) 10x growth:

shields 3%, 94% worse

(6) 20x growth:

shields 1.5%, 97% worse

Even at a 20-year hold, high-growth assets still get hammered. A 5x asset is taxed 68% harder. A 10x asset, 86% harder.

The reform doesn't protect long-term investors. It protects mediocre ones. Is this what they mean when they say "no one gets left behind"? Everyone else gets held back?

Some people are trying to justify the CGT increase by listing the public services we already pay for. Medicare. PBS. Hospitals. Schools. Pensions. Defence.

As if pointing at things the government spends money on settles the argument. It doesn't. We already pay for all of that.

Australians fund those services through income tax, GST, company tax, fuel excise, the Medicare levy, payroll tax, stamp duty, land tax, and the existing CGT regime. Total tax revenue at all levels of government is around 28% of GDP.

The system isn't underfunded by historical standards, and it isn't underfunded by international standards either.

So we shouldn't be telling people "do you want hospitals?"

Instead we need to ask: what specific new spending requires moving Australia from rank 28 to rank 42 on CGT, and why is CGT the right lever to pull?

More 300k Machete bins? Perhaps another 100m website upgrade?

The UK has the NHS, universal, free at point of use, more comprehensive than Medicare. Top effective CGT rate: 24%.

Germany has universal healthcare, strong public schools, generous pensions, and unemployment benefits more generous than ours. Top effective CGT rate: 26.4%.

France has all of the above plus subsidised childcare and one of the world's most generous welfare states. Top effective CGT rate: 34%.

Japan funds universal healthcare and one of the world's largest pension systems. Top effective CGT rate: 20.3%.

Every one of those countries funds the services Australians are being told justify this reform, and every one of them does it with a lower effective CGT rate than what Australia is proposing.

"We have Medicare" is not an argument for this reform. It's an argument for the tax system we already have.

Every time the new CGT rules come up, defenders point to indexation: "It protects you from inflation, that's fairer than the 50% discount."

In theory that sounds reasonable. In practice it only works for assets that barely grew.

Chart 1: Tax bill on capital gains, average wage earner ($100k), Assumes the asset doubled. So a $100k gain comes from a $100k investment that grew to $200k. RBA target inflation (2.5%), new rules from 1 July 2027.

For a typical 5-10 year hold, the new rules add roughly 45-55% more tax at every gain level. You have to hold for ~16.5 years before the new rules stop being a straight tax increase.

For context: the average Australian holds an investment property about 10 years. Retail share holdings turn over faster than that. For the vast majority of real-world holding periods, this is a tax hike.

Chart 2: Same $100k investment, but varying the growth multiple, This is where the indexation defence completely falls apart.

Indexation only shields the inflation portion of the cost base. Over 10 years at 2.5% inflation, that's about $28k off a $100k cost base. If your asset doubled, that's meaningful. If it tripled or more, it becomes a rounding error.

The numbers, top marginal bracket, 10-year hold:

(1) 1.5x growth (slow asset): indexation shields 56% of the gain, new rules slightly better

(2) 2x growth (asset doubled): shields 28%, new rules 44% worse

(3) 3x growth (typical strong ETF decade): shields 14%, new rules 72% worse

(4) 5x growth (good individual stock or property): shields 7%, 86% worse

(5) 10x growth: shields 3%, 94% worse

(6) 20x growth: shields 1.5%, 97% worse

Even at a 20-year hold, high-growth assets still get hammered. A 5x asset is taxed 68% harder. A 10x asset, 86% harder.

The reform doesn't protect long-term investors. It protects mediocre ones. Is this what they mean when they say "no one gets left behind"? Everyone else gets held back?

Every time the new CGT rules come up, defenders point to indexation: "It protects you from inflation, that's fairer than the 50% discount."

In theory that sounds reasonable. In practice it only works for assets that barely grew.

Chart 1: Tax bill on capital gains, average wage earner ($100k), Assumes the asset doubled. So a $100k gain comes from a $100k investment that grew to $200k. RBA target inflation (2.5%), new rules from 1 July 2027.

For a typical 5-10 year hold, the new rules add roughly 45-55% more tax at every gain level. You have to hold for ~16.5 years before the new rules stop being a straight tax increase.

For context: the average Australian holds an investment property about 10 years. Retail share holdings turn over faster than that. For the vast majority of real-world holding periods, this is a tax hike.

Chart 2: Same $100k investment, but varying the growth multiple, This is where the indexation defence completely falls apart.

Indexation only shields the inflation portion of the cost base. Over 10 years at 2.5% inflation, that's about $28k off a $100k cost base. If your asset doubled, that's meaningful. If it tripled or more, it becomes a rounding error.

The numbers, top marginal bracket, 10-year hold:

(1) 1.5x growth (slow asset): indexation shields 56% of the gain, new rules slightly better

(2) 2x growth (asset doubled): shields 28%, new rules 44% worse

(3) 3x growth (typical strong ETF decade): shields 14%, new rules 72% worse

(4) 5x growth (good individual stock or property): shields 7%, 86% worse

(5) 10x growth: shields 3%, 94% worse

(6) 20x growth: shields 1.5%, 97% worse

Even at a 20-year hold, high-growth assets still get hammered. A 5x asset is taxed 68% harder. A 10x asset, 86% harder.

The reform doesn't protect long-term investors. It protects mediocre ones. Is this what they mean when they say "no one gets left behind"? Everyone else gets held back?

If you have any dreams of retiring early or being wealthy, kiss them goodbye, enjoy being a wage slave for life.