As far as income tax goes the top 1% of earners pay 25% of all income tax and the top 10% of earners pay 50% of all income tax.
Budget 2010
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As far as income tax goes the top 1% of earners pay 25% of all income tax and the top 10% of earners pay 50% of all income tax.
Not even close - NSO link
The top 1% have 1/5th of all Britain's wealth, the top 5% 2/5ths and the top 10% over half. Those figures become even more dramatic if you exclude dwellings from the equation.
Soldato
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Rather tame budget really.
I'm a bit worried about the assumed (because they haven't actually released any details) Conservative plans to seemingly slash spending/raise taxes. I can't help but think that Government spending, unfortunately, is a very large part of our GDP. Cut that too rapidly and you see a drop in GDP and spook the markets. A cut in taxes cannot happen because we are too heavily in debt. What's needed in my opinion is a slow and steady reduction in spending that isn't abrupt enough to shock the economy and constructive tax breaks that will encourage business and therefore not have too much of an effect on the overall tax take.
Also, this 50% top tax rate could be a rather costly mistake. My job centres around tax advice/compliance for expats. We've already had one client ask us to do a comparison of costs by country of an exec based in various locations. The UK is now pretty much the most expensive country for high earners, even more so than many traditional high tax European countries. And don't even get me started on the new pension rules, an absolute farce!
I'm a bit worried about the assumed (because they haven't actually released any details) Conservative plans to seemingly slash spending/raise taxes. I can't help but think that Government spending, unfortunately, is a very large part of our GDP. Cut that too rapidly and you see a drop in GDP and spook the markets. A cut in taxes cannot happen because we are too heavily in debt. What's needed in my opinion is a slow and steady reduction in spending that isn't abrupt enough to shock the economy and constructive tax breaks that will encourage business and therefore not have too much of an effect on the overall tax take.
Also, this 50% top tax rate could be a rather costly mistake. My job centres around tax advice/compliance for expats. We've already had one client ask us to do a comparison of costs by country of an exec based in various locations. The UK is now pretty much the most expensive country for high earners, even more so than many traditional high tax European countries. And don't even get me started on the new pension rules, an absolute farce!
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I would think that the distribution would be similar if you included other taxes, esp VAT etc, as most food is excluded from VAT the wealthier will pay a greater proportion as they obviously have more disposable income and thus spend more on non-essential. Personally though I think VAT is a 'fairer' tax than income tax as in some ways in encourages saving with todays low interest rates esp with inflation at 3%, but then that would be bad for the economy as the government needs people to spend as much money as possible.
I'm not sure who's right regarding spending cuts and the deficit, our public debt is fairly low compared with historical levels and way, way lower than Japan. Atleast we are in a better position to Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Italy as we have control of our own currency but that didn't help Iceland.
You know, if you're going to say things after you've been caught getting your facts badly wrong you really should take a few moments to check your facts before embarassing yourself. Looking at income distribution, which is a less meaningful measure of richs, the picture is slightly fairer, but the middle 50% doesn't earn even half the total income. In fact, the top 10% earn more than bottom 50% of all earners put together.
Here's a pretty pie chart.
The middle earners do not get the "vast majority" of income; the top few do.
You think 50% from the top 10% is a "small amount of income"?
Would only be true if VAT was only levied on non-essentials (as was it's original intention) however the scope of VAT has creeped an awful lot so that quite a few essentials are now covered by VAT.
Being better than the very worst of Europe isn't really something to be proud of. And with the deficit being as high as it is the level of debt is going to skyrocket.
See this BBC article: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8068926.stm
And this chart from it:
The ~1.25 million households on £300 (£375 million) a week represent more income than the ~0.2 million on £900 (£180 million) a week.
The point is that the frequency of high earning declines faster than the rate of earning increase.
And this chart from it:
The ~1.25 million households on £300 (£375 million) a week represent more income than the ~0.2 million on £900 (£180 million) a week.
The point is that the frequency of high earning declines faster than the rate of earning increase.
Thats what I thought (if i understand your description clv101 - haven't enough sight to see it). If I understand the governments plan correctly, they expect the deficit to reduce per percentage of gdp due to economic growth, where as the tories want to cut spending achieving the same result. Though the tories plan is likely to greatly increase unemployed from public sector redundencies (with the asociated economic cost of social security expense plus possible loss of skills etc when not used) Although the benefit of lower long term interest rates etc.
The governments rout however would probably create a weaker currency, higher interest rates (both bond market and Bank of England Base rate) and increased inflation, with possible re-run of the 70's industrial unrest. So this election will be as important as 1979 with a distinct possibility of a hung parliament.
The governments rout however would probably create a weaker currency, higher interest rates (both bond market and Bank of England Base rate) and increased inflation, with possible re-run of the 70's industrial unrest. So this election will be as important as 1979 with a distinct possibility of a hung parliament.
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3p on fuel duty, staged or not, is an absolute disgrace given the current climate.
Borrowing forecasted for 167 billion instead of 178 ? Am I meant to be impressed ? We are still facing colossal debt, unreformed public services and a society where it pays not to work at the expense of hard working people.
Election day will be interesting I think.
Borrowing forecasted for 167 billion instead of 178 ? Am I meant to be impressed ? We are still facing colossal debt, unreformed public services and a society where it pays not to work at the expense of hard working people.
Election day will be interesting I think.
hardly.
unless one party finds a way to get people off jobseekers etc and back into work it will make 0 difference.
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Noooooooooooooooo
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This country is ****ed, i'm taxed like a *******.
With 15 years experience as an Engineer, degree educated and working 50 hours a week - I earn around £100 a week more than a benefit scrounger that spends their entire time flicking sky+
With 15 years experience as an Engineer, degree educated and working 50 hours a week - I earn around £100 a week more than a benefit scrounger that spends their entire time flicking sky+
Soldato
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Nope. We have a massive structural deficit. This is the part of the deficit which cannot be corrected with GDP improvements - only active government policy.
The ratio between tax increases/spending cuts is hardly far off Labour's.
Soldato
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Yeah, for once. Too little too late.