Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
I happen to agree on the top rate of income tax (though evidence is in short supply). Do they say the same about a wealth tax?
In any event, there's nothing to stop us raising the overall tax take closer to 50% GDP. Tories on here and elswhere will tell us that will trash the economy as it has in other countries that have tried it such as er, Denmark, Sweden and Norway (although strangely these countries seem to be managing their high-tax economic disaster pretty well last time I looked).
Norway has a tax rate as a percentage of GDP of 43%, Denmark 48% and Sweden 45%.
The Scandinavian countries do OK economically, though Norway is helped by having a lot of oil but of the top 10 nations by gdp per capita, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Norway, Ireland, Qatar, Iceland, USA, Denmark, Singapore and Australia, 6 have a lower national tax take as a percentage of GDP than the UK does and Iceland taxes the same as the UK. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
But tbh 6/10 or 5/10 both say to me that having low tax rates is not really a significant factor in predicting economic performance.
Even on that
Yes, but my point is, we could afford to tax at closer to 50% GDP without trashing the economy, and wipe out the deficit straightaway!
It's so obvious I can't see why the Tories didn't go for it!
The fact that most of the most prosperous nations do not tax at 50% of GDP does not suggest that is the case. The Tories of course would never go for it, otherwise what is the point of being a Tory if you are campaigning to raise taxes and spend more and more, you may as well join Corbyn Labour.
High marginal rates have discouraged so many Europeans from bringing kids into the world. Everyone says Sweden this, Denmark that. Swedes and Danes and Germans want the good life with stuff, not just social services, so they ration kids to zero or, sometimes, one. Then they moan when people from low-wage countries move to the country to do the work their non-children can't do. In this light, European welfare states are only viable for another generation or so, and the UK really dodged a bullet there if the alternative was to keep going in that direction, as seemed possible up to the shortages in the public finances in the 1960s.
Do people really think like that? S Korea and Singapore are at the lowest fertility. Sweden is higher than the US and UK. Norway and Denmark similar. Argentina is the closest to a developed nation above the replacement rate. It would seem to me that it is far more cultural than purely economic.
No doubt. Spend time in these countries and you will observe that the higher the income, the more kids are around the house. Indeed, Swedes and Danes overall have near-replacement fertility. Indigenous Swedes and Danes? Not so much. It's the communities with lower lifestyle expectations who have kids, I mean high marginal tax is tough but not as tough as living in Somalia. So, that is the trade-off these societies surprisingly faced after the 1960s.
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Re: Laffer
"Laffer is currently an economic adviser to Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, who in 2012 zeroed out state tax liability for approximately 330,000 of the top wage earners in the state.[15] The state, which had previously had a budget surplus, experienced a budget deficit of about $200 million in 2012. Drastic cuts to state funding for education and infrastructure have been implemented because of the budget deficits."
He is so discredited, it is amazing anyone still quotes him.
The curve he described "The basic concept was not new; Laffer himself says he learned it from Ibn Khaldun and John Maynard Keynes."
It also describes nothing except that tax rates of 0% and 100% will generate no revenue. Anything in between more. Where the sweet spot is no-one knows.
Quotes from wiki.
I was reading the other day that the actual theoretical turning point of the curve, maximal tax revenue, is at approximately 70% which made me laugh a lot.
No idea of the provenance of that statement though.
There is much debate. However, there is NO evidence that it applies at the levels that Laffer and his merry cohorts claim.
"When asked whether a “cut in federal income tax rates in the US right now would raise taxable income enough so that the annual total tax revenue would be higher within five years than without the tax cut,” 96% of economists surveyed in 2012 disagreed."
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Does Wayne Rooney deserve £300k per week? I may not think so, you may not think so. But the market disagrees with you.
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
I bought my first house at 22...Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma....I was very lucky, I had finished university and got a job in London, I was planning to rent, my mother was like don't waste your money paying rent, we'll help you get on the property ladder...So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006...It's what working class Northerners do, we help our friends and families. Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2 Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3 A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
I happen to agree on the top rate of income tax (though evidence is in short supply). Do they say the same about a wealth tax?
In any event, there's nothing to stop us raising the overall tax take closer to 50% GDP. Tories on here and elswhere will tell us that will trash the economy as it has in other countries that have tried it such as er, Denmark, Sweden and Norway (although strangely these countries seem to be managing their high-tax economic disaster pretty well last time I looked).
Norway has a tax rate as a percentage of GDP of 43%, Denmark 48% and Sweden 45%.
The Scandinavian countries do OK economically, though Norway is helped by having a lot of oil but of the top 10 nations by gdp per capita, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Norway, Ireland, Qatar, Iceland, USA, Denmark, Singapore and Australia, 6 have a lower national tax take as a percentage of GDP than the UK does and Iceland taxes the same as the UK. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
But tbh 6/10 or 5/10 both say to me that having low tax rates is not really a significant factor in predicting economic performance.
Even on that
Yes, but my point is, we could afford to tax at closer to 50% GDP without trashing the economy, and wipe out the deficit straightaway!
It's so obvious I can't see why the Tories didn't go for it!
The fact that most of the most prosperous nations do not tax at 50% of GDP does not suggest that is the case. The Tories of course would never go for it, otherwise what is the point of being a Tory if you are campaigning to raise taxes and spend more and more, you may as well join Corbyn Labour.
You are right that the Tories couldn't really go for it at the moment, which is why we need a Labour government ().
But they do have a habit of coming round to Labour policies in the end!
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
Indeed. Crypto is a libertarian's wet dream. I see from The Telegraph today they are going to try to clamp down on it, but once Bitcoin adopts true privacy solutions like Zcash or Monero, the genie will be well and truly out of the bottle.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there. Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ? Dearie me.
Taking the point seriously, salaries are decided by supply and demand. Hard work and dedication are good things and speaks well of the individual, and talent is a useful possession, but they are not sufficient to ensure high salaries. Lots of people in the UK work hard, are diligent, law-abiding and say their prayers, but will not achieve a high salary.
I bought my first house at 22...Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma....I was very lucky, I had finished university and got a job in London, I was planning to rent, my mother was like don't waste your money paying rent, we'll help you get on the property ladder...So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006...It's what working class Northerners do, we help our friends and families. Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2 Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3 A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
Yeah but you forget: TSE is that rare and exclusive, privately-educated working class Northener!
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
If only the hospital were free to do the same for the nurse eh?
I bought my first house at 22...Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma....I was very lucky, I had finished university and got a job in London, I was planning to rent, my mother was like don't waste your money paying rent, we'll help you get on the property ladder...So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006...It's what working class Northerners do, we help our friends and families. Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2 Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3 A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
As Alan Clark said, Michael Heseltine could never truly be upper class 'because he had to buy his own furniture.'
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
Indeed. Crypto is a libertarian's wet dream. I see from The Telegraph today they are going to try to clamp down on it, but once Bitcoin adopts true privacy solutions like Zcash or Monero, the genie will be well and truly out of the bottle.
The number of pensioners selling their house and “losing their fortunes in a weekend in Vegas” should go up substantially. Well that’s what they will tell the taxman anyway. Meanwhile Bitcoin will rise..
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
Indeed. Crypto is a libertarian's wet dream. I see from The Telegraph today they are going to try to clamp down on it, but once Bitcoin adopts true privacy solutions like Zcash or Monero, the genie will be well and truly out of the bottle.
You'd have to be pretty brave/foolish to pile your wealth into bitcoin imo. And it's hard to hide property/land.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there. Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ? Dearie me.
Taking the point seriously, salaries are decided by supply and demand. Hard work and dedication are good things and speaks well of the individual, and talent is a useful possession, but they are not sufficient to ensure high salaries. Lots of people in the UK work hard, are diligent, law-abiding and say their prayers, but will not achieve a high salary.
Yes well some will be better singers than others too despite practicing , lessons etc.
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fthat you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
If only the hospital were free to do the same for the nurse eh?
It is the presence of a strong City of London and the £52 billion it raises in tax which pays a large part of that nurses salary. Investment bankers are also generally at a significantly higher risk of being fired than nurses if they do not bring in enough business or make enough money for their bank, nurses are unlike to be fired unless in serious breach of professional standards.
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
Indeed. Crypto is a libertarian's wet dream. I see from The Telegraph today they are going to try to clamp down on it, but once Bitcoin adopts true privacy solutions like Zcash or Monero, the genie will be well and truly out of the bottle.
The number of pensioners selling their house and “losing their fortunes in a weekend in Vegas” should go up substantially. Well that’s what they will tell the taxman anyway. Meanwhile Bitcoin will rise..
I bought my first house at 22...Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma....I was very lucky, I had finished university and got a job in London, I was planning to rent, my mother was like don't waste your money paying rent, we'll help you get on the property ladder...So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006...It's what working class Northerners do, we help our friends and families. Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2 Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3 A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
Yeah but you forget: TSE is that rare and exclusive, privately-educated working class Northener!
I don't know anything about TSE's personal background, other than what he has said here, and the point is the same regardless of his characteristics. It genuinely was not a slight on him: rather it was a comment about how people progress thru their lives and the (often mistaken) assumptions we make about other's. One of the reasons I am on this board is to gain knowledge on how others live and what they believe.
Inheritance tax, at 40%, is pretty damn close to taxing wealth at 50%. It just happens in a lump sum when you die. And a large percentage of people's estates will have been taxed in other ways (e.g. income tax, capital gains) throughout their lives on top of that.
Are you really trying to push a double taxation narrative? Transactions are taxed all the time. As wages, as VAT on purchases, as corp tax on profits. It's a never ending cycle of taxation - why should inheritance be any different?
Raising the inheritance tax rate would be good for accountants but not for the Treasury.
No need to raise the rate, just reduce the exemptions. Separately, have a 1% annual tax on wealth. (1% of £11 trillion = £110bn!)
That’s not inheritance tax then.
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
Indeed. Crypto is a libertarian's wet dream. I see from The Telegraph today they are going to try to clamp down on it, but once Bitcoin adopts true privacy solutions like Zcash or Monero, the genie will be well and truly out of the bottle.
You'd have to be pretty brave/foolish to pile your wealth into bitcoin imo. And it's hard to hide property/land.
You gift the land and spread wealth over a variety of crypto currriencies or even bullion, jewels etc.
Salary and sales taxes are easy to collect. Snooping under everyone’s mattresses for fivers that haven’t been annually taxed is hopelessly inefficient.
Good grief, all you Tory PBers really are spooked by the prospect of a proper Labour reform programme aren't you?
Spooked? Hardly? We'll all be spending more time with our money in Singapore, Dubai, Geneva and so on. Corbynomics clearly does not care about the Laffer curve.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
If only the hospital were free to do the same for the nurse eh?
I agree with you - they should be free to pay individual rates. Unfortunately the unions would have a meltdown.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there. Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ? Dearie me.
Taking the point seriously, salaries are decided by supply and demand. Hard work and dedication are good things and speaks well of the individual, and talent is a useful possession, but they are not sufficient to ensure high salaries. Lots of people in the UK work hard, are diligent, law-abiding and say their prayers, but will not achieve a high salary.
Yes well some will be better singers than others too despite practicing , lessons etc.
I bought my first house at 22...Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma....I was very lucky, I had finished university and got a job in London, I was planning to rent, my mother was like don't waste your money paying rent, we'll help you get on the property ladder...So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006...It's what working class Northerners do, we help our friends and families. Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2 Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3 A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
Yeah but you forget: TSE is that rare and exclusive, privately-educated working class Northener!
I don't know anything about TSE's personal background, other than what he has said here, and the point is the same regardless of his characteristics. It genuinely was not a slight on him: rather it was a comment about how people progress thru their lives and the (often mistaken) assumptions we make about other's. One of the reasons I am on this board is to gain knowledge on how others live and what they believe.
Yes, me too. Your points were very well made and I have no argument with them.
IIRC TSE has frequently mentioned on this forum that he was privately educated (often whilst disparaging grammar schools). I find it amusing that he considers himself working class although he went to private school.
Having said that I find many of his posts witty, interesting, and thought-provoking, so if you're reading this TSE, no offence intended pal!
High marginal rates have discouraged so many Europeans from bringing kids into the world. Everyone says Sweden this, Denmark that. Swedes and Danes and Germans want the good life with stuff, not just social services, so they ration kids to zero or, sometimes, one. Then they moan when people from low-wage countries move to the country to do the work their non-children can't do. In this light, European welfare states are only viable for another generation or so, and the UK really dodged a bullet there if the alternative was to keep going in that direction, as seemed possible up to the shortages in the public finances in the 1960s.
Do people really think like that? S Korea and Singapore are at the lowest fertility. Sweden is higher than the US and UK. Norway and Denmark similar. Argentina is the closest to a developed nation above the replacement rate. It would seem to me that it is far more cultural than purely economic.
No doubt. Spend time in these countries and you will observe that the higher the income, the more kids are around the house. Indeed, Swedes and Danes overall have near-replacement fertility. Indigenous Swedes and Danes? Not so much. It's the communities with lower lifestyle expectations who have kids, I mean high marginal tax is tough but not as tough as living in Somalia. So, that is the trade-off these societies surprisingly faced after the 1960s.
Fertility rates in the UK are not correlated with income. Certainly here there is no general evidence that people restrict family size because of money. People do for other reasons, and sometimes involuntarily.
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The basic problem is the injustice in the system in the first place.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
If only the hospital were free to do the same for the nurse eh?
I agree with you - they should be free to pay individual rates. Unfortunately the unions would have a meltdown.
So would the Cabinet, since it would trash the pay cap.
High marginal rates have discouraged so many Europeans from bringing kids into the world. Everyone says Sweden this, Denmark that. Swedes and Danes and Germans want the good life with stuff, not just social services, so they ration kids to zero or, sometimes, one. Then they moan when people from low-wage countries move to the country to do the work their non-children can't do. In this light, European welfare states are only viable for another generation or so, and the UK really dodged a bullet there if the alternative was to keep going in that direction, as seemed possible up to the shortages in the public finances in the 1960s.
Do people really think like that? S Korea and Singapore are at the lowest fertility. Sweden is higher than the US and UK. Norway and Denmark similar. Argentina is the closest to a developed nation above the replacement rate. It would seem to me that it is far more cultural than purely economic.
No doubt. Spend time in these countries and you will observe that the higher the income, the more kids are around the house. Indeed, Swedes and Danes overall have near-replacement fertility. Indigenous Swedes and Danes? Not so much. It's the communities with lower lifestyle expectations who have kids, I mean high marginal tax is tough but not as tough as living in Somalia. So, that is the trade-off these societies surprisingly faced after the 1960s.
Fertility rates in the UK are not correlated with income. Certainly here there is no general evidence that people restrict family size because of money. People do for other reasons, and sometimes involuntarily.
This case study sums the problem up far better than I ever could...
Indeed, what is the point of working hard and trying to get a promotion if more than half your income is taken in tax?
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
childcare
I’ve read some bollocks in my time on here but this is right up there.
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.
I half agree with you. But does an invertment banker deserve 10 times what a nurse gets paid?
Not always but the investment bank is free to pay her/him whatever they choose thankfully.
If only the hospital were free to do the same for the nurse eh?
I agree with you - they should be free to pay individual rates. Unfortunately the unions would have a meltdown.
So would the Cabinet, since it would trash the pay cap.
The pay cap is a symptom of collective bargaining not the cause.
Ideally every hospital could pay any member of staff whatever it wanted. However it would still have to balance its budget - widespread pay rises would mean patients may suffer in other ways.
The anti-Bitcoin.....give it 10 years of Corbyn and we will see the same, the Corbyn Coin...
I've said a few times on here that Venezuela will be the first currency to fall to a speculative attack, a replacement of their fiat / central bank system with a cryptocurrency out of their control.
It's the real reason why governments from the US to China to the UK are trying to clamp down on it. The bad news for them is they are shutting the stable door after the horse has already bolted.
Corbyn endorsed the Venezuelan government, but there's no point in mentioning it because his supporters couldn't care less.
Not just Corbyn's supporters, but labour supporters and - importantly - the electorate more generally.
I thought the tories getting elected after spending most of the 2000's calling for lower regulations and taxes on the city of london was pretty crazy. But the tories just shut up about it for a couple of years and got themselves into power.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Corbyn endorsed the Venezuelan government, but there's no point in mentioning it because his supporters couldn't care less.
Not just Corbyn's supporters, but labour supporters and - importantly - the electorate more generally.
I thought the tories getting elected after spending most of the 2000's calling for lower regulations and taxes on the city of london was pretty crazy. But the tories just shut up about it for a couple of years and got themselves into power.
Venezuela is a circle-jerk for rightwingers.
The electorate doesn't care.
The 40% who voted for Corbyn may not have cared, the 42% who voted Tory clearly did and Corbyn cannot win an overall majority without winning over some of the latter.
High marginal rates have discouraged so many Europeans from bringing kids into the world. Everyone says Sweden this, Denmark that. Swedes and Danes and Germans want the good life with stuff, not just social services, so they ration kids to zero or, sometimes, one. Then they moan when people from low-wage countries move to the country to do the work their non-children can't do. In this light, European welfare states are only viable for another generation or so, and the UK really dodged a bullet there if the alternative was to keep going in that direction, as seemed possible up to the shortages in the public finances in the 1960s.
Do people really think like that? S Korea and Singapore are at the lowest fertility. Sweden is higher than the US and UK. Norway and Denmark similar. Argentina is the closest to a developed nation above the replacement rate. It would seem to me that it is far more cultural than purely economic.
No doubt. Spend time in these countries and you will observe that the higher the income, the more kids are around the house. Indeed, Swedes and Danes overall have near-replacement fertility. Indigenous Swedes and Danes? Not so much. It's the communities with lower lifestyle expectations who have kids, I mean high marginal tax is tough but not as tough as living in Somalia. So, that is the trade-off these societies surprisingly faced after the 1960s.
Fertility rates in the UK are not correlated with income. Certainly here there is no general evidence that people restrict family size because of money. People do for other reasons, and sometimes involuntarily.
This case study sums the problem up far better than I ever could...
Ha. Well, that isn't really true in continental Europe. Maybe in the UK/USA, where taxes on middle-income people are on the whole less onerous, but I still doubt it. It doesn't seem like intelligence has gone down in the last 50 years due to selective contraception.
Corbyn endorsed the Venezuelan government, but there's no point in mentioning it because his supporters couldn't care less.
Not just Corbyn's supporters, but labour supporters and - importantly - the electorate more generally.
I thought the tories getting elected after spending most of the 2000's calling for lower regulations and taxes on the city of london was pretty crazy. But the tories just shut up about it for a couple of years and got themselves into power.
Venezuela is a circle-jerk for rightwingers.
The electorate doesn't care.
The 40% who voted for Corbyn may not have cared, the 42% who voted Tory clearly did and Corbyn cannot win an overall majority without winning over some of the latter.
Technically all he needs is for some of that 42% to abstain... fortunately Corbyn is such a marmite character he is very hard to abstain against. May isn't great, but I'd vote for the devil himself if it kept Corbyn out of power.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The harsh truth on nurses v Wayne Rooney v traders is that a very small number of the best footballers and traders can find people willing to pay millions for their skills, because millions of football fans / future pensioners are affected by their individual performances, whereas there are millions of nurses around the world collectively serving smaller numbers of people per nurse and whose skills are not unique or in particularly high unmet demand relative to the number willing and able to be nurses. As someone said, as well as nurses for OAPs, thank the bankers for investing the pensions at better rates than annuities.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
Never forget this important fact: the huge lack of housing supply to meet demand has absolutely nothing to do with the large increase in the population of the UK over the last 15 years or so, and the fact that many people found it relatively easy to get on the housing ladder in the late 1970s and early 1980s had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the population hardly increased during that time. Only a bigot would suggest such a thing.
Never forget this important fact: the huge lack of housing supply to meet demand has absolutely nothing to do with the large increase in the population of the UK over the last 15 years or so, and the fact that many people found it relatively easy to get on the housing ladder in the late 1970s and early 1980s had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the population hardly increased during that time. Only a bigot would suggest such a thing.
Supply and demand of housing are crucially important.
But they're clearly not the only factor. Between 1994 and 2003, net EU migration was negligible: under 10,000 people in most years, and peaking at just 33,000 in 1998.
Yet house prices in London rose 400% in the fifteen years to 2007.
Since then, house prices have risen at one tenth the rate, despite EU migration being more than an order of magnitude greater. A scatter graph would show a clear inverse correlation between EU migration and London house price increases.
Which is both true, and clearly makes no sense.
The issue is that there are many contributory factors, but political discourse encourages us to pretend that there is just one. We have a tax system that (historically) encourages landlords to outbid private owners. We have had falling interest rates that make housing appear more affordable than ever. And we have had a massive increase in money supply that has inflated the value of certain assets.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
Never forget this important fact: the huge lack of housing supply to meet demand has absolutely nothing to do with the large increase in the population of the UK over the last 15 years or so, and the fact that many people found it relatively easy to get on the housing ladder in the late 1970s and early 1980s had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the population hardly increased during that time. Only a bigot would suggest such a thing.
In the mid 1970s I looked at buying a house in the London suburbs. After trying to suppress laughter at the ridiculous prices (though I could just afford a 3 bedroom semi in a decent SW area on both my and my wife's salary) we transferred to Manchester, and a bought a 3 bedroom semi in the football player / stockbroker area of Cheshire for less than a third of the London price. We sold it a year later and made 15% profit. Even then there was a property shortage. The population might not have been increasing much but there were already a lot of folks here!
Corbyn endorsed the Venezuelan government, but there's no point in mentioning it because his supporters couldn't care less.
Not just Corbyn's supporters, but labour supporters and - importantly - the electorate more generally.
I thought the tories getting elected after spending most of the 2000's calling for lower regulations and taxes on the city of london was pretty crazy. But the tories just shut up about it for a couple of years and got themselves into power.
Venezuela is a circle-jerk for rightwingers.
The electorate doesn't care.
The 40% who voted for Corbyn may not have cared, the 42% who voted Tory clearly did and Corbyn cannot win an overall majority without winning over some of the latter.
You think Tory voters only did so because of Venezuela?
I just checked - in 1975 I paid 10k pounds for my house in Knutsford. (the equivalent house in SW London Rich, Twick, Feltham was almost 40k pounds at that time). Today the house 2 doors from me in Knutsford is yours for the magnificent sum of 285k pounds. That is absolutely ludicrous and shows the depth of the demand v supply problem.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
Never forget this important fact: the huge lack of housing supply to meet demand has absolutely nothing to do with the large increase in the population of the UK over the last 15 years or so, and the fact that many people found it relatively easy to get on the housing ladder in the late 1970s and early 1980s had absolutely nothing to do with the fact that the population hardly increased during that time. Only a bigot would suggest such a thing.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
It's only a hard problem politically. It's unusual to have a problem where the government could just pass legislation and the problem would be solved, but this is one. Repeal the planning laws.
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
If you don't want a foot on the British property ponzi scheme ladder that would make you a Foreigner.
I just checked - in 1975 I paid 10k pounds for my house in Knutsford. (the equivalent house in SW London Rich, Twick, Feltham was almost 40k pounds at that time). Today the house 2 doors from me in Knutsford is yours for the magnificent sum of 285k pounds. That is absolutely ludicrous and shows the depth of the demand v supply problem.
Sure. The housing stock is generally pretty crap, too.
Your knutsford example has gone from about 4x average earnings in 1975 - to 10x average earnings today. Massive equity gains have been had at the expense of non-property owners and not-yet-property owners. It's been a zero sum game. The tories have no answer - their client vote expect subsidies for property owners (as we saw with the doorstep reaction to the dementia tax). That's how ridiculous things have got.
There are also some seriously dodgy and pretty widespread practices that the government turns a blind eye to, like;
POINT 1 A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
Hmm. I don't buy property because I want someone else to look after the infrastructure while I spend my money on enjoying life. I like there being lots of BTL landlords as it gives me more choice. What class is that?
Not sure but I can deduce a few things
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country. 2) You have no pets, or small ones if any. 3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
The fundamental problem is not BTL, or second homes or any such thing - it is a huge lack of housing supply to meet demand, particularly in certain areas. Address that and you solve the problem.
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
It's only a hard problem politically. It's unusual to have a problem where the government could just pass legislation and the problem would be solved, but this is one. Repeal the planning laws.
I wouldn't support total repeal - that leads to Houston TX and all that entails - but pruning drastically would help.
When I was back in Yorkshire about 12-15 years ago, several home building projects foundered on the insistence on including "affordable housing" in the mix. Builders aren't going to build homes they can't sell, but they're not going to build homes they can't make money on either. As any realtor will tell you, the whole price model keys on the cheapest houses in the development.
Another classic was the opening of the Macarthur Glen discount shopping mall in the country near York. Their marketing folk came to talk to my Rotary Club, and one of the most contentious fights they had was over the number of bicycle parking spots. The local authority folks wanted several hundred, and to reduce the number of parking places. This is a discount mall in the country - who the hell is going to go there by bicycle?
I just checked - in 1975 I paid 10k pounds for my house in Knutsford. (the equivalent house in SW London Rich, Twick, Feltham was almost 40k pounds at that time). Today the house 2 doors from me in Knutsford is yours for the magnificent sum of 285k pounds. That is absolutely ludicrous and shows the depth of the demand v supply problem.
Sure. The housing stock is generally pretty crap, too.
Your knutsford example has gone from about 4x average earnings in 1975 - to 10x average earnings today. Massive equity gains have been had at the expense of non-property owners and not-yet-property owners. It's been a zero sum game. The tories have no answer - their client vote expect subsidies for property owners (as we saw with the doorstep reaction to the dementia tax). That's how ridiculous things have got.
There are also some seriously dodgy and pretty widespread practices that the government turns a blind eye to, like;
My Yorkshire example is even worse - in 7 years over the millennium my home in the 'golden triangle' went from 150k pounds to 390k pounds. Mainly an affluent area it also includes some deprived areas and several big council estates.
I just checked - in 1975 I paid 10k pounds for my house in Knutsford. (the equivalent house in SW London Rich, Twick, Feltham was almost 40k pounds at that time). Today the house 2 doors from me in Knutsford is yours for the magnificent sum of 285k pounds. That is absolutely ludicrous and shows the depth of the demand v supply problem.
Sure. The housing stock is generally pretty crap, too.
Your knutsford example has gone from about 4x average earnings in 1975 - to 10x average earnings today. Massive equity gains have been had at the expense of non-property owners and not-yet-property owners. It's been a zero sum game. The tories have no answer - their client vote expect subsidies for property owners (as we saw with the doorstep reaction to the dementia tax). That's how ridiculous things have got.
There are also some seriously dodgy and pretty widespread practices that the government turns a blind eye to, like;
I've often wondered the extent to which low interest rates, and rising prices work together against new property owners. Say you bought a £50k house with a £5k deposit when interest rates were 10%. Interest rates fall to 5%, and the house price goes up to £100k. The next purchaser needs to find a £10k deposit, even though the house has the same repayments as before. You, as the owner of the place, sell out and can now afford a massive deposit on your new place.
I was intrigued by the Singapore model where 80% of the population live in state run rented accommodation. We keep being told we need to copy countries like Singapore, is that the answer in London where folk are effectively accommodated in public housing en masse and not the few that get Council or Housing assoc provision? The police and NHS used to accommodate their staff in large numbers in this way, do we need to go back to it?
Anyhow in the British context the government clearly can't be trusted with this. People who want this problem solved need to agitate for repeal, not reform.
(Or move to Japan, it's much more liberal, and it's gradually getting over its anti-immigration stupids too.)
I just checked - in 1975 I paid 10k pounds for my house in Knutsford. (the equivalent house in SW London Rich, Twick, Feltham was almost 40k pounds at that time). Today the house 2 doors from me in Knutsford is yours for the magnificent sum of 285k pounds. That is absolutely ludicrous and shows the depth of the demand v supply problem.
Sure. The housing stock is generally pretty crap, too.
Your knutsford example has gone from about 4x average earnings in 1975 - to 10x average earnings today. Massive equity gains have been had at the expense of non-property owners and not-yet-property owners. It's been a zero sum game. The tories have no answer - their client vote expect subsidies for property owners (as we saw with the doorstep reaction to the dementia tax). That's how ridiculous things have got.
There are also some seriously dodgy and pretty widespread practices that the government turns a blind eye to, like;
I've often wondered the extent to which low interest rates, and rising prices work together against new property owners. Say you bought a £50k house with a £5k deposit when interest rates were 10%. Interest rates fall to 5%, and the house price goes up to £100k. The next purchaser needs to find a £10k deposit, even though the house has the same repayments as before. You, as the owner of the place, sell out and can now afford a massive deposit on your new place.
The demand side for housing is certainly affected to a large extent by the availability and cost of finance, especially for first time buyers. As you say, once people are on the ‘ladder’, it’s easier to trade up as the leveraged capital growth allows for a larger deposit on the next property - even if prices rise - and so on...
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
They run SNL twice on a saturday - once early in the evening to get timings, blocking etc done, and then the live show. The early show is recorded, just in case they need it.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
And it takes the convicts nine balls to get their first scalp of the morning, a silly edge to the keeper from Vince. Why did I bother getting up to watch this crap?
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
They run SNL twice on a saturday - once early in the evening to get timings, blocking etc done, and then the live show. The early show is recorded, just in case they need it.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
Ha, I didn’t know that, the old record-the-dress-rehearsal trick. I did always wonder what would happen if there was a fire alarm in the studio or a large piece of set got stuck on the stage.
You’re right that the older shows are better, and they certainly took more risks in the early days, but the hatful of Emmys this year suggests they’re still comparatively good at what they do.
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
They run SNL twice on a saturday - once early in the evening to get timings, blocking etc done, and then the live show. The early show is recorded, just in case they need it.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
Ha, I didn’t know that, the old record-the-dress-rehearsal trick. I did always wonder what would happen if there was a fire alarm in the studio or a large piece of set got stuck on the stage.
You’re right that the older shows are better, and they certainly took more risks in the early days, but the hatful of Emmys this year suggests they’re still comparatively good at what they do.
Not really - there's just nothing else like it on US mainstream TV - and it's been there over 40 years, so has a reverence it probably doesn't deserve.
But Tina Fey "I can see Russia!!" is a goodie. Unfortunately these days SNL is so politically liberal that it is losing it.
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
They run SNL twice on a saturday - once early in the evening to get timings, blocking etc done, and then the live show. The early show is recorded, just in case they need it.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
Ha, I didn’t know that, the old record-the-dress-rehearsal trick. I did always wonder what would happen if there was a fire alarm in the studio or a large piece of set got stuck on the stage.
You’re right that the older shows are better, and they certainly took more risks in the early days, but the hatful of Emmys this year suggests they’re still comparatively good at what they do.
Not really - there's just nothing else like it on US mainstream TV - and it's been there over 40 years, so has a reverence it probably doesn't deserve.
But Tina Fey "I can see Russia!!" is a goodie. Unfortunately these days SNL is so politically liberal that it is losing it.
You mean you disagree with it. That doesn't mean that SNL has lost it.
The impersonator in question is Kate McKinnon, who is probably the best political impersonator left on SNL since Jason Sudekis's (Biden, Romney) and Tina Fey's (Palin) departure. This does mean omitting Alec Baldwin (Trump) and Melissa McCarthy (Spicer), but they're just slumming. Anybody who tells you that Tracey Ullmann does the best Merkel hasn't seen McKinnon's...although having said that I think Ullmann's better overall.
Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump both won Emmys this year. Well, Kate McKinnon and Alec Baldwin from SNL did anyway.
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
They run SNL twice on a saturday - once early in the evening to get timings, blocking etc done, and then the live show. The early show is recorded, just in case they need it.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
Ha, I didn’t know that, the old record-the-dress-rehearsal trick. I did always wonder what would happen if there was a fire alarm in the studio or a large piece of set got stuck on the stage.
You’re right that the older shows are better, and they certainly took more risks in the early days, but the hatful of Emmys this year suggests they’re still comparatively good at what they do.
Not really - there's just nothing else like it on US mainstream TV - and it's been there over 40 years, so has a reverence it probably doesn't deserve.
But Tina Fey "I can see Russia!!" is a goodie. Unfortunately these days SNL is so politically liberal that it is losing it.
You mean you disagree with it. That doesn't mean that SNL has lost it.
No. I mean the ratings say it's not what it was. Whether I agree or disagree with it doesn't affect the ratings - unfortunately!
Some of the Trump stuff they do is really really funny. Some isn't. The ratings just aren't there any more. It's over 40 years old - is that a surprise?
Why are the Conservatives fighting on Labour ground on the subject of social mobility? The idea that it's the government's job to encourage social engineering in order to create more equality is an entirely left-wing concept and not something the Tories should have got involved with under any circumstances. It's indicative of their surrender to their opponents' way of thinking that they've got sucked into this whole saga.
Quite right. The Conservatives should be telling people like me to know our place and ensure that those who are born into privilege get to enjoy their just rewards in life.
I guess from your reply that you think it's the government's job to organise equality between people, rather than people trying to improve their lives themselves, ie. it should be a top-down process.
Comments
"When asked whether a “cut in federal income tax rates in the US right now would raise taxable income enough so that the annual total tax revenue would be higher within five years than without the tax cut,” 96% of economists surveyed in 2012 disagreed."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arthur_Laffer
Crypto currencies would make wealth taxes a farce and cash would make a comeback.
Would every tax payer have to produce every receipt to prove they hadn’t bought bitcoin but splashed it on champagne instead ?
Share ownership would plummet , gold would soar, foreign property ownership would rise...
A good definition of class in 2010's South-East England looks like this:
lower working class: will never buy property, because they cannot afford it
upper working class: buys property via mortgage, pays own deposit
lower middle class: buys property via mortgage, relatives pay for deposit
upper middle class: buys property outright, relatives pay for house
upper class: will never buy property, because they will inherit
POINT 2
Money you pay back when you can and feel like it, even if they don't want it, is not a loan it's a gift. A loan is something you have to pay back when they say, even if you can't or don't want to.
POINT 3
A dwelling - not just a house, a dwelling, including studio flats - in 2000 in Central London would not have gone for less than 100K. I think from this that the money Granny ScreamingEagles gave you would have been around the 10K mark or above.
SUMMARY
There are very few working-class Northerners whose relatives could have given them 10K in 2000 and who at adulthood were the sole grandchild of grandparents.
But they do have a habit of coming round to Labour policies in the end!
Life isn’t fair and never will be.
Salary and sales taxes are easy to collect. Snooping under everyone’s mattresses for fivers that haven’t been annually taxed is hopelessly inefficient.
IIRC TSE has frequently mentioned on this forum that he was privately educated (often whilst disparaging grammar schools). I find it amusing that he considers himself working class although he went to private school.
Having said that I find many of his posts witty, interesting, and thought-provoking, so if you're reading this TSE, no offence intended pal!
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/nhs-radiology-review-cancer-patients-diagnosis-missed-junior-doctors-a8085976.html
10% of Radiology jobs in the country are vacant, many for over a year.
Tories only like market forces when they can be used to screw the workers.
https://youtu.be/YwZ0ZUy7P3E?t=55s
Ideally every hospital could pay any member of staff whatever it wanted. However it would still have to balance its budget - widespread pay rises would mean patients may suffer in other ways.
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-42217798
The anti-Bitcoin.....give it 10 years of Corbyn and we will see the same, the Corbyn Coin...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/12/03/maduros-economic-war-venezuela/
http://nakamotoinstitute.org/mempool/speculative-attack/
It's the real reason why governments from the US to China to the UK are trying to clamp down on it. The bad news for them is they are shutting the stable door after the horse has already bolted.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-12-03/reason-bitcoin-sudden-plunge-revealed-uk-plans-regulatory-crackdown-cryptocurrencies
I thought the tories getting elected after spending most of the 2000's calling for lower regulations and taxes on the city of london was pretty crazy. But the tories just shut up about it for a couple of years and got themselves into power.
Venezuela is a circle-jerk for rightwingers.
The electorate doesn't care.
1) You most likely live in London - it has the lowest rental yields in the country.
2) You have no pets, or small ones if any.
3) You don't particularly have tonnes of material possessions (By weight & volume)
Yes, I know that it is an easy problem to state but by no means easy to solve. But it has been the case since the 1970s in the UK since I became a home owner there.
But they're clearly not the only factor. Between 1994 and 2003, net EU migration was negligible: under 10,000 people in most years, and peaking at just 33,000 in 1998.
Yet house prices in London rose 400% in the fifteen years to 2007.
Since then, house prices have risen at one tenth the rate, despite EU migration being more than an order of magnitude greater. A scatter graph would show a clear inverse correlation between EU migration and London house price increases.
Which is both true, and clearly makes no sense.
The issue is that there are many contributory factors, but political discourse encourages us to pretend that there is just one. We have a tax system that (historically) encourages landlords to outbid private owners. We have had falling interest rates that make housing appear more affordable than ever. And we have had a massive increase in money supply that has inflated the value of certain assets.
Your knutsford example has gone from about 4x average earnings in 1975 - to 10x average earnings today. Massive equity gains have been had at the expense of non-property owners and not-yet-property owners. It's been a zero sum game. The tories have no answer - their client vote expect subsidies for property owners (as we saw with the doorstep reaction to the dementia tax). That's how ridiculous things have got.
There are also some seriously dodgy and pretty widespread practices that the government turns a blind eye to, like;
https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/dec/02/homeowner-freehold-management-fees-unadopted
When I was back in Yorkshire about 12-15 years ago, several home building projects foundered on the insistence on including "affordable housing" in the mix. Builders aren't going to build homes they can't sell, but they're not going to build homes they can't make money on either. As any realtor will tell you, the whole price model keys on the cheapest houses in the development.
Another classic was the opening of the Macarthur Glen discount shopping mall in the country near York. Their marketing folk came to talk to my Rotary Club, and one of the most contentious fights they had was over the number of bicycle parking spots. The local authority folks wanted several hundred, and to reduce the number of parking places. This is a discount mall in the country - who the hell is going to go there by bicycle?
Denial of reality is not a recipe for success.
But apparently Houston do have some nasty car-economy-encouraging regulations - the big ones being requiring off-street parking and minimum lot sizes:
http://marketurbanism.com/2016/09/19/how-houston-regulates-land-use/
Anyhow in the British context the government clearly can't be trusted with this. People who want this problem solved need to agitate for repeal, not reform.
(Or move to Japan, it's much more liberal, and it's gradually getting over its anti-immigration stupids too.)
Tina Fey’s Sarah Palin was an all time classic, she completely nailed the voice and the mannerisms.
Tracey Ullman is probably the most versatile impressionist around, her Mrs May is better than McKinnon’s effort last weekend - but the shows are different and she’d have had longer to prepare for it and more time in the makeup chair. SNL is done mostly live so there’s only a few minutes between sketches. You’re right that McKinnon’s Merkel is also very good.
I was lucky enough to go to a taping many years back when I lived in the NE area. In those days - late 70s early 80s - it was funny and edgy. Today it's just a faint shadow of what it once was.
You’re right that the older shows are better, and they certainly took more risks in the early days, but the hatful of Emmys this year suggests they’re still comparatively good at what they do.
But Tina Fey "I can see Russia!!" is a goodie. Unfortunately these days SNL is so politically liberal that it is losing it.
Now THAT was funny. Harvey Corman and Tim Conway.
Some of the Trump stuff they do is really really funny. Some isn't. The ratings just aren't there any more. It's over 40 years old - is that a surprise?