Cameron makes savings tax pledge

lynzpower

Masomnia wrote: »

Masomnia, but not Nick Mason.

Hehe don't worry Nick I still respect you, despite your recent outing I did apply to Oxford myself, so hard feelings there would just be jealousy/bitterness!

And I still respectfully disagree, sorry! People who don't save can already save tax-free in an ISA. You'd have to save more than 10% of income per annum to see any real benefit - or as someone pointed out, come into a bit of cash through a nice windfall. Doesn't seem all that likely at the moment.

How about my situation though.

I dont have a large wage by aqny stretch & Oh temps, so he doesnt earn a lot, but have low living costs and am a total skinflint. therefore, my miserly ways mean - right now- I alone save over 800 per month. My isa is filled and Ive filled OHs too. Im paying tax on the excess that- twice- why?

OTOH imagine if I wanted to buy a car now worth say 10k. Im not encouraged by the tax system to actually save for it, I pay tax when Ive earned it and stick it in the bank and get taxed again. The reason why people think oh Ill take a loan for that car/ holiday/ wedding is that BECAUSE they have forgotten or never discovered saving and how much money you COULD make if the interest rates were the other way around. When I first joined MSe there were some 10% savings rates kicking around. Why should the gov take part of that- it DISCOURAGES saving.

leveller2911

Rochdale_Pioneers wrote: »

Which as I pointed out above is where they disagree with the rest of the world.

We are NOT like the rest of the world, 1 size wont fit all .

We as a nation like to own a house, which im sure you,ll agree is probably the biggest investment you,,ll ever make, UNLIKE just about all of the rest of Europe.

So in my view you CANNOT saddle the next 2 generations with massive national debt which is in effect a punt...

Good ol Gordys just put everything on 24 Black on a roulette wheel

and he had NO fu*king right to...:eek:

leveller2911

You can tell the government is serious about cutting government spending......................................VAT returns dont come with a pre-paid envelope any more.

And my self assesment bill didnt come with a paying -in slip, they had plenty of room on the paper, when I phoned up to enquire I was told "Its to save money"..............and they didnt laugh when they told me:rolleyes:

So we can be rest assured they are taking this recession seriously :rolleyes: .

I can sleep soundly tonight.:rotfl:

Sapphire

harry_w wrote: »

Why should people priced out of the housing market for years, have their savings rates slashed while pensioners sitting on wealth gained from that inflated housing market get their savings sheltered from tax?

Many people have not speculated on the housing 'market', but have saved over many years in order to try and support themselves in their elder years. They are basic-rate taxpayers, not wealthy individuals, and they are nor 'sitting on wealth gained from that inflated housing market'.

People like this deserve to be helped much more than those who have borrowed to the hilt and got themselves, prudent people like the above-mentioned savers, and this country in general into the horrendous economic mess it is in.

In any case, I believe the Tory proposal is not only relevant to pensioners, but to all savers who are basic rate taxpayers.

PasturesNew

nickmason wrote: »

Not sure how I was supposed to know that I needed to register. Spoke to an accountant friend of mine about this, and she pointed out that this is happening a lot. Unsurprisingly many people are just pocketing the cash, rather than declaring it and incurring a £100 fine.

This is one thing I've never understood. The Govt et al spend all day every day inventing new laws, most of which we never know about. Then, through no fault of your own you fall foul of one and whoops ... a fine - and a bad day.

With regard to any self-employed income, the black/white response would be "well you knew you were self-employed, didn't you do your research?" when the reality is, increasingly now, if you find work for people/organisations then they want you to do it self-employed. So there you are, self-employed but working, or nothing.... so you go "yep, self-employed" and start. No research, no waking up thinking "I have all the time in the world and I have planned for ages to go self employed so now I will sit and make appointments with the Tax Office and go find out all about this fantastic new world I have expected and planned for". It's often done in a daze of desperation, followed by getting caught up in the rest of life .... you know you have to do a tax return and will inevitably get round to it, but having to register isn't up there on the To Do List.

I remember in the late 70s that to start a business you had to let them know and they sent you a nifty certificate. That stopped. I always thought that was a shame since people getting a nifty certificate was something which made more people aware. It would have been a requirement to show your nifty certificate before you did work for somebody. It had a registration number and everything on it.

They shouldn't have stopped that.

nickmason

PasturesNew wrote: »

This is one thing I've never understood. The Govt et al spend all day every day inventing new laws, most of which we never know about. Then, through no fault of your own you fall foul of one and whoops ... a fine - and a bad day.

Complexity again. I do accept that ignorance is no defence. But I think there's a corollary to that; try and keep ignorance at bay - the gov is supposed to be working with/for us, not against us.

With regard to any self-employed income, the black/white response would be "well you knew you were self-employed, didn't you do your research?" when the reality is, increasingly now, if you find work for people/organisations then they want you to do it self-employed. So there you are, self-employed but working, or nothing.... so you go "yep, self-employed" and start. No research, no waking up thinking "I have all the time in the world and I have planned for ages to go self employed so now I will sit and make appointments with the Tax Office and go find out all about this fantastic new world I have expected and planned for". It's often done in a daze of desperation, followed by getting caught up in the rest of life .... you know you have to do a tax return and will inevitably get round to it, but having to register isn't up there on the To Do List.

Absolutely. From what my accountant friend said, the government is positively trying to encourage everyone to be PAYE. (It's all cash-flow management apparently, along with the bonus of moving the self-assessment date forward which was a nice windfall for the overextended government).

Hmm - I thought we were about stimulating innovation and entrepreneurship. I don't think this government has much time for small businesses/start-ups (except the sexy ones). And okay, I'm sure that many will suggest that the Thatcher government didn't, even if she was the daughter of a grocer.

PasturesNew

nickmason wrote: »

From what my accountant friend said, the government is positively trying to encourage everyone to be PAYE.

Over the years I've done LOADS of different chunks of self-employed work. Loads.... all sorts of things. I even got made redundant in 2002 yet kept the job for another year, winding the work down, on a self-employed basis.

The thing is, companies have things they want doing, but it's too complex to employ people to do them. Just tiny jobs. In just the last three years I've done web project management, internet marketing, telephone market research, organising, UK agent for a worldwide company, telephone appointment making, medical transcription. Among others. All just to keep the pennies rolling in somehow.

I've never wanted to be self-employed. I still don't. It requires activities and tasks that I have no interest in. I know what I do well and I'd love to do jobs doing those things, not being self-employed. But if somebody's offering £100 to undertake some survey work, or £X/hour to make some appointments.... you have to do it because it's work.

It's another thing the Govt managed to achieve: more people than ever before are bumbling about forlornly under the banner of "self-employed" when all they really want is a PAYE job and no hassle.

nickmason

PasturesNew wrote: »

Over the years I've done LOADS of different chunks of self-employed work. Loads.... all sorts of things. I even got made redundant in 2002 yet kept the job for another year, winding the work down, on a self-employed basis.

The thing is, companies have things they want doing, but it's too complex to employ people to do them. Just tiny jobs. In just the last three years I've done web project management, internet marketing, telephone market research, organising, UK agent for a worldwide company, telephone appointment making, medical transcription. Among others. All just to keep the pennies rolling in somehow.

I've never wanted to be self-employed. I still don't. It requires activities and tasks that I have no interest in. I know what I do well and I'd love to do jobs doing those things, not being self-employed. But if somebody's offering £100 to undertake some survey work, or £X/hour to make some appointments.... you have to do it because it's work.

It's another thing the Govt managed to achieve: more people than ever before are bumbling about forlornly under the banner of "self-employed" when all they really want is a PAYE job and no hassle.

(Is that so; I thought there were fewer self-employed now?)

I think the idea is that those companies are "supposed" to go via temp agencies. That way - the theory goes - there's still "quick" tax receipts and flexible labour.
The unintended consequence is that more is done "for cash", on the black market.

From a different perspective; increasing employee rights (at the expense of employer flexibility) reduces the incentives for employers to employ, and instead they then hire in from an agency (at great cost, and no additional value to the economy as a whole). So the [STRIKE]employee[/STRIKE] individual suffers, as does the economy generally. I know there's a happy medium, but I suspect we might have gone too far.

I have seen charities pay agencies double the "wage" paid to the worker, simply to avoid the business risk of having too many staff.

lynzpower

From a different perspective; increasing employee rights (at the expense of employer flexibility) reduces the incentives for employers to employ, and instead they then hire in from an agency (at great cost, and no additional value to the economy as a whole). So the employee individual suffers, as does the economy generally. I know there's a happy medium, but I suspect we might have gone too far.

Weve definately gone way too far Nick.

I used to work in social services ( perm employed) and over half the staff were agency staff (( some overseas some not) they paid 25k perm or 45ph temp. Go figure. One temp from Australia who had bu**er all knowledge of UK law was earning more than the team manager who had to take responsibility for all the cases in the team ( child protection) and whos neck would have fully been on the block should anything have gone wrong.

carolt

On the other hand, I've worked in FE colleges where temp staff were paid considerably less than permanent staff, which they could get away with by making the contracts last just the length of the term/half term, thus avoiding the need to pay equivalent holiday pay or indeed sick pay or any of those tiresome benefits. Let alone pensions! And so naturally the vast proprtion of staff were on these crappy contracts, as it was far cheaper for colleges than employing staff permanently.

So I suspect your example may be unusual.