Rishi's proposed 'wealth tax'

[BFTD]

19 minutes ago, Detournement said:

It'll start off as a wealth tax and end up chopping everyone's current account that is bulging due to Covid. The public have saved over £100 billion so far, obviously it's not evenly spread but everyone who remained employed and most people on furlough will have a good bit more cash than they did 12 months ago.

Excluding the millions on minimum wage with no spare cash to begin with, one would assume.

[Bob in Denny]

6 minutes ago, MixuFruit said:

Be some laugh if the UK government borrowed money, gave it all to their pals, and now raids peoples bank accounts to pay for the interest

They already have spunked 3 BILLION

on contracts they haven't told anyone about. Out of 11 approx..

They issued contracts to companies like Deliotte to run Covid test centres.. certainly not health experts...

 

Edited December 20, 2020 by Bob in Denny
Edit for spelin

[Detournement]

4 minutes ago, BFTD said:

Excluding the millions on minimum wage with no spare cash to begin with, one would assume.

There are obviously people in that situation but it's not everyone on a low wage. 

[jakedee]

They already have spunked 3 BILLION
on contracts they haven't told anyone about. Out of 11 approx..
They issued contracts to companies like Deliotte to run Covid test centres.. certainly not health experts...
 

[Dev]

3 hours ago, Henderson to deliver ..... said:

I'm going to be brutally honest here, I'd much prefer to guillotine them and take it all.

If you were wealthy what would you contribute and at what level of wealth? Serious question.

How much do you earn i.e. a rough guide?

[Dev]

1 hour ago, NotThePars said:

Neat coming from a multi-Millionaire!

[Dev]

Setting aside the usual politics.

Given the size of the problem the Government may go down the road of issuing the equivalent of War Bonds. These offer low interest rates  over a very long repayment period and  basically rely upon what are acts of charity by those who can afford to buy them and who wish to help this country and its' people. 

The usual selfish wealthy people will take great care not to buy into this but, sadly, that's always been the case.

 

[Detournement]

6 minutes ago, Dev said:

Setting aside the usual politics.

Given the size of the problem the Government may go down the road of issuing the equivalent of War Bonds. These offer low interest rates  over a very long repayment period and  basically rely upon what are acts of charity by those who can afford to buy them and who wish to help this country and its' people. 

The usual selfish wealthy people will take great care not to buy into this but, sadly, that's always been the case.

 

They are already issuing 30 year bonds with a yield of 0.84% and selling them no bother at all. 

[BFTD]

15 minutes ago, MixuFruit said:

could at least one of @Dev  and @Detournement please pick an avatar

The mods should be able to choose an avatar for any poster without one after, ooh, a year.

Better yet, it could be a Platinum reward.

[Detournement]

I'll pick one.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

My biggest issue is that I think it will be the middle earners who end up paying for this.

 

Those at the top will just pay accountants to find some wheeze to avoid paying the tax whilst those at the bottom will pay nothing because they won't be near the threshold for paying the tax.

 

A lot will depend on where that threshold is set - too low and it will hit many who wouldn't consider themselves wealthy - especially those who have been prudent and saved into pensions.

 

If we are going to tax wealth perhaps begin with those who have second homes?

 

 

[Granny Danger]

2 hours ago, DeeTillEhDeh said:

My biggest issue is that I think it will be the middle earners who end up paying for this.

 

Those at the top will just pay accountants to find some wheeze to avoid paying the tax whilst those at the bottom will pay nothing because they won't be near the threshold for paying the tax.

 

A lot will depend on where that threshold is set - too low and it will hit many who wouldn't consider themselves wealthy - especially those who have been prudent and saved into pensions.

 

If we are going to tax wealth perhaps begin with those who have second homes?

 

 

I don’t have a problem taxing second homes but it’s a bit arbitrary.  I reckon closing tax loopholes would be easy if the political will was there.

[coprolite]

6 hours ago, Henderson to deliver ..... said:

I'd start with anyone who has reached a level of wealth where they feel obliged to try and hide their wealth and assets abroad or indulge in tax avoidance loopholes.

Anyone earning at least 3x the average uk wage should be taxed more also.

 

6 hours ago, Suspect Device said:

Not sure they feel obliged. I think they're just fucking greedy.

Anyone earning 3x the average wage is paying the top rate. Would you increase the top rate? What to? 

 

6 hours ago, Henderson to deliver ..... said:

They currently pay 40% right ?

Let's bump that up to 50% for starters.

 

3 hours ago, Detournement said:

They are already issuing 30 year bonds with a yield of 0.84% and selling them no bother at all. 

Average salary is £29k.

You have to earn £30k in scotland or £37 k elsewhere to pay higher rate (40%). So you don't have to be a particularly high earner to pay higher rate. 

At £50k your marginal rate can be 60% if you have two kids, as child benefit is withdrawn. 

At £100k your marginal rate goes up again as the tax free allowance is withdrawn, up to £150k.at £50k you pay the additional rate of 45%.

So you need to earn over 5x average to hit top level, of an extra 5%.

But income tax is for paupers. Real toffs have capital gains, usually taxed at 20% (10% if you can get entrepreneurs relief uncharacteristically restricted by these tories). 

Wealth tax has historically been difficult to administer, audit enforce. Even France phased theirs out. 

I'd expect this is getting floated so as to soften the blow of an increase to capital gains tax, which the jungle drums say is coming. 

 

[welshbairn]

4 minutes ago, MixuFruit said:

I don't think either of those numbers are correct are they?

It depends on your personal allowance apparently. And you have to take into account the drop of NI to 2% from 12%.

[coprolite]

10 minutes ago, MixuFruit said:

I don't think either of those numbers are correct are they?

No, you're right, that's 30k or 37k above your personal allowance. 

[Gordon EF]

The width of the tax bands are ludicrous and seem more or less designed to get a large number of voters on 'comfortable' salaries to fight the battles of those with eye-watering wealth.

If we're talking about a tax coming in at wealth of £500k then whoever said this would 'hit the middle hardest' is staggeringly ignorant. Why don't people do a 10 second Google search before saying thing like this? Less than 2% of people in the UK have a combined wealth of £500k (including property, cash, shares, bonds, and investment trusts). Of course pensions could well drag a few folk into that bracket but in no conceivable situation are we talking about "the middle".

The median person in the UK earns £31,500 per year and has a total wealth of £36k.

[DeeTillEhDeh]

 

 

 

The width of the tax bands are ludicrous and seem more or less designed to get a large number of voters on 'comfortable' salaries to fight the battles of those with eye-watering wealth.

If we're talking about a tax coming in at wealth of £500k then whoever said this would 'hit the middle hardest' is staggeringly ignorant. Why don't people do a 10 second Google search before saying thing like this? Less than 2% of people in the UK have a combined wealth of £500k (including property, cash, shares, bonds, and investment trusts). Of course pensions could well drag a few folk into that bracket but in no conceivable situation are we talking about "the middle".

The median person in the UK earns £31,500 per year and has a total wealth of £36k.

 

Tell me where in my post I used the figure of £500k?

 

I said that I thought that middle earners would end up paying it because they'll have a much lower threshold than that.

 

It will also come down to how wealth is calculated - I personally trust these fuckers as far as I could throw them - just watch the loopholes for those at the top to exploit.

 

[Jambomo]

Increasing tax this way would be fine if they weren’t basically giving it all away to their mates. For that reason alone it’s a massive no, they should try not giving billions to shell companies opened a few months ago and run by their brother in law’s, and use that money instead.

[parsforlife]

1 hour ago, coprolite said:

 

 

 

Average salary is £29k.

You have to earn £30k in scotland or £37 k elsewhere to pay higher rate (40%). So you don't have to be a particularly high earner to pay higher rate. 

Whilst that’s true.  If your earning 31k a year your barely paying anymore tax than someone on 29k.  You might be paying 40% tax but your only doing that on 0.3% of your income.

 

[Jambomo]

24 minutes ago, MixuFruit said:

Well that's the central conceit isn't  it. Our savings are already being made available to the government through banks, pensions etc buying government bonds in order to provide the interest. But the government needs to invest that cash in things that will grow the economy like trains, roads, broadband, education etc. In saying folk need taxed more, it's actually a startling admission of guilt that they've essentially sucked a pile of money out the economy and into Swiss bank accounts.

Exactly. I also think that we are currently seeing an increase in the Tories evading the rules on handing out contracts etc and they are essentially doing what they want. Increasing tax now, when they are clearly completely unrestrained in this regard, would simply be pissing more money up the wall.

I am not at all against taxation but the question is now immeshed with the behaviour of the current government and that makes it difficult. It is possible to be for extra taxation but against this government being the ones collecting and wasting it.

Edited December 20, 2020 by Jambomo