There's another layer for many of the majors - the cost of the towns. My understanding is that FBT was a major factor in killing residential town construction at new major operations, indictectly leading to FIFO. Added to that was "normalisation" costs - State governments insisted that the towns be handed over to shires or councils and be run like a "normal country town". To pay for this, extraordinary rates were imposed on the companies to pay for the upkeep of the facilities they had built to attract workers.

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