Are the Tories going to tear themselves apart?

Mistermeaner

This country cannot afford all the lovely things it wants to provide as there isn't enough money ..... The benefits bill is too high and IMO personal taxes are far too high.

I've never understood why tax is so high at the point money is earned vs compared to say consumption or extravagance.

The issue with high taxation on working and huge benefits to compensate for not working is that it makes it far too easy for people to make bad choices (bad for them and bad for the country). It also encourages a lack of personal responsibility and family responsibility. The route to getting their own free house for many people is to have a kid they can't afford then the money rolls in. What does that kid then see as the blue print?

chucknorris

Mistermeaner wrote: »

This country cannot afford all the lovely things it wants to provide as there isn't enough money ..... The benefits bill is too high and IMO personal taxes are far too high.

I've never understood why tax is so high at the point money is earned vs compared to say consumption or extravagance.

The issue with high taxation on working and huge benefits to compensate for not working is that it makes it far too easy for people to make bad choices (bad for them and bad for the country). It also encourages a lack of personal responsibility and family responsibility. The route to getting their own free house for many people is to have a kid they can't afford then the money rolls in. What does that kid then see as the blue print?

Maybe the answer is that after a certain period (2 years?), if someone is capable of working, but still hasn't found work, then they only get housing benefit for shared accommodation. Easy with singles, a bit more difficult with families, but something has to be done. It would certainly act as an incentive to work. It obviously isn't ideal, but I think it is a workable solution.

mwpt

Mistermeaner wrote: »

This country cannot afford all the lovely things it wants to provide as there isn't enough money ..... The benefits bill is too high and IMO personal taxes are far too high.

I've never understood why tax is so high at the point money is earned vs compared to say consumption or extravagance.

The issue with high taxation on working and huge benefits to compensate for not working is that it makes it far too easy for people to make bad choices (bad for them and bad for the country). It also encourages a lack of personal responsibility and family responsibility. The route to getting their own free house for many people is to have a kid they can't afford then the money rolls in. What does that kid then see as the blue print?

We keep returning to the same question, what is your alternative? Can you point to a society where you'd prefer to live that works differently?

JuicyJesus

Mistermeaner wrote: »

This country cannot afford all the lovely things it wants to provide as there isn't enough money ..... The benefits bill is too high and IMO personal taxes are far too high.

Personal taxes are around the lowest they've been for a century. ALL taxes have been cut to the point that we cannot fund adequate public services without deficit spending.



We can't afford anything because taxes have already been slashed back repeatedly for everyone, but you're still not happy. People in this country want something for nothing - they want great public services, but they also don't want to pay for them with taxes, and they also don't want the government to borrow money for them, and rather than make the logical connection between our diminishing tax base and our rotting public services people instead blame immigrants and benefits scroungers. It's vaguely pathetic, even more so reading arguments about how the life of someone who (apparently) pays higher rate tax is so so much harder and more difficult than someone on £70pw benefit. I imagine if she was having such a charmed life, you'd be handing in your resignation this morning to enjoy your new happy life of free everything. I doubt that will happen.

mwpt

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Personal taxes are around the lowest they've been for a century. ALL taxes have been cut to the point that we cannot fund adequate public services without deficit spending.

<snip image>

We can't afford anything because taxes have already been slashed back repeatedly for everyone, but you're still not happy. People in this country want something for nothing - they want great public services, but they also don't want to pay for them with taxes, and they also don't want the government to borrow money for them, and rather than make the logical connection between our diminishing tax base and our rotting public services people instead blame immigrants and benefits scroungers. It's vaguely pathetic, even more so reading arguments about how the life of someone who (apparently) pays higher rate tax is so so much harder and more difficult than someone on £70pw benefit. I imagine if she was having such a charmed life, you'd be handing in your resignation this morning to enjoy your new happy life of free everything. I doubt that will happen.

No, I disagree with that. You are comparing unproductive eras with more productive ones. Tax income as a percentage of GDP has remained fairly consistent or grown over the decades despite reductions in the rate of income tax per person. We also spend more as a percentage of GDP. Our welfare state has grown more as a percentage of GDP.

The problem really is that labour costs are high, housing costs are high, welfare costs are high and so to maintain these, services are cut. And even then, services are probably better than they were 30 or more years ago.

The real issues for me are a huge increase in subsidised working (tax credits), huge increases in the cost of housing and ageing population and increased pensions bill.

It is not unreasonable for people who have a high cost of living and pay fairly high taxes to want their taxes to be spent efficiently.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

JuicyJesus wrote: »

ALL taxes have been cut to the point that we cannot fund adequate public services without deficit spending..

Eh?

ALL taxes are now higher than they've been in 40 or so of the last 50 plus years.



Whether the tax is initially levied as a tax on income or a tax on business or a tax on consumption is of absolutely no relevance.

Because ALL taxes are ultimately paid by ordinary people, 100% of ALL taxes are paid by the consumers of good and services and ALL taxes have to be reflected in the price we pay for everything, and they are eating up more of our money than they have in 80% of the last half century.

What governments (of all parties) have become increasingly ingenious about doing is disguising the fact we live in such a high tax state via the ever increasing adoption of more Stealth Taxes.

But it's risible nonsense to suggest our taxes are at record lows and this is the reason for excessive borrowing, when the fact is the main reason for excessive borrowing is the bloated size of government spending relative to GDP.

We can't afford anything because taxes have already been slashed back repeatedly for everyone, but you're still not happy. People in this country want something for nothing - they want great public services, but they also don't want to pay for them with taxes,.

Och away....

In the year 2000, which I'll remind you was 3 years into a Labour Government, the UK government spent 34% of GDP and collected 34% of GDP in taxes.

I don't recall anyone moaning about rotting public services and excessive tax cuts.

Now today and even after several years of "cuts" (which have actually seen the State increase it's spending year on year, but never mind) the State is going to spend 41% of GDP this year while collecting 36% of GDP in taxes.

Both Spending and Taxation are higher now in the first term of this Tory government than they were in the first term of the last Labour government.

Ain't that an 'inconvenient truth'....

Mistermeaner

mwpt wrote: »

We keep returning to the same question, what is your alternative? Can you point to a society where you'd prefer to live that works differently?

To answer your question directly: USA in terms of taxation and welfare model

In this country welfare is such that not only is it prohibitively expensive it is an incentive for the wrong kind of behaviours; how about for example if a young lady gets herself pregnant with no means to provide a roof for herself instead of the tax payer being asked to fund that she stays at home with her parents; family responsibility and an incentive for her parents to raise her right. Do we want people to make sensible and rational decisions that they are personally responsible for based on their circumstances and what they can / cannot afford or do we want to say to people 'do whatever you like, don;t worry about consequences someone else will sort that out'

Out,_Vile_Jelly

Surely Osborne has ruined any chances he may have had of being future party leader with this mess?

No point in being the Nasty Party if you can't even be nasty in a competent, efficient manner.

Mistermeaner

JuicyJesus wrote: »

Personal taxes are around the lowest they've been for a century. ALL taxes have been cut to the point that we cannot fund adequate public services without deficit spending.



We can't afford anything because taxes have already been slashed back repeatedly for everyone, but you're still not happy. People in this country want something for nothing - they want great public services, but they also don't want to pay for them with taxes, and they also don't want the government to borrow money for them, and rather than make the logical connection between our diminishing tax base and our rotting public services people instead blame immigrants and benefits scroungers. It's vaguely pathetic, even more so reading arguments about how the life of someone who (apparently) pays higher rate tax is so so much harder and more difficult than someone on £70pw benefit. I imagine if she was having such a charmed life, you'd be handing in your resignation this morning to enjoy your new happy life of free everything. I doubt that will happen.

Your graph is incorrect but others have already addressed that.

Ref: "People in this country want something for nothing - they want great public services, but they also don't want to pay for them with taxes, and they also don't want the government to borrow money for them, and rather than make the logical connection between our diminishing tax base and our rotting public services people instead blame immigrants and benefits scroungers."

- you are confused as I am advocating lower public services


I also won't be handing in my notice as I could never be the type of person who would be comfortable with others paying for me ---- if I can be clear I harbour no hard feelings against the women down my road who lives the way she does; she is playing the hand she is dealt in the game where she has not set the rules.... my issue is with the rules being as they are it encourages the players to play in a certain way that IMO is not good for everybody: me in terms of the amount of taxes I must pay and in essence the amount of work I must do to pay for somebody else not to do any work, but also for the individuals caught in the benefits system for whom there is no incentive to try and do anything at all as they will be worse off.

Socialists talk about raising minimum wages but this does not work as it skews the cost of everything and makes Uk less competitive; the only answer IMO is to reduce the amount people get for doing nothing.

Another thing to consider is that the house that she is living in (paid for my tax payers) is a private rental - tax payer money is being given to a private individual so she can have a free house. That means there is one less house available on the market for a young working person to buy, so the cost and availability of housing for working people increases. These working people are also paying taxes out before they save for a deposit and mortgage in order to help pay for that women to have her free house.

How about she could move back in with her parents, a young working couple can buy that house and we all pay a bit less tax - why would that be so unreasonable?

After all; surely she could have considered her accomodation and financial situation before having a child. Oh no, sorry I forgot its her right to have a a child with no consideration of the consequeneces because someone else can worry about all that.

roddydogs

Their aint gonna be an election for yonks, so it dosent matter., their is no opposition anyway.