The Budget 2013 - 12:30

[ubersonic]

this has to be the biggest thing in politics and economics which winds me up at the moment

tax avoidance = legal (and pretty much everyone does it in some form within the law)
tax evasion = illegal

Winds me up too, maybe they should be renamed to avoid people confusing them so much, we can call avoidance "careful spending" and evasion "stealing", much easier for people to get their head round

Why does it wind you up so much? People will always want to find loopholes that allow them to pay less tax.

I read it as him being wound up by people and the media confusing the terminology so much, not people doing it.

 

[Hagar]

We sold our house last year and are in rented. I would pay 40% on the interest from the quite large cash sum in savings accounts whereas my wife is a non tax payer and pays none. So it is all in her name.

We pay no less tax than if it was bricks and mortar rather than cash, we still pay property taxes on a rented house.

Tax avoidance yes, evasion no IMHO.

 

[Spook187]

Thats very frightening. Even more debt on it's way then.

And the tories never overspent in the past did they.

 

[DampDog]

And the tories never overspent in the past did they.

There's a historical chart showing the deficit over the past few decades here. 2008 is where it just went crazy. Out of the last 32 years, we've only had 6-7 years with a surplus.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/oct/18/deficit-debt-government-borrowing-data#

 

[atpbx]

And the tories never overspent in the past did they.

Not in any way comparable to the catastrophic mess that Brown was responsible for.

Its like taking out a loan against your house to buy some new windows compared to mortgaging your house and everything you own twice over and flushing it down the toilet.

 

[MooMoo444]

Not in any way comparable to the catastrophic mess that Brown was responsible for.

Its like taking out a loan against your house to buy some new windows compared to mortgaging your house and everything you own twice over and flushing it down the toilet.

I flush browns down the toilet.

 

[realBabelfish]

What? My annual train pass for London cost ~£4,500.

and? how many miles do you travel? im not talking people commuting 100 miles to work, you choose to live miles away from work, or you could work more locally and probably see a £10-20k reduction in your wages. im talking about buses and tube etc. buses, taxis are no more expensive in london than around here.

 

[clv101]

Beer duty cut by 1p from Sunday night.

This is quite farcical - for all but the most extreme beer drinkers, this isn't going to amount to more than a few quid a year. Ten pints a week is only a fiver. It's just headline grabbing rubbish.

 

[realBabelfish]

Current predictions show Labour romping home with a majority of 110. Landslide indeed.

ah. i heard it was eleventyone percent.

 

[realBabelfish]

This is quite farcical - for all but the most extreme beer drinkers, this isn't going to amount to more than a few quid a year. Ten pints a week is only a fiver. It's just headline grabbing rubbish.

yup. absolutely **** all help to anybody.

 

[elmarko]

There's a historical chart showing the deficit over the past few decades here. 2008 is where it just went crazy. Out of the last 32 years, we've only had 6-7 years with a surplus.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/oct/18/deficit-debt-government-borrowing-data#

It's funny that people blame Brown for the global financial crisis.

Like it would have been any different with anybody else in power, the graph shows the history quite well.

 

[DampDog]

Not in any way comparable to the catastrophic mess that Brown was responsible for.

Its like taking out a loan against your house to buy some new windows compared to mortgaging your house and everything you own twice over and flushing it down the toilet.

Is that true, ie based on numbers or just an assumption? Just looking at the chart I posted above. (If I read it correctly, which I doubt lol.) The borrowing done by Brown prior to the 2008 crash, (2002-2007) doesn't look that different to the borrowing under Lamont & Clarke. 1990-96. They also had a surplus to begin with.

The above is a question, not a statement because I don't know.. But that's how I read the numbers.

 

[Pudney]

This is quite farcical - for all but the most extreme beer drinkers, this isn't going to amount to more than a few quid a year. Ten pints a week is only a fiver. It's just headline grabbing rubbish.

I imagine the cut isn't designed to help the beer drinker, it's to help producers and sellers (breweries and pubs) where the volume they sell will make a difference to them. Not everything has to be designed to help the public directly.

 

[clv101]

How is this going to effect the volume producers are able to sell? What's the price elasticity of a pint of beer? Seriously, this is an inconsequential announcement designed for the media, no one else.

 

[Ilikeitblackplease]

Why should the state fund first time buyers, oh its to keep housing high.

 

[DampDog]

wonder what the PM is sneakily eating?

Spent the previous hours with Osbourne, just not had time to swallow.. Didn't Osbourne gag a bit too?

Or maybe a West Cornwall Pasty...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/mar/29/pasty-row-david-cameron

 

[Sankari]

Problem is, that would be extremely bad.

Like, crossing the streams bad.

If I remember correctly, crossing the streams enabled them to destroy a giant marshmallow man, thereby saving the world from certain destruction. So... probably not the best example to use.

I think whoever ended up in power this term would have been (universally) hated. Too many unpopular decisions that needed to be made unfortunately, regardless of who was in power and the direction they took.

Perhaps.

In my view, if people want to hate the Tories at all, they should be hating them for not going far enough with their austerity drive. The current proposals are piecemeal; simply tinkering at the edges.

And I say this as someone who was glad that the Tories won power at the last election.

 

[estebanrey]

I imagine the cut isn't designed to help the beer drinker, it's to help producers and sellers (breweries and pubs) where the volume they sell will make a difference to them. Not everything has to be designed to help the public directly.

But it comes back to the individual though, the 1p cut isn't much use to the producers unless people buy more beer, I can't see anyone deliberately upping the amount they buy because of it.

The bigger profit would be made by keeping the 1p themselves, that's the only way they'd see it.

 

[Pudney]

How is this going to effect the volume producers are able to sell? What's the price elasticity of a pint of beer? Seriously, this is an inconsequential announcement designed for the media, no one else.

But it comes back to the individual though, the 1p cut isn't much use to the producers unless people buy more beer, I can't see anyone deliberately upping the amount they buy because of it.

The bigger profit would be made by keeping the 1p themselves, that's the only way they'd see it.

Producers and vendors cut their costs by 1p per pint, volumes they buy & sell it can be substantial. End consumers see virtually no difference but the benefit isn't designed to help them. It's designed to help the brewers and pubs, primarily the smaller brewers and pubs where cash is a premium and the cost savings immediately in cash terms can make a real difference. Or at least that's the inention I got from what Osborne said.

In fact, if memory served, that's exactly who George Osborne said the cut was for during his speech. But it was pretty long winded and I kept getting bored.

 

[do_ron_ron]

This is quite farcical - for all but the most extreme beer drinkers, this isn't going to amount to more than a few quid a year. Ten pints a week is only a fiver. It's just headline grabbing rubbish.

There just has been a long debate on minimum pricing to curb alcohol abuse, what message does this send out? Are they capable of joined-up thinking?

I would like to have seen no childcare cost subsidy at all. Why subsidize two people in a household to have jobs? You have to work out if you can afford children before you have them, nobody forces you to have children. Children are not fashion accessories to be dumped on other people when the novelty has worm off. If one person per household is looking after a child that normally helps the child develop better. It also frees up one job for the unemployed who do not then claim benefits.

One thing that nobody mentioned in the TV coverage I watched was the 'elephant' in the room. All the projections about jobs and benefits could be blown out the water by the influx of Romanians and Bulgarians.