No country has ever taxed or subsidised its way to prosperity.
You don't address debt and deficit with yet more debt and deficit.
And profit is not a dirty word because success in business is something to be proud of.
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After all, you can't have strong communities without strong economies to sustain them and you can't have strong economies without profitable private businesses.
Above all else, policy-makers need to understand that every dollar government spends comes from the people, either through taxes and borrowings; or, over the past few years, through the process known as quantitative easing which is not indefinitely sustainable.
A certain level of government spending is necessary and good.
In Lincoln's words, government should do for people what they can't do for themselves – and no more.
Richer people, stronger countries and a better world all depend upon policy-makers' grasp of these fundamentals and there's no better place to reiterate them than the World Economic Forum – creator of the global competitiveness index as well as this conference.
As always, stronger economic growth is the key to addressing almost every global problem.
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Stronger growth requires lower, simpler and fairer taxes that don't stifle business creativity.
And stronger growth requires getting government spending under control so that taxes can come down; and reducing regulation so that productivity can rise.
In the decade prior to the Crisis, consistent surpluses and a preference for business helped my country, Australia, to become one of the world's best-performing economies.
This is a slightly edited version of Tony Abbott's speech last week to the World Economic Forum at Davos.
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