Jeremy Hunt in plea to early retirees: ‘Britain needs you’

zagfles

OldScientist said:

zagfles said:

OldScientist said:

daveyjp said:

Spinybif said:

Time to phase out all unearned benefits.  Hard workers are fed up paying taxes to see the lazy & stupid  claim benefits without giving anything back.  Simple solution, you have to work for the community on the National Minimum Wage to earn your benefits. Even the disabled could read to children who are behind at school, fully able  could litter pick or  remove graphiti.  I'll bet 90%of those "unable" to get work would suddenly do so. If you have made sacrifices to earn your early retirement and don't need to rely on the state good luck to you. Why breach the LTA only to be penalised by 55% tax whilst working for the privilege 

Who manages all these extra 'public sector' employees?

According to the ONS ( https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwealth/bulletins/theeffectsoftaxesandbenefitsonhouseholdincome/financialyearending2021 ), in 2022 just over half of UK individuals receive more in benefits than they pay in taxes. So, as a whole, quite a lot of us are on 'unearned benefits' (including, for most people, their state pension since you would have needed to have set £250k aside (out of NI?) to have enough to buy an annuity with an inflation adjusted income of £10k).

In 2016 (couldn't find any more recent figures, see https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/governmentpublicsectorandtaxes/publicsectorfinance/articles/howisthewelfarebudgetspent/2016-03-16 ), of the benefit budget, 42% went on pensions, 16% on incapacity and disability, 1% on unemployment benefits, 10% on housing, 18% on family, income support, and tax credits.

In other words, the plan targets, at best, about 17% (well, 27% if you include housing) of the welfare budget.

Why would you not include family income support and tax credits - they're mostly means tested (or sometimes income tested) at a fairly low level. Apart for child ben which is income tested at a high level. Housing definitely need including. Not that they'd be totally eliminated, but partially in a lot of cases.

But the underlying point is the treatment of particularly people with disabilities, as charity cases who should be shoved onto the scrapheap of life long benefits dependancy, rather as people differently abled who can contribute to society in some way.

It's really an attitude change that's needed. Rather than "oh you're disabled, poor you, my compassion oozes from every pore, here have all this money and get out of my sight", it's "oh you're disabled, well what can you do and what can't you do, we'll find you something you can do and are happy to do". Obviously there'll be some who can't contribute in any way, but the majority almost certainly could.

Tax credits are for those in work (surely those already in work don''t need to be forced in to additional work in order to obtain their benefits)?

For those with disabilities (which covers an enormous range of conditions from long term illness, physical, and mental), there is a big difference between ensuring that they have fair access to the jobs market (i.e. they are not discriminated against) and being allocated work or having benefits withheld.

Child tax credit is not just for those in work, they're for those who don't work too. There is no work requirement to get CTC.

Working tax credit is for those who work, but tapers off at a bit over full time min wage, so is mostly paid to those working part time. Universal Credit is both for those in and out of work, and yes there's a minimum expected hours (on min wage x those hours) that you're expected to work or seek. Some will have "limited capacity for work (related activity)", but not necessarily no capacity, which often seems to be the way they are treated.

NedS

zagfles said:

bluenose1 said:

I am currently working but won’t be working a day longer than I intend to because of Jeremy Hunt saying I should.
The press have done great divisive tactics of getting us focused on benefit fraud etc, not surprising really when most of our Papers are owned by multi millionaires living abroad. Yet tax avoidance and evasion costs UK far more than benefit fraud etc. 

Zahawi and presumably his financial advisors thought  he could get away with it in his high profile ministerial role and  Rishi Sunak’s wife is said to have avoided £20 million in tax by claiming to be non-dom. Read somewhere that Zahawi’s tax affairs have been questioned for years by some reporters with threats of libel etc to try to close any investigation. By the sounds of it this often succeeds so how many others are/ have done it.
So if those in the public eye think they can get away with it, what are those below the radar, the big corporations etc doing to avoid/ evade tax? 

Unfortunately and not surprisingly there is no political will to tackle this.

Well he clearly hasn't got away with it, has he? Have you listened to the news today? Just been on a long journey with Radio 2 on and every hour we were told about Zahawi and the HMRC "investigation" and how Sunak was so wrong to spend a few days actually looking into what happened rather than the usual media demands of immediate knee-jerk action when there's no real need for something that happened/been ongoing a while ago. 

Don't think there was any wrongdoing on the part of Sunak's wife, she was claiming a legitimate status, but even so the media was on her case. Clearly those in the "public eye" are not getting away with it, even using perfectly legitimate methods to reduce their tax bill. Even a minor seat belt violation makes the headlines.

Meanwhile not read or heard anything about benefit fraud in the media recently. It's blatenty obvious where the current media focus is.

Indeed, the two cases are very different. Sunak's wife was presumably paying the correct amount of tax on her foreign income in the country she was domiciled for tax purposes, as per the rules.

Zahawi's case is very different. He is living in the UK and registered in the UK for tax purposes. He directly benefited from £27million from the sale of shares in yougov and failed to declare that income to HMRC. We will never know if he deliberately tried to conceal it, but why would anyone set up an off shore trust held by a company in Gibraltar registered in your father's name to hold legitimate UK assets other than for the purposes of tax evasion, and then fail to declare the proceeds to HMRC? This is not the actions of a person looking to ensure they are openly and transparently meeting their responsibility to pay the correct amount of tax in the UK. He got caught and paid a £1.1million fine on top of the £3.7million of tax that was due. And he's lost his job. And hopefully he will lose his seat at the next election.

I can understand the media's focus on this as tax evasion / failure to collect taxes by HMRC far outweighs benefit fraud / overpayments by DWP.

zagfles

NedS said:

OldScientist said:

zagfles said:

Why would you not include family income support and tax credits - they're mostly means tested (or sometimes income tested) at a fairly low level. Apart for child ben which is income tested at a high level. Housing definitely need including. Not that they'd be totally eliminated, but partially in a lot of cases.

But the underlying point is the treatment of particularly people with disabilities, as charity cases who should be shoved onto the scrapheap of life long benefits dependancy, rather as people differently abled who can contribute to society in some way.

It's really an attitude change that's needed. Rather than "oh you're disabled, poor you, my compassion oozes from every pore, here have all this money and get out of my sight", it's "oh you're disabled, well what can you do and what can't you do, we'll find you something you can do and are happy to do". Obviously there'll be some who can't contribute in any way, but the majority almost certainly could.

Tax credits are for those in work (surely those already in work don''t need to be forced in to additional work in order to obtain their benefits)?

Funny you should mention that, but that is exactly what the government is currently doing on UC by increasing the Administrative Earnings Threshold (AET) - the threshold amount people must earn in order to be deemed to be earning enough and not have to attend weekly jobcentre appointments and seek more work. (Those on Tax Credits are slowly being migrated onto UC as it's replacement).

The amount a single person is expected to earn has increased from £355/month to £617/month (equivalent of 15h/week at NMW) and anyone earning less in the last month will be expected to attend the jobcentre and look for more work. This figure will rise again in April in line with increases to the NMW.

IIRC it was originally intended to be 35x NMW for a single person with no dependants or disabilities, ie they were expected to work full time before claiming benefits, but seems to have fallen over the years.

NedS

zagfles said:

NedS said:

OldScientist said:

zagfles said:

Why would you not include family income support and tax credits - they're mostly means tested (or sometimes income tested) at a fairly low level. Apart for child ben which is income tested at a high level. Housing definitely need including. Not that they'd be totally eliminated, but partially in a lot of cases.

But the underlying point is the treatment of particularly people with disabilities, as charity cases who should be shoved onto the scrapheap of life long benefits dependancy, rather as people differently abled who can contribute to society in some way.

It's really an attitude change that's needed. Rather than "oh you're disabled, poor you, my compassion oozes from every pore, here have all this money and get out of my sight", it's "oh you're disabled, well what can you do and what can't you do, we'll find you something you can do and are happy to do". Obviously there'll be some who can't contribute in any way, but the majority almost certainly could.

Tax credits are for those in work (surely those already in work don''t need to be forced in to additional work in order to obtain their benefits)?

Funny you should mention that, but that is exactly what the government is currently doing on UC by increasing the Administrative Earnings Threshold (AET) - the threshold amount people must earn in order to be deemed to be earning enough and not have to attend weekly jobcentre appointments and seek more work. (Those on Tax Credits are slowly being migrated onto UC as it's replacement).

The amount a single person is expected to earn has increased from £355/month to £617/month (equivalent of 15h/week at NMW) and anyone earning less in the last month will be expected to attend the jobcentre and look for more work. This figure will rise again in April in line with increases to the NMW.

IIRC it was originally intended to be 35x NMW for a single person with no dependants or disabilities, ie they were expected to work full time before claiming benefits, but seems to have fallen over the years.

When UC was introduced, the thresholds were set in-line with Job Seekers Allowance which it replaced. Off the top of my head, JSA was £73.10/week, and if you worked part time, the first £5 was disregarded and anything else was deducted pound for pound. This meant earnings of £78.10/week (or £338/month) would result in nil JSA and the claim closing - so the same threshold of £338 was originally set for UC and then increased in time to match rises in JSA rates. However, recent rises in NMW have outstripped rises in benefit rates with the net result that someone on NMW would only need to work 9h/week to meet the threshold. The government decided they should be working more and this was increased to 12h in September 2022 and again to 15h on 31st Jan 2023 and thresholds will now increase in line with 15h x NMW going forward, breaking the historic link to JSA.

The 35h expectation is for someone who is unemployed or working less that 15h and attending appointments at the jobcentre - they are required to look for work or more work, and must consider all available positions including full time (35h/week), but once they are working 15h or more at NMW they are not longer required to attend regular appointments at the jobcentre, so will be paid any benefit top up regardless. So effectively their required hours has increased to 15h/week to get the jobcentre off their back.

zagfles

NedS said:

zagfles said:

bluenose1 said:

I am currently working but won’t be working a day longer than I intend to because of Jeremy Hunt saying I should.
The press have done great divisive tactics of getting us focused on benefit fraud etc, not surprising really when most of our Papers are owned by multi millionaires living abroad. Yet tax avoidance and evasion costs UK far more than benefit fraud etc. 

Zahawi and presumably his financial advisors thought  he could get away with it in his high profile ministerial role and  Rishi Sunak’s wife is said to have avoided £20 million in tax by claiming to be non-dom. Read somewhere that Zahawi’s tax affairs have been questioned for years by some reporters with threats of libel etc to try to close any investigation. By the sounds of it this often succeeds so how many others are/ have done it.
So if those in the public eye think they can get away with it, what are those below the radar, the big corporations etc doing to avoid/ evade tax? 

Unfortunately and not surprisingly there is no political will to tackle this.

Well he clearly hasn't got away with it, has he? Have you listened to the news today? Just been on a long journey with Radio 2 on and every hour we were told about Zahawi and the HMRC "investigation" and how Sunak was so wrong to spend a few days actually looking into what happened rather than the usual media demands of immediate knee-jerk action when there's no real need for something that happened/been ongoing a while ago. 

Don't think there was any wrongdoing on the part of Sunak's wife, she was claiming a legitimate status, but even so the media was on her case. Clearly those in the "public eye" are not getting away with it, even using perfectly legitimate methods to reduce their tax bill. Even a minor seat belt violation makes the headlines.

Meanwhile not read or heard anything about benefit fraud in the media recently. It's blatenty obvious where the current media focus is.

Indeed, the two cases are very different. Sunak's wife was presumably paying the correct amount of tax on her foreign income in the country she was domiciled for tax purposes, as per the rules.

Zahawi's case is very different. He is living in the UK and registered in the UK for tax purposes. He directly benefited from £27million from the sale of shares in yougov and failed to declare that income to HMRC. We will never know if he deliberately tried to conceal it, but why would anyone set up an off shore trust held by a company in Gibraltar registered in your father's name to hold legitimate UK assets other than for the purposes of tax evasion, and then fail to declare the proceeds to HMRC? This is not the actions of a person looking to ensure they are openly and transparently meeting their responsibility to pay the correct amount of tax in the UK. He got caught and paid a £1.1million fine on top of the £3.7million of tax that was due. And he's lost his job. And hopefully he will lose his seat at the next election.

I can understand the media's focus on this as tax evasion / failure to collect taxes by HMRC far outweighs benefit fraud / overpayments by DWP.

So he's had a massive fine, lost his job, and been headline news all day. Yet apparently they all get away with and the media only focus on benefit fraud, we keep being told.

As to the level of benefit fraud, nobody really knows. If they could identify fraud to quantify it they'd be able to eliminate it! Personally I don't think blatent fraud is so much an issue so much as exaggeration, eg someone genuinely has a condition but eg overstates the effect that condition has on their day to day life. I know of people who have even had this suggested to them by a charity for their condition! As discussed here many times before there are far more working age people claiming disability benefits in the UK than other similar countries.

But in any case - the whole "other crimes are worse" argument is constantly used for benefit fraud, it's a ridiculous argument, it's like saying burglary should be ignored because rapists and murderers are on the loose etc. It's usually used by those who pretend to be against divisive tactics but all they want to do is move the divide elsewhere. Don't divide workers and benefit claimants, instead divide rich and poor, etc.

zagfles

NedS said:

zagfles said:

NedS said:

OldScientist said:

zagfles said:

Why would you not include family income support and tax credits - they're mostly means tested (or sometimes income tested) at a fairly low level. Apart for child ben which is income tested at a high level. Housing definitely need including. Not that they'd be totally eliminated, but partially in a lot of cases.

But the underlying point is the treatment of particularly people with disabilities, as charity cases who should be shoved onto the scrapheap of life long benefits dependancy, rather as people differently abled who can contribute to society in some way.

It's really an attitude change that's needed. Rather than "oh you're disabled, poor you, my compassion oozes from every pore, here have all this money and get out of my sight", it's "oh you're disabled, well what can you do and what can't you do, we'll find you something you can do and are happy to do". Obviously there'll be some who can't contribute in any way, but the majority almost certainly could.

Tax credits are for those in work (surely those already in work don''t need to be forced in to additional work in order to obtain their benefits)?

Funny you should mention that, but that is exactly what the government is currently doing on UC by increasing the Administrative Earnings Threshold (AET) - the threshold amount people must earn in order to be deemed to be earning enough and not have to attend weekly jobcentre appointments and seek more work. (Those on Tax Credits are slowly being migrated onto UC as it's replacement).

The amount a single person is expected to earn has increased from £355/month to £617/month (equivalent of 15h/week at NMW) and anyone earning less in the last month will be expected to attend the jobcentre and look for more work. This figure will rise again in April in line with increases to the NMW.

IIRC it was originally intended to be 35x NMW for a single person with no dependants or disabilities, ie they were expected to work full time before claiming benefits, but seems to have fallen over the years.

When UC was introduced, the thresholds were set in-line with Job Seekers Allowance which it replaced. Off the top of my head, JSA was £73.10/week, and if you worked part time, the first £5 was disregarded and anything else was deducted pound for pound. This meant earnings of £78.10/week (or £338/month) would result in nil JSA and the claim closing - so the same threshold of £338 was originally set for UC and then increased in time to match rises in JSA rates. However, recent rises in NMW have outstripped rises in benefit rates with the net result that someone on NMW would only need to work 9h/week to meet the threshold. The government decided they should be working more and this was increased to 12h in September 2022 and again to 15h on 31st Jan 2023 and thresholds will now increase in line with 15h x NMW going forward, breaking the historic link to JSA.

The 35h expectation is for someone who is unemployed or working less that 15h and attending appointments at the jobcentre - they are required to look for work or more work, and must consider all available positions including full time (35h/week), but once they are working 15h or more at NMW they are not longer required to attend regular appointments at the jobcentre, so will be paid any benefit top up regardless. So effectively their required hours has increased to 15h/week to get the jobcentre off their back.

So pretty similar to the old WTC, where you had to work at least 16 hours (or more for some, IIRC it was 30 hours for a single person with no children/disabilities). 

drjohn67

After progression/promotion, the last 20+ years I paid over £50-60000 tax annually and NIC of around £6-7000 annually. 

Plus, a compulsory pension employee contribution (then) of almost 30% of salary to fund a Govt pension paying 1/80th of salary. (Based upon average life expectancy this would on average recoup 80% of the contributions made. It did however result in an annual pension tax liability and lifetime allowance charge liabilities). 

Using lump sums to top up DB pension, retirement has reduced monthly income by far less than expected. Tax will be less than £15000 annually and NIC nil.

Acknowledge am very fortunate, although I had previously intended to work for another 5-10 years. Tolerated increased workload despite stagnant income for 15 years. Accepted loss of personal allowance, annual pension tax and eventual LTA charge thresholds.

The final straw was the further freezing of LTA and the recognition that during a time of high inflation for each year that I delayed retirement, it could cost me as much as £50000 in annual pension tax / increased LTA liability.
 E.g. Fund over 1.5M would increase by 4% per year and would be increased by CPI (currently 10%).

Although, the bigger increase has been long-term sick, the economically inactive group has included upper middle earners with key skills and tax revenues that the country/economy needs. 

I hope that the main focus will be on helping / supporting long term sick as there is unlikely to be enough space in the budget to 

mumf

Here ya go! As usual,government lives in Lah Lah Land ,and real people tell us how things really are! 

Over-50s at work: 'You feel your usefulness has passed' https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-64441775

SouthCoastBoy

I would be interested to know what percentage of the economically inactive over 50s would like a job but can't get one that meets their criteria

Sea_Shell

Jezza can jog on!!