What extra taxes would you volunteer to pay?

michaels

Blueday wrote: »

Have you got that right?

https://www.ukpublicrevenue.co.uk/past_revenue

'In 1900 public revenue in the United Kingdom was 10 percent of GDP. Now it is 37 percent GDP after peaking at 43 percent GDP in the early 1980s'

Seems to depend how you measure it, your figures for example look at tax take rather than spending that also includes borrowing which is of course just deferred taxation:

GreatApe

michaels wrote: »

Seems to depend how you measure it, your figures for example look at tax take rather than spending that also includes borrowing which is of course just deferred taxation:

Most people would also not consider imputed rent as the 'private sector'

So if total government spending is £780B and the private sector is £1,170B to give total GDP of £1,950B

However something like £220 billion of private sector GDP is just from people owning their own homes but for the figures they are treated as renting their own homes to themselves at a value added. Is that really what most people would consider 'the private sector'?? For a start it employs no one and no work is done it just a value assigned

If you exclude that imputed rent on residential homes then its closer to £780B government and ££950B private or 45.1% government

Likewise the social stock downplays the role of government.
A social flat that is rented out for £5k a year adds £5k to the government side. The flat next door identical but rented out for £20k a year adds £20k to the private sector side. So on paper if that was the sum total of our nation it would look like the public sector is only 20% of the economy but in reality its exactly 50% as the are two identical flats.

AlanJKDuval

Hi, all. Newbie here, first post.

One tax that I wouldn't pay directly, but that would end up affecting what I pay for goods, would be to make it harder for large multi-nationals to avoid taxation by playing fast and loose with the truth about 'where the money was earned', and dodgy schemes around paying licensing fees for brand names to umbrella companies and so on.

I admit, I don't know much about corporate taxation, but I assume that, just as small businesses do, large businesses can claim back VAT on their own purchases based on the VAT that they collect from the sale of their own goods and services. In the case of multi-nationals with high turnover and a low tax bill, I'd be keen to see this stopped. Yes, it will push up the prices of your Amazon or Starbucks purchases (although the Starbucks thing wouldn't affect me - it's not even really coffee), but with other, smaller competitors in the market, there's only so high the price can go before they're no longer competitive... but at least then the playing field would be more equitable for smaller businesses.

That would rake billions of pounds in, and should only moderately affect what I pay for goods and services to those large multi-nationals.

westernpromise

Welcome Alan.

AlanJKDuval wrote:

That would rake billions of pounds in, and should only moderately affect what I pay for goods and services to those large multi-nationals.

I'm not so sure. Last weekend I bought a book for £10 in Waterstone's that is £4.49 on Amazon. I don't share your confidence that companies like that will be indifferent to their tax bill going up by billions.

AlanJKDuval

Indifferent? No.

Sufficient to cease trading in the UK as the more hysterical catastrophists seem to think? Also no.

As I suggested, at least some of the price would be passed on to me, thereby mitigating the impact on them, and that's an impact I'm prepared to accept.

John-K_3

Since Labour lost, I have seen...

Personal allowance removed
Marginal rate increase to 47%
Not allowed to put more than 10k a year into my pension
Cannot offset mortgage interest fully against rent

So no, I am not keen to pay any extra taxes. I would actually like to see the burden spread a little more fairly, it falls too heavily on the highest earners at the moment.

vivatifosi

John-K wrote: »

Since Labour lost, I have seen...

Personal allowance removed
Marginal rate increase to 47%
Not allowed to put more than 10k a year into my pension
Cannot offset mortgage interest fully against rent

So no, I am not keen to pay any extra taxes. I would actually like to see the burden spread a little more fairly, it falls too heavily on the highest earners at the moment.

And ironically under Labour, Brown cut the 10% tax band for low earners, making the lowest paid worse off. It's a funny old world when parties don't appear to be playing to their core audience.

John-K_3

vivatifosi wrote: »

And ironically under Labour, Brown cut the 10% tax band for low earners, making the lowest paid worse off. It's a funny old world when parties don't appear to be playing to their core audience.

What is strange is how the facts seem not to be well known. There are often posts on here saying how the conservatives have given tax breaks to their friends, but what breaks I wonder do people thin have been given?

Top earners were much better off under Labour than they are now, in myriad ways, yet people seem to just assume that the opposite’s the case.

kinger101

LHW99 wrote: »

I would be happy to pay a small amount to visit my GP, say £5-£10 (with passes for those with chronic / long lasting conditions, which I am not at the moment_.
I have to pay for a checkup at the (NHS) dentist, and the opticians charge for an eyetest except in certain cases, so don't see why the same shouldn't be the case for GP's.

NHS dentists are a rip-off. It's sham medicine. Go private and you'll see the difference in the treatment immediately.

I've not had many GP appointments I'd pay for. On more than one occasion I've came out worse. The problem is with too few doctors and dentists, there's an awful lot of incompetence that would otherwise be weeded out.

westernpromise

kinger101 wrote: »

The problem is with too few doctors and dentists, there's an awful lot of incompetence that would otherwise be weeded out.

Correct, but certain special interest groups beloved of the Guardian and the BBC are simply beyond criticism: charities, NHS employees, left wing comedians, and so on.

As a result, it's beyond the pale to mention the greed of charity employees (chief exec salary averages £255,000 a year)
https://www.thirdsector.co.uk/charity-pay-study-2017-highest-earners/special-report/article/1427306

or that the NHS lets people die of starvation in hospital
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/two-patients-die-starvation-thirst-each-day-nhs-hospitals-uk-care-homes-statistics-office-national-a7517171.html
and kills up to another 22,000 patients every year by giving them the wrong drugs.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/02/23/nhs-drug-errors-may-causing-22000-deaths-every-year/

That stuff gets buried very quickly if it comes out at all. Imagine if banks killed 22,000 people a year! Imagine if a bank chief exec paid himself as salary 3% of his outfit's gross revenues like the head of Caudwell Children does!

We'd never hear the end of it from the usual suspects even though bankers, unlike most charities, do something useful and perform an important social function.