Paddles B'mere said..
Stamp has given the most rational comment on this thread so far. Super is just a personal investment with mandatory inputs made on behalf of employees and no mandatory inputs for anyone not drawing a wage. Limits are set on maximum input per year for everyone whether they be an employee drawing a wage or a sole trader not drawing a wage. The funds are private (ie not government) entities, the taxation arrangements for both contributions and withdrawals are however set by the government and they do change. I would urge anyone who is serious about sussing out their super option to seek the assistance of an independent, appropriately licensed financial advisor (as someone has said above) as they are the only people that can legally provide you with the advice you need.

I am not a licensed financial advisor (the wife is), but I can tell you that a general rule of thumb balance for an SMSF to be viable is around $250k, if you've got less it usually goes backwards, but again talk to any good, independent financial advisor. Goverment are really clamping down on SMSF because of misuse and also dodgy advice being provided to people to have a crack and start one up. Krusty has cracking good advice there too, keep an eye on how it's performing.

A lot of the factors in this thread will adversely affect the performance of a super fund, however the government "taking your super" is highly unlikely, but sure eppo, I'll PM you and eat crow in 2027 if it all falls in a heap and "the government takes my super" ............... I'll probably be sleeping in my car though

boofta said..
In 1929 the market crashed, if you stayed in, a year later the original market doubled The folk who borrowed to buy stocks
all lost the lot due margin lending, The govt. will never make super less attractive than individual investment. Labor will grab
what it can, because ultimately they want us to have a pension level income provided by US. The real fundamental flaw of
western society is non taxpayers get to vote. So there is no way to limit welfare, and no incentive to work, you don't starve on welfare.
Do not buy property in super, the rules are far more onerous than normal ownership, horrendous compliance requirements.
Buy the top 20 ASX stocks on dips, in a SMSF when your fund has at least 600k and you will beat all the industry funds by 1-2%
Don't believe the funds outperforming SMSF's and justifying their fees, they cant. Their returns cannot beat simply buying the ASX
top 20 stocks, after all that's about all they invest in, They quote low fees but hide the real cost in their performance levels.
If you manage to accumulate more than 1.6m it then becomes a slight tax problem but nothing like outside super.
I have done this since 1995 and always been 1-2% ahead of all industry funds, every single year.