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@catogrande said in British Politics:
There are some taxes that don't disproportionately hit the lower paid. CGT (usually), higher rate income tax, loss of HRT relief on pension contributions. The problem though is two fold. Firstly due to the smaller number of people involved the amount raised is not as significant. Secondly, avoidance. Is it worth all the costs and effort to avoid paying 40% income tax? Probably not 50%? 60%? Well that's a different story, plus of course you are talking about people who can afford to pay for rigorous planning.
I think we need a debate on how efficiently the state spends our money at the same time as we debate tax rises (which almost certainly need to happen).
Agree with the binary viewpoint and also see the hypocrisy in their own financial positions. Which of the two are they?
Welsh friend of mine grew up in the valleys, went to a Comprehensive, has a PhD and is probably the smartest guy I know, on why his family was never left-wing: "We were never rich enough to be socialists".
Too many people on the Left see wealth as obscene - but not for themselves of course, as they are far too virtuous..
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@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
There are some taxes that don't disproportionately hit the lower paid. CGT (usually), higher rate income tax, loss of HRT relief on pension contributions. The problem though is two fold. Firstly due to the smaller number of people involved the amount raised is not as significant. Secondly, avoidance. Is it worth all the costs and effort to avoid paying 40% income tax? Probably not 50%? 60%? Well that's a different story, plus of course you are talking about people who can afford to pay for rigorous planning.
I think we need a debate on how efficiently the state spends our money at the same time as we debate tax rises (which almost certainly need to happen).
Agree with the binary viewpoint and also see the hypocrisy in their own financial positions. Which of the two are they?
Welsh friend of mine grew up in the valleys, went to a Comprehensive, has a PhD and is probably the smartest guy I know, on why his family was never left-wing: "We were never rich enough to be socialists".
Too many people on the Left see wealth as obscene - but not for themselves of course, as they are far too virtuous..
To be honest, any tax rise which seems fair is likely to be pretty easily accepted. Taxes on online shopping, tweaks to capital gains / pensions etc. I imagine people will be stupid enough to accept any changes which they don't see which effect them, like rises in employee NI.
I cannot see wealth taxes being accepted. Sunak has ruled that out as that is something dreamed up by the minimum wage or billionaire gang. In the modern financial environment all that will do is ensure the rich shift their assets elsewhere. Which is disastourous.
And then you read completely absurd things like the below ... which suggests nothing has changed at ll in financial technologies since 1950.
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@majorrage said in British Politics:
I cannot see wealth taxes being accepted. Sunak has ruled that out as that is something dreamed up by the minimum wage or billionaire gang. In the modern financial environment all that will do is ensure the rich shift their assets elsewhere. Which is disastourous.
It's also economic idiocy. The top 1% own 20% of the UK's £13tn wealth or £2.6tn. Assuming that wealth stayed in the UK and you taxed that wealth at 10% a year (£260bn) for 10 years and carried on spending as now, you'd pay off the nation debt.
But in the 11th year the debt would start growing again by £100bn a year (or more, as tax on rich people's income would be decimated) and the same old problems would surface. Only this time there's no wealth to tax as you've spent it all. You can play with the rate of the wealth tax, but you still end up buggered.
And then you read completely absurd things like the below ... which suggests nothing has changed at ll in financial technologies since 1950.
My 14yr-old grand-niece can pick holes on Jones absurd arguments. It's all emotion and rage, rather than any intellectual insight.
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@majorrage said in British Politics:
@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
There are some taxes that don't disproportionately hit the lower paid. CGT (usually), higher rate income tax, loss of HRT relief on pension contributions. The problem though is two fold. Firstly due to the smaller number of people involved the amount raised is not as significant. Secondly, avoidance. Is it worth all the costs and effort to avoid paying 40% income tax? Probably not 50%? 60%? Well that's a different story, plus of course you are talking about people who can afford to pay for rigorous planning.
I think we need a debate on how efficiently the state spends our money at the same time as we debate tax rises (which almost certainly need to happen).
Agree with the binary viewpoint and also see the hypocrisy in their own financial positions. Which of the two are they?
Welsh friend of mine grew up in the valleys, went to a Comprehensive, has a PhD and is probably the smartest guy I know, on why his family was never left-wing: "We were never rich enough to be socialists".
Too many people on the Left see wealth as obscene - but not for themselves of course, as they are far too virtuous..
To be honest, any tax rise which seems fair is likely to be pretty easily accepted. Taxes on online shopping, tweaks to capital gains / pensions etc. I imagine people will be stupid enough to accept any changes which they don't see which effect them, like rises in employee NI.
I cannot see wealth taxes being accepted. Sunak has ruled that out as that is something dreamed up by the minimum wage or billionaire gang. In the modern financial environment all that will do is ensure the rich shift their assets elsewhere. Which is disastourous.
And then you read completely absurd things like the below ... which suggests nothing has changed at ll in financial technologies since 1950.
All you had to say was 'Owen Jones' ...
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Owen Jones could do with reading a book himself. Effective rate of income tax during the war peaked at 99.25% not 98%. The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
Aside from his inaccuracies, I am not sure what point he was trying to make.
He is a complete wankstain.
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@catogrande said in British Politics:
The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
The top rate of tax was 83% and there was a 15% "Investment income surcharge" on top of that.
Funnily enough, UK industry suffered from major underinvestment at the time - can't think why.
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@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
The top rate of tax was 83% and there was a 15% "Investment income surcharge" on top of that.
Funnily enough, UK industry suffered from major underinvestment at the time - can't think why.
Against that I think one’s butler, housekeeper, chauffeur, nanny, etc. were fully deductible!
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@pakman said in British Politics:
@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
The top rate of tax was 83% and there was a 15% "Investment income surcharge" on top of that.
Funnily enough, UK industry suffered from major underinvestment at the time - can't think why.
Against that I think one’s butler, housekeeper, chauffeur, nanny, etc. were fully deductible!
From memory not the nanny. Something to do with non-specific additional services.
Maybe that was just in the Cato household though.
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@catogrande said in British Politics:
@pakman said in British Politics:
@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
The top rate of tax was 83% and there was a 15% "Investment income surcharge" on top of that.
Funnily enough, UK industry suffered from major underinvestment at the time - can't think why.
Against that I think one’s butler, housekeeper, chauffeur, nanny, etc. were fully deductible!
From memory not the nanny. Something to do with non-specific additional services.
Maybe that was just in the Cato household though.
New meaning to non deductible deposit!
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@pakman said in British Politics:
@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@catogrande said in British Politics:
The 98% effective income tax rate was during the mid to late 1970s when Labour were in power.
The top rate of tax was 83% and there was a 15% "Investment income surcharge" on top of that.
Funnily enough, UK industry suffered from major underinvestment at the time - can't think why.
Against that I think one’s butler, housekeeper, chauffeur, nanny, etc. were fully deductible!
Don't think those things were deductible, but you could off-set things like interest on loans, life Assurance premiums etc, pension contributions etc. Company cars were almost untaxed.
Much easier to use a limited company to route earnings thru as well.
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Just heard the last part of it. Very growth oriented. Sunak's a different sort of politician, isn't he? Big concern must be inflation and interest rises hitting the cost of government borrowing, but overall seems solid.
Starmer was simply awful. Tone deaf to the public mood, student politics quips and looking politically artless.
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Thumbs down for that Tax & Spend Budget from me. Sunak was the first Chancellor to raise Corporation Tax since 1974 when Denis Healey promised to the squeeze the rich until the pips squeak.
The overall UK tax hit will be the highest since the late 1960s:
UK Growth will suffer from these tax hikes.
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He did acknowledge that. He said 1% rise puts the cost up by 25billion annually. That is indeed an issue. However, we aren't alone with that.
Starmer was terrible and made himself come across completely thick. The only point he said which made sense, was that Sunak didn't mention NHS. Which he didn't.
To give a bit more context to others that care (if they exist), Sunak is going balls out on internal growth. He says companies have reserved huge stock piles of cash (they have) and he wants them to spend it. There are huge tax breaks if you spend. He's also setting up all sorts of initiatives for small businesses. With my wife setting one up, this is great news for us. The lack of hike on fuel & booze duty is also great as these are two of my favourite pastimes ....
What Starmer failed grasp (in my view) was any sort of depth to Sunak's proposals. He went on and on about failures on unemployment, business debt, hard times etc. He harked on about previous failures etc (which made no sense to me) and said Sunak said nothing about levelling up. Which was odd, as Sunak had mentioned levelling up about 20 times. The budget was basically this.
Sunak: Here is a fishing rod, fishing tackle, a whole bunch of lessons on how to fish, and pond full of fish. You will need to supply your own bait, and I know you already have lots of it.
Starmer: This wasn't what was needed. We needed a fish.Sorry Keir, I quite like you, but you've completely fucked this one up.
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@majorrage said in British Politics:
He harked on about previous failures etc (which made no sense to me) and said Sunak said nothing about levelling up. Which was odd, as Sunak had mentioned levelling up about 20 times. The budget was basically this.
Captain Hindsight - can't help himself.
He just looks out of his depth.
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@majorrage I've tried to like Keir Starmer (according to a mutual friend, he's a great guy) and he is an improvement on Corbyn the Mad (who wouldn't be), but he is very tough to listen to. He's like Ed Miliband but without the charisma........
Beyond being a pro-NHS movement, UK Labour looks done. With the Tories shifting left and doing all they can to hit the productive bits of the UK economy to reward their new chums in the old Red Wall constituencies, there's big ground now opened for a pro-business, pro-supply side UK political movement.
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@sparky said in British Politics:
I've tried to like Keir Starmer (according to a mutual friend, he's a great guy) and he is an improvement on Corbyn the Mad (who wouldn't be), but he is very tough to listen to. He's like Ed Miliband but without the charisma........
Starmer needs to be more himself then. Miliband could at least smile & laugh in public - Starmer sounds and looks plain weird at times.
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@victor-meldrew said in British Politics:
@majorrage said in British Politics:
He harked on about previous failures etc (which made no sense to me) and said Sunak said nothing about levelling up. Which was odd, as Sunak had mentioned levelling up about 20 times. The budget was basically this.
Captain Hindsight - can't help himself.
He just looks out of his depth.
Been saying this for months
British Politics