Is being a tax avoider socially unacceptable?

chucknorris

Hoopie1 wrote: »

Not according to my financial adviser (he'd better be right, or he's getting sued, I guess).

I've recently chickened out (hence the bravery comment), but good luck anyway.

jamesd

Hoopie1 wrote: »

I participate in Venture Capital Trust and Enterprise Development Zone investments. Can someone clarify if this sort of tax avoidance is morally acceptable or not?

Of course it is. You're exposing your money to investment risk to help small businesses grow and receiving some tax benefit to compensate you for that socially desirable action and its attendant risks to your money.

Some people might focus on you saving tax but the reason for those tax breaks is to help small companies to grow. You're playing your part by participating.

jamesd

kinger101 wrote: »

Let's be clear on this. Putting money in an ISA, and manipulating your profits through transfer pricing are not the same thing. Tax avoidance usually involves minimising the tax liability by applying the law in a way which was not originally intended when it was drafted.

That's not close to right. Tax avoidance usually involves ordinary people using various forms of tax avoidance in the ways in which they were intended to be used, via things like ISAs, pensions, VCT, EIS or Seed EIS.

ISA: 13.5 million adult ISA accounts were subscribed to in 2013-14, along with another 432,000 Junior. Given the UK population of about 63 million that's a number of subscribed to accounts equal to 22% of the whole population in one year.

Personal pension: 7.6 million individuals paid into one in 2007-8, dropping to 5.5 million in 2012-13. In 2012-2013 there were 8.2 million personal pensions around (page 19).

VCT: There were 15,540 VCT investors in 2012-13. Far less than the mainstream ISA and pension tax avoidance but still significant compared to the sort of numbers who might engage in the various definitions of "undesirable avoidance".

EIS: There were 87,888 EIS subscriptions in 2011-12, though note that individuals can subscribe to more than one EIS, just as they can be in more than one ISA or personal pension.

So it's not remotely close to true to claim that most tax avoidance is applying the law in an unintended way. It's mostly just normal people doing perfectly ordinary things like saving or planning for retirement.

Then there's the undesirable tax avoidance category, which varies depending on who is claiming what is undesirable.

usa1

Its my civil duty to manage my affairs legally, so that that the Govt. steals less of my money.

Hoopie1

jamesd wrote: »

Of course it is. You're exposing your money to investment risk to help small businesses grow and receiving some tax benefit to compensate you for that socially desirable action and its attendant risks to your money.

Some people might focus on you saving tax but the reason for those tax breaks is to help small companies to grow. You're playing your part by participating.

That is my view as well. But investments like these have been demonised in the press, even though they were encouraged by the government. My conscience is clear, although I'm sure many think it shouldn't be.

jamesd

VCT managers invariably seek more money from investors that is desired by businesses than investors provide. Your conscience should be clear, so should that of anyone who explains VCTs and encourages suitable people to use them. Not that long ago I explained to a retiring person how they could get £40,000 a year of tax free income in part using VCTs. Doing that would have involved them investing around £150,000 to help small businesses grow. Which is more tax revenue and more jobs and the associated benefits for society.

TickersPlaysPop

CLAPTON wrote: »

excellent practical advice

we should all stop buying
-food
-petrol
-gas
-electricity
-supermarkets
-electrical goods
-phones
-broadband
-cars
-computers/pads/printers etc
-houses
-newspapers
-media company offering

Excellent proof of the extent to which we have all been stitched up and given no choice, thank you Clapers... you are starting to see things clearly now?

Please note I did write "...as much as possible" but you can chose to ignore that of course.

Privatise everything, give poeple no choice, care about only profits for share holders, pay no tax on industrial scale.... suck the country dry.... More austerity .... more social suppression.... simple... Vote Tory, Labour, LibDem or UKIP.... basically the bankers , the highly wealthy, the multinational companies are in control

Spidernick

Cyberman60

Carl31 wrote: »

I think people get confused by evasion and avoidance

I think these media stories of large corporations not paying tax are being taken that they are just not paying it, illegally, when in fact they are doing nothing wrong, just playing by the rulebook

No, I think Labour are deliberately confusing the difference between avoidance and evasion and I have listened to this ignorant rhetoric for years. They try to conflate the two when it suits them in order to demonise wealthy Tories. When in power they do nothing about it, so it's purely a cynical attempt as usual to garner votes from their usual attempt at bigoted class warfare.

CLAPTON

TickersPlaysPop wrote: »

Excellent proof of the extent to which we have all been stitched up and given no choice, thank you Clapers... you are starting to see things clearly now?

Please note I did write "...as much as possible" but you can chose to ignore that of course.

Privatise everything, give poeple no choice, care about only profits for share holders, pay no tax on industrial scale.... suck the country dry.... More austerity .... more social suppression.... simple... Vote Tory, Labour, LibDem or UKIP.... basically the bankers , the highly wealthy, the multinational companies are in control

My list was designed to illustrate that '..as much as possible' is a small percentage of what we buy so was impractical, hollow recommendation.

Many people would considered that there was less choice pre privatisation than post privatisation.

Fortunately people in the UK are free to vote for who they like and anyone can start a political party.

People seem reasonably content with the range of parties as there doubt seem to be many new ones starting up.

Fortunately you are free to grow your own food, never use petrol or gas/electricity, ride a bike and still live a decent life by exploiting your fellow citizens.