Pre-Budget Report - LIVE

movingforward2010

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Well hey. At least benefits are rising more than public sector workers pay and they won't be hit by NI rises

All is good.

they always have JSA went up for £60.50 pw to £64.30 , my wages went up by £1.14! a week- which was then of course taxed.

i didnt even have 1% pay increase last year as a frontline civil servant, a woman next me had 0% just a £187 one off payment - which was taxed on top to!

Im NOT complaining as im lucky to have a job , but please bear in mind front line staff dont get pay increases to the level the Daily Mail quote, i can imagine the only ones to suffer will be the senior CS's on £70k +! or will they........

ivavoucher

Pete111 wrote: »

Um what about.

'Did you accept any UK Govt Money as a bail out' - YES/NO

YES -Tax on big bonuses
NO - Carry on

How much simpler does it need to be?

The massive bonuses that lead to recklessness needs to be stopped from happening again.

And if a bank insists on massive bonuses they need to be told no help from the taxpayer should they hit a problem.

Thrugelmir

whathavewedone wrote: »

Did anyone watch George Osborne's response to the PBR? I've been a bit dubious about him as Shadow Chancellor, mainly because of his age, but I thought he was excellent this afternoon.

I can't believe all the ridiculous giveaways and then a rise on National Insurance for everyone on over 20k. Nothing that's going to reduce the deficit and nothing to encourage growth either. A purely cynical PBR to appeal to Labour's core voters. I hope the media rip them apart for this.

Freezing of personal allowances for 2 years is a stealth tax.

AD used argument that RPI is negative. Whereas most home owners will incur increased council tax, petrol, electric , heating costs. Which could be paid out of an almost static wage. Add on top another 1% of national insurance on earnings.

And the squeeze (or start of) starts to become apparent.

Freezing of personal allowances is etimated to raise £2.2 billion initially. So hardly a huge sum in context of the budget deficit.

This was an election budget rather than a face music one. No wonder we are becoming disillusioned with politicians that care more for being in power than the populace they pupport to represent.

JasonLVC

Not sure if I'm understanding this correctly.

The 0.5% NI increase in 2011...I think there was already a 0.5% increase to NI in last years PBR and I think this 0.5% annunced today is ON TOP of the previously announced 0.5%.

So I think that means from April 2011, earners over £20k will be paying 1% NI.

Trust the government to make a 1% tax hike look like a 0.5% tax hike and then delay it for 2 yars so that it means absolutely nthing until the next government takes over......

Thrugelmir

JasonLVC wrote: »

Not sure if I'm understanding this correctly.

The 0.5% NI increase in 2011...I think there was already a 0.5% increase to NI in last years PBR and I think this 0.5% annunced today is ON TOP of the previously announced 0.5%.

So I think that means from April 2011, earners over £20k will be paying 1% NI.

Trust the government to make a 1% tax hike look like a 0.5% tax hike and then delay it for 2 yars so that it means absolutely nthing until the next government takes over......

This is what stands Brown out from any previous Chancellor of any party (and now Darling under instruction no doubt) .... bury the details in the small print.

JasonLVC

I've no issue with paying 1% NI more in 2011 if that is what the economy needs to get back to full health....but why the continued deceit?.

We all know how bad things are Alastair, how about some honesty for once and tell it straight rather than make out this is a paltry increase when it isn't. This 1% also applies to employers as well so that's 2% across the board (employee/employer) from 2011.

Not that hard to say really was t?.

Mr_Mumble

re: Thruglemir's post. I'm bambuzzled as to how the press have completely missed the freezing of personal allowances for both income and national insurance next year while bizarrely mentioning freezing the higher rate threshold in 2012/13 (I can only assume Darling mentioned the latter but not the former in his speech?!)

Of course there are arguments that those lucky enough to be in work should pay more. That the effective 1.2% increase in income tax and national insurance, that comes about by not increasing thresholds inline with earnings, is warranted. However, this argument doesn't hold water when the government is increasing benefits rather than freezing, or based on RPI reducing, them.

The government is spending more (on benefits, per person as well as overall) and taxing more (fiscal drag from freezing thresholds along with the NI hikes, 50% tax rate, et al). This seems awfully problematic to me. Not just in the increased burden on public finances but the message it gives to the populous. The government are, yet again, disincentivising work by having an even cushier benefits system while penalising labour via higher taxes specifically aimed at workers. How is this promoting growth?

Thrugelmir

Mr_Mumble wrote: »

re: Thruglemir's post. I'm bambuzzled as to how the press have completely missed the freezing of personal allowances for both income and national insurance next year while bizarrely mentioning freezing the higher rate threshold in 2012/13 (I can only assume Darling mentioned the latter but not the former in his speech?!)

Of course there are arguments that those lucky enough to be in work should pay more. That the effective 1.2% increase in income tax and national insurance, that comes about by not increasing thresholds inline with earnings, is warranted. However, this argument doesn't hold water when the government is increasing benefits rather than freezing, or based on RPI reducing, them.

The government is spending more (on benefits, per person as well as overall) and taxing more (fiscal drag from freezing thresholds along with the NI hikes, 50% tax rate, et al). This seems awfully problematic to me. Not just in the increased burden on public finances but the message it gives to the populous. The government are, yet again, disincentivising work by having an even cushier benefits system while penalising labour via higher taxes specifically aimed at workers. How is this promoting growth?

The thrust of AD's budget is based on certain levels of growth of GDP. Some have said that these levels of growth while not optmistic, could be blown off course. So there's no contingency in AD's forecasts for either lower growth or a further downturn.

pipkin71

ILW wrote: »

Think I will invest in companies selling Stella, cheap fags and velour jogging suits. Should make a killing

Might also pay to invest in sky too

JasonLVC

Yep, confirmed the 0.5% NI increase is on top of the already announced 0.5% NI increase.

This public setor pay freeze/cap of 1%.....hoe come the bankers get a 50% tax rate with immiediate effect but the public sector workers can continue to award themsevles pay increases (albeit capped) plus uncapped bonus' until 2011?

How does that save the government billions now?. I thought the recent Brown announcements was about cutting public sector spending and yet they're delaying thoe savings when we need those savings now.