Private spare bedroom tax.

StevenMarks

Homeowners already pay more for the extra bedrooms; I paid £160,000 more for an extra two bedrooms last year (compared to a 2 bedroom house that sold at about the same time).

chucky

Fella wrote: »

Utter rubbish. The top tax rate under Labour's 13-year rule was 40%. Under the coalition it's 5% higher at 40%.

This is fact.

This makes no sense.

I do wish people would take their hatred of political parties out of their logic. It doesn't help them understand reality.

gazter

N1AK wrote: »

The issue is that even people who broadly speaking support the intention of the change referring to it as a "spare room subsidy" leaves a nasty taste in the mouth because it is so laden with political spin.

It's also nonsense to suggest there isn't a 'cost of living' crisis, or that there wasn't a tax break for millionares. It is undoubtedly true that one of the first tax changes by the current government was to cut income tax for very high earners; I don't even think it was the wrong thing to do but the only lie here is you pretending it's fictional.

It wasnt one of the first things they did. It was in the budget of 2012 two years after the election. The labour government had a 50% tax rate for three weeks. Yes, three weeks, prior to that it was 40% for the entire parliament.
It stayed 50% for three years under the coalition and then dropped to 45%.

onlyroz

ukcarper wrote: »

What about a tax on empty seats in cars?

In some countries (Canada springs to mind) there are motorway lanes which can only be used if there are two or more passengers in the car.

LydiaJ

wotsthat wrote: »

Currently 3 people living in a 3 bed house pay full council tax. A single occupant in the same house would get a discount.

A single person gets a 25% discount. So:
Single person pays 75%
Two people pay 100% shared between 2 people so 50% each
3 people pay 100% shared between 3 people so 33% each
4 people pay 25% each
Etc

No incentive for single occupancy here.

Percy1983

As other have said there is no bedroom tax.

In short why should a couple in a four bedroom house get more than a couple in a 1 bedroom flat? The old system was rewards benefits claimants for having bigger houses than they needed.

I will say maybe the implementation has been a bit heavy handed, it should be a case of it only kicks in when they find you a suitable smaller property and you refuse it, but until they give people an actual option it seems a bit off.

As mentioned as a property owner I have paid extra for 3 bedrooms and we do hope to have more use for them in the future but until that time why should I be taxed?

Annie1960

michaels wrote: »

It would certainly my result in us utilising tbe spare bedrooms...as studies, halls, laundry rooms or anything that was not taxed. Perhaps we should reinstate the window tax?!

Why stop at a window tax? Why doesn't the government confiscate all privately owned property. This would solve the problem of under-occupancy. They do this in North Korea. Perhaps the OP would be satisfied with this.

Annie1960

chewmylegoff wrote: »

There is no such thing as bedroom tax in the public housing sector - benefits reduction is not a tax however much labour try to spin it.

It would be ludicrous to try to penalise people who own their property for having a spare bedroom. The cost of collection of such a tax would be astronomical compared to the revenues raised and it would be political suicide for any party who introduced it.

Agree. Those of us who own our property have worked hard for this, and already paid tax on the money we earned. Why penalise us because we did not take 2/3 holidays a year, did not buy a new car every year, and instead used the money to build up equity in our homes.

Annie1960

MobileSaver wrote: »

The problem is that the population is growing faster than places to live so one solution is to attack the source by taxing people who have children...

The more children you have the more tax you pay. Perhaps this may concentrate minds to the fact that money could be saved by NOT utilising available bedrooms.

And people who have children they cannot afford to support (and expect taxpayers to support) should be taxed double.

wotsthat

LydiaJ wrote: »

A single person gets a 25% discount. So:
Single person pays 75%
Two people pay 100% shared between 2 people so 50% each
3 people pay 100% shared between 3 people so 33% each
4 people pay 25% each
Etc

No incentive for single occupancy here.

It should be fairly obvious that a discount is an incentive.

A 25% discount is providing an incentive to use housing inefficiently as it reduces the cost disadvantage of living alone.

Being less worse off is an incentive in itself.