Peter Costello appears to have had a change of heart about raising the GST rate.
The former Liberal treasurer now says doing so would be 10 times more effective than taxing the rich.
The appetite among some to slug higher-income earners more was a "ritualistic bout of envy".
"The trouble with the idea we can tax the budget back into balance by soaking the rich is there just aren't enough rich to go around," Mr Costello wrote in News Corp newspapers on Tuesday.
But it wasn't that long ago the architect of the GST was against increasing the impost, the revenue from which all goes to the states and territories.
"I think you would increase it and they'd (the states) just waste the money anyway," he said back in August 2013.
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