The Future Fund should shut and its $250 billion in assets should be sold to pay down government debt, according to a paper warning the fund will struggle to deliver the returns required to justify its existence.

The Albanese government could reduce Australia’s $896 billion gross debt by more than 25 per cent and save $10 billion per year in interest if it liquidates the $203 billion future fund and $47 billion in subsidiary funds, according to a new paper by Dimitri Burshtein from the right-wing Centre for Independent Studies.