She's given more time to bringing in tax on milkshakes but taking it off bingo and both subsidising AND taxing EVs than she has to everything to do with infrastructure.
She thinks raising the 2 child benefit cap is popular.
In fact, it's massively unpopular - even with Labour voters.
Popular with Labour MPs. They have to get through 2026 to get to 2028.
It is popular with Labour to Green defectors too but Middle England and the City of London and wealthy investors living in the UK will hate this socialist budget
Ironic that the 'BBC Verify' post in the live feed about the two child benefit cap and poverty uses the bullshit 'relative poverty' measure.
You may not like it, that's fair enough, but it's a clear, objective, and widely used measure. Hardly something to criticise BBC Verify for.
Out of interest what would you propose as the measure of poverty? Does a child need to be starving, in rags, no shoes?
When we interrogate our idea of poverty it is always a relative concept at its core, because poverty is ultimately about being excluded from the normal patterns of consumption and participation in our current society. In my view it is so-called 'absolute' poverty measures that are bullshit.
Not being able to 'keep up with the Joneses' in a neighbourhood pissing contest doesn't make someone poor. It makes them unable to afford an unnecessary and 'fashionable' splurging of cash you don't have on things you don't need. And the idea that should be subsidised by the taxpayer is just another tier in the cake of relative poverty bullshit.
Edited: as an aside, I'll be AFK for the Budget, which is a shame but needs must.
It's not about keeping up with Jones's. The point is that what we might consider an absolute poverty line now would be very different to the absolute poverty line 50 years ago, because we have different expectations about what constitutes a minimum standard of living, and these expectations are related to what we consider a normal standard of living. This is why I find the idea of some kind of objective and immutable poverty line fundamentally dishonest.
As always it depends on what is done with the concept. Relative and absolute poverty are clearly different ideas. Relative poverty has the property of being more or less by definition ineradicable. Absolute poverty has the property of being a quantity of immiseration which is unacceptable when encountered, especially in children.
Damage is done by leftists who elide relative poverty into something self evidently bad, when it is not self evident. Rightists do harm by insisting the real measure should be more like absolute poverty, which we should not contemplate for anyone. Imprecision and ambiguity is the permanent friend of lobbyists.
Relative poverty is not ineradicable. If you define relative poverty as, say, 60% of the median wage, then it is straightforward (in mathematical terms) to have a distribution with no-one in relative poverty.
You still have the idea though that people are in poverty, when in reality, compared to previous generations and indeed most around the world, they lead comfortable lives, eat enough food, are warm and dry. The term is pernicious and says more about societal equality than the struggles of those who have less.
And you still ignore that many children are in absolute poverty, the number rising. There are people in this country who do not eat enough foor and are not warm and dry.
However, my point was not on these broader questions or on how it is best to assess poverty in the country. My point was just that lots of you can't do maths. If you're going to complain about relative poverty measures, it behooves you to understand the underlying calculation.
I'm not ignoring it. Absolute poverty does exist. But relative poverty is a poor measure of that.
And also a measure that you don’t understand the maths for.
Labour MPs wildly cheering a massively unpopular announcement - which will lose them votes.
They get to spend more on benefits and feel self-righteous.
Not sure abolishing juries and rising tax on working people will go down well. If they'd cut benefits as well as increasing tax that would've shown a desire to get to grips with the public finances, instead of just whacking the working to throw more money into benefits (/Labourclientvote).
Edited: also, the triple lock should end. While Reeves deserves criticism for ducking this, she's only one of many recent Chancellors to fail here.
Good news unless you're either a Landlord or Tenant. Especially good news if you're a first time buyer - cheaper houses for you.
In other news, the stampede of Landlords exiting the market is making rentals very difficult to obtain, and pushing rents through the roof...
Yet again this bizarre logic that these homes are wiped off the face of the earth. If there are more first-time buyers, that means there are fewer people looking to rent.
I'm a landlord. There's a chance I sell my flat to my tenant as a result of this. Bad news for me; good news for them and the rest of the country.
Minimum wage increased to £10.85 an hour for 18 to 24 year olds and living wage increased to over £12
Increasing at a faster rate for young adults at a time the government says there's a crisis as one-eighth of young adults are not in education, employment or training. The highest unemployment rate in that demographic for over a decade and its rising, so the response is to increase minimum wage faster than the regular rate rises by.
Another disappointing budget, can kicked down the road as per usual. I suspect the biggest impact on the UK economy by 2029 is if and when we get peace in Ukraine.
Good news unless you're either a Landlord or Tenant. Especially good news if you're a first time buyer - cheaper houses for you.
In other news, the stampede of Landlords exiting the market is making rentals very difficult to obtain, and pushing rents through the roof...
What pushed rents through the roof was the Liz Truss induced hike in mortgage rates. Many BTL mortgage hikes were passed straight on as rent hikes.
Two points:
1) It wasn't really Truss - she just accelerated a process of interest rates returning to long term norms that was going to happen anyway.
2) It's all of it combined anyway. Landlords are selling up in droves because it's not worth it any more (ancidata, but three of my employees have recently bought their first houses - all the houses were ex-rentals). Supply and demand means that with less properties on the market to rent, prices are going up. And with demand for housing being very inelastic, what do we think that's doing to prices boys and girls...
I agree. Thamesmead has been snakebit by a lack of rail linkage for decades. Apparently the rail extension is going ahead.
Be nice if she made some similar commitments outside of London. A brief statement on TRU - which is already happening - and a vague statement of support without commitment on NPR. Not really enough. But maybe there's no room in the speech for detail.
NPR was killed by the Treasury last time around, as was the TPU. Maybe they’ll happen this time, but I wouldn’t hold my breath - the Treasury has successfully killed off all the other rail projects.
Note also the lack of any serious roads investment in the north. Where are the motorways to fill in the gaps between the northern cities?
I don't think there's a pair of cities of comparable size, in the whole of Europe, with transport links as poor as those between Manchester and Sheffield, for example.
It's an insult to intelligence to state that there would be no great economic return on remedying that.
Manchester Sheffield is secondary - Manchester - Leeds and Leeds - Sheffield links are probably as bad...
Similar arguments apply to all, and investments in all of them would likely be multiplicative rather than additive, but the first example is notably awful.
I agree. Thamesmead has been snakebit by a lack of rail linkage for decades. Apparently the rail extension is going ahead.
Be nice if she made some similar commitments outside of London. A brief statement on TRU - which is already happening - and a vague statement of support without commitment on NPR. Not really enough. But maybe there's no room in the speech for detail.
NPR was killed by the Treasury last time around, as was the TPU. Maybe they’ll happen this time, but I wouldn’t hold my breath - the Treasury has successfully killed off all the other rail projects.
Note also the lack of any serious roads investment in the north. Where are the motorways to fill in the gaps between the northern cities?
I don't think there's a pair of cities of comparable size, in the whole of Europe, with transport links as poor as those between Manchester and Sheffield, for example.
It's an insult to intelligence to state that there would be no great economic return on remedying that.
The problem is that growth is from such a low base. So in the Treasury model it doesn't contribute much to overall growth compared with 1% in London.
We should force the government/ONS to always report GDP on a regional basis.
I agree. Thamesmead has been snakebit by a lack of rail linkage for decades. Apparently the rail extension is going ahead.
Be nice if she made some similar commitments outside of London. A brief statement on TRU - which is already happening - and a vague statement of support without commitment on NPR. Not really enough. But maybe there's no room in the speech for detail.
NPR was killed by the Treasury last time around, as was the TPU. Maybe they’ll happen this time, but I wouldn’t hold my breath - the Treasury has successfully killed off all the other rail projects.
Note also the lack of any serious roads investment in the north. Where are the motorways to fill in the gaps between the northern cities?
I don't think there's a pair of cities of comparable size, in the whole of Europe, with transport links as poor as those between Manchester and Sheffield, for example.
It's an insult to intelligence to state that there would be no great economic return on remedying that.
Manchester Sheffield is secondary - Manchester - Leeds and Leeds - Sheffield links are probably as bad...
Without wanting to disagree too much with your general point: Manchester-Sheffield is poor in terms of both rail and road. Manchester-Leeds and Leeds-Sheffield are ok in terms of road and poor in terms of rail. But the reason Manchester-Sheffield is secondary is because the links are so poor! It should be just as important as Sheffield-Leeds, but there are ten times the Sheffield-Leeds commuters than Sheffield-Manchester ones.
Good news unless you're either a Landlord or Tenant. Especially good news if you're a first time buyer - cheaper houses for you.
In other news, the stampede of Landlords exiting the market is making rentals very difficult to obtain, and pushing rents through the roof...
What pushed rents through the roof was the Liz Truss induced hike in mortgage rates. Many BTL mortgage hikes were passed straight on as rent hikes.
Two points:
1) It wasn't really Truss - she just accelerated a process of interest rates returning to long term norms that was going to happen anyway.
2) It's all of it combined anyway. Landlords are selling up in droves because it's not worth it any more (ancidata, but three of my employees have recently bought their first houses - all the houses were ex-rentals). Supply and demand means that with less properties on the market to rent, prices are going up. And with demand for housing being very inelastic, what do we think that's doing to prices boys and girls...
What you describe is 3 fewer properties on the market to rent, but also 3 fewer people renting, so supply and demand are down by the same amount and prices won’t change.
Ironic that the 'BBC Verify' post in the live feed about the two child benefit cap and poverty uses the bullshit 'relative poverty' measure.
You may not like it, that's fair enough, but it's a clear, objective, and widely used measure. Hardly something to criticise BBC Verify for.
Out of interest what would you propose as the measure of poverty? Does a child need to be starving, in rags, no shoes?
When we interrogate our idea of poverty it is always a relative concept at its core, because poverty is ultimately about being excluded from the normal patterns of consumption and participation in our current society. In my view it is so-called 'absolute' poverty measures that are bullshit.
Not being able to 'keep up with the Joneses' in a neighbourhood pissing contest doesn't make someone poor. It makes them unable to afford an unnecessary and 'fashionable' splurging of cash you don't have on things you don't need. And the idea that should be subsidised by the taxpayer is just another tier in the cake of relative poverty bullshit.
Edited: as an aside, I'll be AFK for the Budget, which is a shame but needs must.
It's not about keeping up with Jones's. The point is that what we might consider an absolute poverty line now would be very different to the absolute poverty line 50 years ago, because we have different expectations about what constitutes a minimum standard of living, and these expectations are related to what we consider a normal standard of living. This is why I find the idea of some kind of objective and immutable poverty line fundamentally dishonest.
As always it depends on what is done with the concept. Relative and absolute poverty are clearly different ideas. Relative poverty has the property of being more or less by definition ineradicable. Absolute poverty has the property of being a quantity of immiseration which is unacceptable when encountered, especially in children.
Damage is done by leftists who elide relative poverty into something self evidently bad, when it is not self evident. Rightists do harm by insisting the real measure should be more like absolute poverty, which we should not contemplate for anyone. Imprecision and ambiguity is the permanent friend of lobbyists.
Relative poverty is not ineradicable. If you define relative poverty as, say, 60% of the median wage, then it is straightforward (in mathematical terms) to have a distribution with no-one in relative poverty.
You still have the idea though that people are in poverty, when in reality, compared to previous generations and indeed most around the world, they lead comfortable lives, eat enough food, are warm and dry. The term is pernicious and says more about societal equality than the struggles of those who have less.
And you still ignore that many children are in absolute poverty, the number rising. There are people in this country who do not eat enough foor and are not warm and dry.
However, my point was not on these broader questions or on how it is best to assess poverty in the country. My point was just that lots of you can't do maths. If you're going to complain about relative poverty measures, it behooves you to understand the underlying calculation.
I'm not ignoring it. Absolute poverty does exist. But relative poverty is a poor measure of that.
And also a measure that you don’t understand the maths for.
I'm not an idiot. Of course I understand the maths. I am against the term xxx poverty because of how it is used. It is used to imply one thing when the measure is actually something else.
They fell on the leak. I guess they like the increase in the headroom in the budget plan. If that brings down the rate of interest for the debt over the next few years then it will be one of the better results of this budget.
Regardless of the content, or the voice, given the huge amount of pressure Reeves is under, her delivery was absolutely fine, and surprisingly confident. Quite impressive under the circumstances.
£2000 cap on salary sacrifice paid into private pensions from 2029
I think this is just for NI. Income tax is still calculated after the pension contribution. Seems to me a sensible measure for raising more tax while a making the tax savings the same whether it's by salary sacrifice or personal contributions to your own pension. Not sure why she's waiting until 2029 for the change.
Ironic that the 'BBC Verify' post in the live feed about the two child benefit cap and poverty uses the bullshit 'relative poverty' measure.
You may not like it, that's fair enough, but it's a clear, objective, and widely used measure. Hardly something to criticise BBC Verify for.
Out of interest what would you propose as the measure of poverty? Does a child need to be starving, in rags, no shoes?
When we interrogate our idea of poverty it is always a relative concept at its core, because poverty is ultimately about being excluded from the normal patterns of consumption and participation in our current society. In my view it is so-called 'absolute' poverty measures that are bullshit.
Not being able to 'keep up with the Joneses' in a neighbourhood pissing contest doesn't make someone poor. It makes them unable to afford an unnecessary and 'fashionable' splurging of cash you don't have on things you don't need. And the idea that should be subsidised by the taxpayer is just another tier in the cake of relative poverty bullshit.
Edited: as an aside, I'll be AFK for the Budget, which is a shame but needs must.
It's not about keeping up with Jones's. The point is that what we might consider an absolute poverty line now would be very different to the absolute poverty line 50 years ago, because we have different expectations about what constitutes a minimum standard of living, and these expectations are related to what we consider a normal standard of living. This is why I find the idea of some kind of objective and immutable poverty line fundamentally dishonest.
As always it depends on what is done with the concept. Relative and absolute poverty are clearly different ideas. Relative poverty has the property of being more or less by definition ineradicable. Absolute poverty has the property of being a quantity of immiseration which is unacceptable when encountered, especially in children.
Damage is done by leftists who elide relative poverty into something self evidently bad, when it is not self evident. Rightists do harm by insisting the real measure should be more like absolute poverty, which we should not contemplate for anyone. Imprecision and ambiguity is the permanent friend of lobbyists.
Relative poverty is not ineradicable. If you define relative poverty as, say, 60% of the median wage, then it is straightforward (in mathematical terms) to have a distribution with no-one in relative poverty.
You still have the idea though that people are in poverty, when in reality, compared to previous generations and indeed most around the world, they lead comfortable lives, eat enough food, are warm and dry. The term is pernicious and says more about societal equality than the struggles of those who have less.
And you still ignore that many children are in absolute poverty, the number rising. There are people in this country who do not eat enough foor and are not warm and dry.
However, my point was not on these broader questions or on how it is best to assess poverty in the country. My point was just that lots of you can't do maths. If you're going to complain about relative poverty measures, it behooves you to understand the underlying calculation.
I'm not ignoring it. Absolute poverty does exist. But relative poverty is a poor measure of that.
And also a measure that you don’t understand the maths for.
I'm not an idiot. Of course I understand the maths. I am against the term xxx poverty because of how it is used. It is used to imply one thing when the measure is actually something else.
You claimed, “Relative poverty has the property of being more or less by definition ineradicable.” This suggests you do not understand the maths.
I get about 55 mpg (I think !) from my car, so that is 12 miles per litre.
So to emulate a 3p per mile tax you'd need to increase fuel duty by 36p.
Other half's car isn't quite as efficient but she does fewer miles - fuel duty would have to go up maybe 25-30p to replicate the 3p charge or so for us ?
1.5p per mile for hybrids is massive compared to pure petrol or diesels quite honestly probably about equivalent of 15-20p hike (New cars are quite fuel efficient !)
State pension increased in line with the triple lock
Another damaging inheritance from your lot.
Kemi floated means testing it
Any sensible person looking at it objectively would simply say that state pensions should just be linked to CPI, like most private pensions are. That we will be billions of £ drift from that going forward is down to the most humongous political failure, plain and simple.
Apart from anything else, a canny government having abolished the triple lock could easily announce a smidgin higher increase in the state pension each year, than CPI, and get the political credit for it.
Regardless of the content, or the voice, given the huge amount of pressure Reeves is under, her delivery was absolutely fine, and surprisingly confident. Quite impressive under the circumstances.
Don't nearly all Chancellors tend to hit the right tone with their budget speech? It feels the easiest of the big political speeches.
And the content is naive politically and a continuation of the timid and cautious approach that has failed Starmer & Reeves to date. Streeting and Mahmood seem to realise more radical change is needed.
I get about 55 mpg (I think !) from my car, so that is 12 miles per litre.
So to emulate a 3p per mile tax you'd need to increase fuel duty by 36p.
Other half's car isn't quite as efficient but she does fewer miles - fuel duty would have to go up maybe 25-30p to replicate the 3p charge or so for us ?
1.5p per mile for hybrids is massive compared to pure petrol or diesels quite honestly probably about equivalent of 15-20p hike (New cars are quite fuel efficient !)
Fuel duty rate is currently £0.5295 per litre, so the per-mile rate for EVs is still some way lower than that implied by fuel duty on fossil fuels for cars.
So, now we’ve got this boring budget stuff out the way, we can turn our attention to the most significant event of perhaps the century to date, Your Party’s inaugural conference this weekend.
Can we have a market on how many MPs will leave before it’s over?
They fell on the leak. I guess they like the increase in the headroom in the budget plan. If that brings down the rate of interest for the debt over the next few years then it will be one of the better results of this budget.
A lot of these measures have a good motivation but are horribly implemented - per mile incentivises short journeys over long ones, the mansion tax introduces all sorts of weird cutoffs and controversies, no other significant tax simplifications or reforms.
It reminds me of when I cook dinner for my parents.
Comments
I don't detect necessary reform so far; I think most of PB is probably in general agreement on the need for that.
Will the £100k income tax rate cliff edge stay in place?
Not sure abolishing juries and rising tax on working people will go down well. If they'd cut benefits as well as increasing tax that would've shown a desire to get to grips with the public finances, instead of just whacking the working to throw more money into benefits (/Labourclientvote).
Edited: also, the triple lock should end. While Reeves deserves criticism for ducking this, she's only one of many recent Chancellors to fail here.
I'm a landlord. There's a chance I sell my flat to my tenant as a result of this. Bad news for me; good news for them and the rest of the country.
Insanity.
(Trump did this which added some masure of chaos to US ports.)
1) It wasn't really Truss - she just accelerated a process of interest rates returning to long term norms that was going to happen anyway.
2) It's all of it combined anyway. Landlords are selling up in droves because it's not worth it any more (ancidata, but three of my employees have recently bought their first houses - all the houses were ex-rentals). Supply and demand means that with less properties on the market to rent, prices are going up. And with demand for housing being very inelastic, what do we think that's doing to prices boys and girls...
We should force the government/ONS to always report GDP on a regional basis.
But the reason Manchester-Sheffield is secondary is because the links are so poor! It should be just as important as Sheffield-Leeds, but there are ten times the Sheffield-Leeds commuters than Sheffield-Manchester ones.
(something to do with it being a stupid tax to raise as its pretty regressive, fuels inflation, and dampens economic growth all in one handy package).
Quite impressive under the circumstances.
Apart from that, unless I have missed something, it's just another rate of inflation cut to follow the trend from the previous 15 years,
TImid timid timid.
Quite soothing.
So to emulate a 3p per mile tax you'd need to increase fuel duty by 36p.
Other half's car isn't quite as efficient but she does fewer miles - fuel duty would have to go up maybe 25-30p to replicate the 3p charge or so for us ?
1.5p per mile for hybrids is massive compared to pure petrol or diesels quite honestly probably about equivalent of 15-20p hike (New cars are quite fuel efficient !)
(I agree that it is another Bitsa item.)
Apart from anything else, a canny government having abolished the triple lock could easily announce a smidgin higher increase in the state pension each year, than CPI, and get the political credit for it.
And the content is naive politically and a continuation of the timid and cautious approach that has failed Starmer & Reeves to date. Streeting and Mahmood seem to realise more radical change is needed.
Mind, some ofd that will be accounted for by inflation.
Can we have a market on how many MPs will leave before it’s over?
My portfolio is modestly up.
It reminds me of when I cook dinner for my parents.