Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
I've been pondering on the unfairness of today's stuff while out walking. Here's a brief personal take just on the NI bit (I won't tackle the whole package, which I think is deeply flawed):
My daughter (30) earns a bit less than the average wage - around £25,000 p.a. Her housing costs are £1,000 a month, excluding council tax; doesn't leave her much spending money, especially once bills are paid. My occupational pension is roughly the same amount; I have no other income. My housing costs are zero, excluding council tax; we've paid off the mortgage.
So my income is completely untouched. Hers goes down a bit. How on earth can this be right?
I've said on here before that I think too many people think the interests of the retired and the young are different or in conflict. They're not to many of us who have kids. The fact that I contribute nothing but my hard-up-daughter does is a f***ing disgrace.
What would you have done instead? A wealth tax perhaps. It was being suggested earlier by some on here.
Yes, a wealth tax of some sort - lots to choose from. Failing that, even a rise in income tax would have been fairer (especially if targeted at those with the broadest shoulders, i.e. highest incomes).
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
BJO comes out as a Boris fan while Philip, Max and CR leave the "Blue" fold
Just another day on PB...
I'll remind you of that adage.
There are two types of people in the world, 1) The people Boris Johnson has lied to and betrayed and 2) Those people who have yet to been lied to and betrayed by Boris Johnson.
I see George Osborne has tweeted support for the measures. We'll have you back soon.
I might be working for George soon.
I think.
Got a phone call about an hour ago from a headhunter offering me an interview at a boutique investment bank in London (but with the potential for 95% WFH).
Sounded a lot like Robey Warshaw, if it is, I'm in.
PS - I'm sure I've got some comments from George circa 2007-2016 saying an increase on NI is a tax on jobs.
That would be the famously discreet Robey Warshaw?
My claim to fame is that once I attended a lunch hosted by Robey Warshaw and ended up on the same table as Lady Robey.
Anyhoo I just know this job will in fact be Deutsche.
If it's Robey Warshaw I've worked closely with Simon Warshaw, so VM if you want a chat.
If it's Deutsche do not touch with a barge pole no matter how much they offer you.
Have too much bother on to follow politics these days. Have I missed anything important? Or is it just the usual?
Fascinating to look at the Canadian election polling.
Among the rolling pollsters, EKOS has a steady 6-point Conservative lead but Mainstreet has seen some big Conservative leads trimmed back in recent days to a 2.4% lead yesterday. Nanos had a 2 point Liberal lead.
Abacus Data polls a bigger sample - 2,875 - and the current figures are Liberals and Conservatives tied on 32 and NDP on 21. Since last week, the only change has been a one point drop for the Conservatives so big changes in the rolling polls aren't being matched in more conventional polling.
In the provinces, NDP lead by six in British Columbia, the Conservatives have huge leads in Alberta, Manitoba and Saskatchewan but in Ontario the Liberals still lead by three and have a one point advantage over BQ in Quebec.
The line seems to be the Liberals will still end up as the largest party on these numbers but short of a majority with the NDP making gains on both Liberals and Conservatives.
Glad another finds it fascinating! By contrast, 338 is showing a 3%+ Tory lead and a plurality of 12 seats for the Conservatives.
It all comes down to whether you weight EKOS, with its consistently outsize Tory leads, and daily polls, as equally as all the others. One thing seems to be true. The Liberal wound has been cauterised. They are no longer bleeding votes, and possibly clawing them back. The NDP, usually squeezed, aren't being.
Three things Trudeau has always done well. Come on strong late in the campaign. He is formidable in the debates, two more to come. Run much better from behind as an underdog. And, crucially, if repeated, poll much better than expected from polling.
My current prediction is both parties to win around 140 seats. A tiny number of votes will decide which party comes out slightly ahead.
Very much where I am right now too. It is looking too close to call.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
I've been pondering on the unfairness of today's stuff while out walking. Here's a brief personal take just on the NI bit (I won't tackle the whole package, which I think is deeply flawed):
My daughter (30) earns a bit less than the average wage - around £25,000 p.a. Her housing costs are £1,000 a month, excluding council tax; doesn't leave her much spending money, especially once bills are paid. My occupational pension is roughly the same amount; I have no other income. My housing costs are zero, excluding council tax; we've paid off the mortgage.
So my income is completely untouched. Hers goes down a bit. How on earth can this be right?
I've said on here before that I think too many people think the interests of the retired and the young are different or in conflict. They're not to many of us who have kids. The fact that I contribute nothing but my hard-up-daughter does is a f***ing disgrace.
Set up a direct debit to her for the difference ?
I help her out of course, but that's not really the point of what I wrote.
BJO comes out as a Boris fan while Philip, Max and CR leave the "Blue" fold
Just another day on PB...
I'll remind you of that adage.
There are two types of people in the world, 1) The people Boris Johnson has lied to and betrayed and 2) Those people who have yet to been lied to and betrayed by Boris Johnson.
I see George Osborne has tweeted support for the measures. We'll have you back soon.
I might be working for George soon.
I think.
Got a phone call about an hour ago from a headhunter offering me an interview at a boutique investment bank in London (but with the potential for 95% WFH).
Sounded a lot like Robey Warshaw, if it is, I'm in.
PS - I'm sure I've got some comments from George circa 2007-2016 saying an increase on NI is a tax on jobs.
That would be the famously discreet Robey Warshaw?
My claim to fame is that once I attended a lunch hosted by Robey Warshaw and ended up on the same table as Lady Robey.
Anyhoo I just know this job will in fact be Deutsche.
If it's Robey Warshaw I've worked closely with Simon Warshaw, so VM if you want a chat.
If it's Deutsche do not touch with a barge pole no matter how much they offer you.
Have too much bother on to follow politics these days. Have I missed anything important? Or is it just the usual?
Cheers, will message you tomorrow.
I know all about avoiding Deutsche. I heard about their infamous parties.
James Melville @JamesMelville · 1h Sweden 🇸🇪 has announced they will be removing almost all remaining covid restrictions (of which there were significantly less than most countries) - this includes numbers limits on gatherings and distancing in restaurants.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You'd think in a decent world the well to do old people would stop to think about the world they're creating for their children, and grandchildren and potentially great grandchildren.
Too much to hope for it seems. "Give us everything and when we die you may be able to inherit some of it after we're gone" seems to be the order of the day.
We are dealing with human nature here. Some of the money may trickle down in older people's lifetimes in the form of gifts (notably of the Bank of Mum and Dad variety for mortgage deposits.) But people who have assets want to enjoy them, the comfortable lifestyles they buy, and they want their families to inherit whatever is left. Looking at it cynically - as must be the default mode when dealing with other people's motives - if you can get strangers' kids to pay to mop up your wee when you go gaga, so that as much of your money as possible can be left to your own kids when you shuffle off, then why wouldn't you?
I imagine that you are perfectly well aware that, when Margaret Thatcher made her "no such thing as society" remarks, she said that people must look after themselves first, and then their neighbours. I think we ought to consider the possibility that wealth has become so hard to accrue, is so valuable, and therefore so jealously guarded, that the horizons of a great many property owners don't extend beyond themselves and their families anymore. People don't care about their neighbours, some because they are selfish but others because they feel that they can't afford to. That's the Conservative voter base.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
It wouldn't require any such thing. There's no such thing as "affordable housing" its a myth.
If the supply of housing grows faster than the demand for it then the price/earnings ratios will come down. If the supply grows slower than the demand, then they go up.
It really isn't rocket science or complicated beyond that. You could build nothing but luxury houses in the South and the price of houses in the South would come down if you built enough of them - the people living in OK houses would move into the new luxury ones, leaving the older OK ones for someone else.
All housing that is sold is affordable. Affordable to someone anyway. Does anyone deliberately build unaffordable housing?
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
Its because you have an infantile kiddy Parliament.
The grown up Parliament in Westminster can deal with matters like international relations, war, defence, security etc
So the kiddy Parliament in Holyrood can deal with what toys to buy (free tuition, free NHS parking or whatever), fiddling around with difference for the sake of it . . . and planning for another referendum. Because even the First Minister, even the governing party, even the opposition parties don't think that the governing party in Holyrood is really in charge so they agitate and do playground politics instead.
Because the government in Holyrood isn't serious - but its never been serious since it launched.
If you want a serious government in Holyrood, you need a Parliament that is taken seriously and voted for seriously. And that's only going to happen if Holyrood becomes independent and cuts the apronstrings with Westminster.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
It won't, there is not a single Labour seat on the council. The council is also building new affordable housing and council housing for locals as part of the Local Plan. However most locals are also property owners who want to keep their homes in the family.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally. They also bring their anti Brexit London cultural values with them too
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
Fireworks and fox-hunting are things which exercise many voters. And the miners' pardon is a Labour MP's initiative validated by an independent inquiry's recommendations; I see the Law Society of Scotland recommended a pardon, in principle at least.
The witches are long dead - but many of the convicted miners are not.
The other points are issues of major importance. And you will recall that the Scots were already doing rather more than the equivalent south of the border, and that some revision of the arrangements is both necessary and immediately important politically in view of the news this mornijng with its knockon effects on the budget.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Well, I agree, but it's not all that easy if you're only intermittently interested (like most of the population). You need to sign up every time you move, which for many young people is at least every year - varying jobs, relationships, etc. - and of course when you've just moved home, the last thing you want to do is fiddle around with application forms. Once you settle somewhere, it becomes more or less automatic - just confirm once a year when the form comes round. Therefore, the electorate is always more rural/older than the population. Requiring ID is just one extra bit of hassle to enlarge the difference.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
Its because you have an infantile kiddy Parliament.
The grown up Parliament in Westminster can deal with matters like international relations, war, defence, security etc
So the kiddy Parliament in Holyrood can deal with what toys to buy (free tuition, free NHS parking or whatever), fiddling around with difference for the sake of it . . . and planning for another referendum. Because even the First Minister, even the governing party, even the opposition parties don't think that the governing party in Holyrood is really in charge so they agitate and do playground politics instead.
Because the government in Holyrood isn't serious - but its never been serious since it launched.
If you want a serious government in Holyrood, you need a Parliament that is taken seriously and voted for seriously. And that's only going to happen if Holyrood becomes independent and cuts the apronstrings with Westminster.
Plenty of state parliaments in Federal states are not kiddie parliaments
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
It won't, there is not a single Labour seat on the council. The council is also building new affordable housing and council housing for locals as part of the Local Plan. However most locals are also property owners who want to keep their homes in the family.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally
Your arrogance and conceitedness that your own area can't go Labour - even while you're boasting of the fact that people can't afford a home of their own and "preserving green spaces" is more affordable than having enough homes on the market - reminds me very much of the former Labour MP for Hartlepool's attitude that his voters had "nowhere else to go".
He was arrogant and wrong and so are you. If people's needs aren't met they can and will look elsewhere.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
I thought the idea of HS2, above anything more high minded, was to bring Birmingham firmly into the London commuter zone.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
For what it's worth, my organisation is thrilled by the programme's inclusion ending the use of cages for hens and pigs on Scottish farms, as well as signing up to work with Westmnister on the live exports ban. I've not followed the other issues but I wouldn't take the BBC summary as gospel.
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
Its because you have an infantile kiddy Parliament.
The grown up Parliament in Westminster can deal with matters like international relations, war, defence, security etc
So the kiddy Parliament in Holyrood can deal with what toys to buy (free tuition, free NHS parking or whatever), fiddling around with difference for the sake of it . . . and planning for another referendum. Because even the First Minister, even the governing party, even the opposition parties don't think that the governing party in Holyrood is really in charge so they agitate and do playground politics instead.
Because the government in Holyrood isn't serious - but its never been serious since it launched.
If you want a serious government in Holyrood, you need a Parliament that is taken seriously and voted for seriously. And that's only going to happen if Holyrood becomes independent and cuts the apronstrings with Westminster.
Plenty of state parliaments in Federal states are not kiddie parliaments
That's true.
But they don't have such a broken "devolution" settlement or such a dominating, federal government as we have.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
About 15% of people to pay more than half of the new tax
Let me guess: Mr Eagles is one of them, and the New Statesman’s bar chart posted earlier was disengenuous bollocks?
Jake Berry has nailed it, working class Northerners like me are going to pay more taxes to help rich southerners give their houses to their kids inheritance tax free.
Jake Berry MP doesn't even live in the North of England.
He lives on Ynys Mon, where he has a property empire. And of course he has big house in the South of England.
So, why is he leading the Northern Research Group ? Why is he even in it ?
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Well, I agree, but it's not all that easy if you're only intermittently interested (like most of the population). You need to sign up every time you move, which for many young people is at least every year - varying jobs, relationships, etc. - and of course when you've just moved home, the last thing you want to do is fiddle around with application forms. Once you settle somewhere, it becomes more or less automatic - just confirm once a year when the form comes round. Therefore, the electorate is always more rural/older than the population. Requiring ID is just one extra bit of hassle to enlarge the difference.
Yes, sort of. But it's only one of a dozen things you have to do when you move house (driving licence utility bills credit card insurance etc etc etc) and more important than all the other things, in the long view. If I were a well heeled leftie philanthropist I'd invest a lot in a JUST FING VOTE advertising campaign.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
What really beats me still is that this tax is to benefit people like me who stand to inherit substantial wealth, my parents will leave behind an estate valued at seven figures because my dad bought land then built and sold flats in inner London. It seems ridiculous that an NHS nurse (which is always the best example) will pay up to an additional £12-14k in tax over a lifetime of working so that my sister (a chartered account) and I (financial services) can ensure a maximum of just £80k per parent who potentially needs care is wiped away from our inheritance.
There just seems to have been a complete fuck up at the top of the government. The treasury bean counters want the money and will now bitch that the economy is taking a massive hit from 2023 onwards and wonder why working age people aren't spending as much money while the oldies pass their assets on to already wealthy middle aged children who have no need for them.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
I was a Tory voter once. Not very long ago - 2019.
I should be a target Tory voter - working class northern homeowner, semi-manual worker, now branching out as an entrepreneur, living in a Tory marginal.
I'm incandescent over this dogs breakfast. I don't think I've ever been so angry, even when the government was screwing me in the name of saving OAPs from Covid.
They only got one thing right today - cancelling the monstrosity of the triple lock rise. But they've done it all wrong, because they took that hit without fixing the abomination permanently. It's still case that until this nettle is grasped pension spending will keep growing towards the entirety of GDP.
Then they've managed to do everything possible wrong with income tax, NI and social care.
If they wanted to take a political hit whilst raising money, now was the time to merge NI and income tax. Instead, like morons, they have created a third tax where NI sort of behaves like income tax as working pensioners pay it too.
The effect of all this is to raise taxes steeply on everyone except pensioners and BTL landlords. I suppose to make working people angrier, they could spend the proceeds hiring people to wander round slapping us in the face, but that would only be slightly worse.
Having grabbed this cash, their plan is to throw it down the NHS black hole. Good news for aspiring middle managers and IT contractors - there aren't extra doctors and nurses available to hire, so it won't do much for patients. But don't worry, shortly the NHS will be back for a few billion more, with dire threats of collapse if the money isn't forthcoming.
The social care fix(if it happens) is to take all the savings but the last £23k of the poor, unless you've assets over ~£110k. Then you keep everything after the first £86k has gone.
Those whose parents are sitting on £500k in a house in the SE get to inherit north of £400k, (>80%) whilst from my northern house I get to leave about £30k (<30%). I'm expected to pay extra tax to pay for this.
Everything they have done is stupid. Everything they have done is an attack on workers, just to reward rich oldies.
I doubt I'll ever vote Tory again now. I was already pretty furious with them over Covid (too much lockdown, too little border control), this is the last straw.
What I don't know is who to vote for. The Labour Party isn't serious. Also they are just as keen on workers taxes - they just shovel money to the feckless and public sector fat cats.
Maybe the Lib Dens could finally arrive as the sensible party - but between their nutty Europillia, the zero Covid wing (it seems to have killed their civil liberties beliefs), and their eco-fascism (the green agenda needs scrapping now, the country can't afford it if we're this skint), I'm not hopeful.
Maybe Farrage will ride to the rescue - he's the only serious force who might provide the needed challenge to the Tories on their right. But I'm not sure he's interested.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
IHT raises ≈ £5billion. The new levy will be £12billion iirc.
So IHT needs to raises ≈ 3 x what it is now.
That's a lot of hit for a tax the public absolutely hates.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
It won't, there is not a single Labour seat on the council. The council is also building new affordable housing and council housing for locals as part of the Local Plan. However most locals are also property owners who want to keep their homes in the family.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally
Your arrogance and conceitedness that your own area can't go Labour - even while you're boasting of the fact that people can't afford a home of their own and "preserving green spaces" is more affordable than having enough homes on the market - reminds me very much of the former Labour MP for Hartlepool's attitude that his voters had "nowhere else to go".
He was arrogant and wrong and so are you. If people's needs aren't met they can and will look elsewhere.
My area would never go Labour it might go LD but mainly because of Londoners who cannot afford to buy in London buying in Epping Forest, bringing their anti Brexit values with them and also Nimbyism. There are a number of LD councillors who win on an anti development platform locally, not a single Labour councillor.
The North and Midlands might go Tory, the South might go LD, it would not go Labour. See Chesham and Amersham too shortly after Hartlepool.
There is more chance of Labour becoming the 3rd party, confined to inner cities, than there is of Labour winning the South
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
It's odd. I have voted in every GE since I could, starting at age 18 in 1979 (Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; to be young was very heaven.)
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's an important 'but' - the change could also mean that care providers lose out on a huge amount of income - I'm told govt sounded out care providers about making this change before today's announcement and sector reacted with horror https://twitter.com/bbclaurak/status/1435328629303619584
The alternative to that is local authority costs increase by a huge amount if they wish to keep care homes solvent.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
It won't, there is not a single Labour seat on the council. The council is also building new affordable housing and council housing for locals as part of the Local Plan. However most locals are also property owners who want to keep their homes in the family.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally
Your arrogance and conceitedness that your own area can't go Labour - even while you're boasting of the fact that people can't afford a home of their own and "preserving green spaces" is more affordable than having enough homes on the market - reminds me very much of the former Labour MP for Hartlepool's attitude that his voters had "nowhere else to go".
He was arrogant and wrong and so are you. If people's needs aren't met they can and will look elsewhere.
That's just electoral numbers playing out though.
Imagine being a local councillor for Greenbelt Ward on Smalltown borough council. There's space for new housing in your patch, and some of it isn't that beautiful. There are people who would really benefit from new housing there.
But those people mostly don't live in your ward. There might be a few- young adults who really ought to leave home but can't afford to. But mostly, the people who would be grateful for the new housing live in flats in Smalltown Central, or maybe the ex council houses (now owned by BTL landlords) in Poorbit. Or more likely, in a different town or city altogether.
The people who do live in your ward don't have a problem with high house prices; if they did, they wouldn't be living there. They like living on the edge of the green belt- and, to be fair, they probably paid a bit of a premium on their house to achieve that. If they are more calculating, they may have worked out that more houses will reduce the (relative) value of their place. But even if they haven't done the sums on that, opposing new housing is in their interest.
This isn't about whether things should be this way- this is just the practical politics. What should an ambitious councillor for Smalltown Greenbelt, one who likes being a councillor and wants to be re-elected, do?
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
Speaking as a Millenial, I'd say the chart shows the problem is getting better not worse. But from a very poor baseline.
My first election when I was 18 is 2001 which is other than 2005 the very low point of young person turnout. Oddly enough today's 18 year olds have a higher turnout than my class or first time voters did. Not that much higher, but higher.
But more significant is that the 18 year olds of 2001 are now just the 35+ year olds of 2019 - and our turnout is much higher now than it was when we were 18.
I think the problem is that you need something to vote for (or against) and as you get older you find things in your life you want to vote for or against, but not all 18 year olds have that or see the point in politics yet. Plus "youth" politics tends to get dominated by a very particular set of young person that does not represent most young people.
Talk about "youth" interests in politics and you hear about Tuition Fees (not relevant to 50% of young people), or the Environment (of great interest to Waitrose youth maybe, but not necessarily to Aldi youth).
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
He is actually right about this, if we're talking here about properties and not just houses.
Flats, certainly in less upmarket areas, can be had all over the place for £150k, and a wide range are available for less than £200k. The South-East doesn't consist entirely of hugely overheated London and Surrey.
But yes, if you want a nice house almost anywhere in this corner of the country you need to mortgage yourself up to the f***ing eyeballs, absent a very well paying profession and/or the intercession of rich parents.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
It's odd. I have voted in every GE since I could, starting at age 18 in 1979 (Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; to be young was very heaven.)
Well I it is still around 50/50 vote/do not vote among young people, so a fair old number will have voted every election since they could.
I'm not sure what the answer to the problem is, as I'm not sure exactly how the problem arises (no doubt it has many factors). Things like bemoaning safe seats or lack of targeting probably isn't it, since turnout overall used to be higher and that had to include a youth element which was higher. And despite our moaning we're not a gerontocracy (yet), and even if we were that had to start somewhere.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
It's hard to know what will politically interest the youth. I voted in 2005 when I was first able, but I don't recall following any details or much caring about matters, but by 2010 I was very into it.
It might simply have been that I was out of education and had a do nothing short term job at the time of the election so had a lot of time to trawl news and discover silly political blogs. But it's not a strategy that can be widely applied.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
Perhaps you should say Watford GAP unless you think St Albans is affordable.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
There are already more property owners in the North and Midlands than London percentage wise. They are also getting closer to the South in home ownership too.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
Somebody inheriting £500,000 rather than £600,000 is hardly being 'hammered'. They're a jammy bugger, profiting by virtue of where their parents happened to buy a house.
Surely Sturgeon knows that the Fringe finished early this year? Her program today must be a late contender for the joke of the festival. Here it is in its technicolour splendour: as summarised by the BBC
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
For what it's worth, my organisation is thrilled by the programme's inclusion ending the use of cages for hens and pigs on Scottish farms, as well as signing up to work with Westmnister on the live exports ban. I've not followed the other issues but I wouldn't take the BBC summary as gospel.
Nick, with the greatest of respect we have an education system in crisis, between a quarter and a third of our shops on our High Streets sitting empty, the worst drug death rate in Europe, Universities which have grown fat on the back of foreign students who are no longer coming, a frightening situation in respect of Covid, serious problems with our infrastructure, a Police force who have today been fined for criminal negligence resulting in the death of a motorist, a Crown Office being sued for over £100m it doesn't have, an absurd backlog of criminal trials, I really could go on all night.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
At the risk of pointing out the obvious you could have had a pretty good war for the £400bn spent on dealing with Covid. What did they think was going to happen?
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
It's odd. I have voted in every GE since I could, starting at age 18 in 1979 (Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; to be young was very heaven.)
Well I it is still around 50/50 vote/do not vote among young people, so a fair old number will have voted every election since they could.
I'm not sure what the answer to the problem is, as I'm not sure exactly how the problem arises (no doubt it has many factors). Things like bemoaning safe seats or lack of targeting probably isn't it, since turnout overall used to be higher and that had to include a youth element which was higher. And despite our moaning we're not a gerontocracy (yet), and even if we were that had to start somewhere.
The question is what people have to vote for.
Even in 2001 almost every one of my friends at uni voted. But half the population didn't, which it wouldn't surprise me is primarily made up of the non-uni young.
I'll be honest its hard for me to put myself in their shoes but if you're a young 18 year old who dropped out of school and is working a minimum wage job, doesn't have kids, isn't looking for housing at the moment as living with mum and dad still and are much more interested in going out with mates and getting laid than paying attention to politics . . . what party is actually appealing for your vote?
If even those "youth campaigners" in politics are talking about Tuition Fees, or Palestine, or the Climate Crisis . . . none of which is that interesting to you . . . then who is addressing your concerns?
The cunning plan of this tax move is to further and permanently shift the tax burden from the rentier class to the working poor. By hypothecating the "Health Levy" on the kind of taxes poor people pay, it leaves the way clear to reduce some of the remaining taxes rich people pay at the point when they decide to reduce taxes overall. They may reduce capital gains tax etc, but the Health Levy stays.
Part of the Tories' "some are more level than others" agenda, it seems...
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Not in most of London, even flats are unaffordable to buy there.
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
There are already more property owners in the North and Midlands than London percentage wise. They are also getting closer to the South in home ownership too.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
Yes. You are meant to govern for everybody, not just the average and above. And I come from Lancashire, but thanks for the insight.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
And you don't see that as broken?
Probably only realise how broken it is when his Council gets won by Labour. I expect it'll happen before too long.
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
It won't, there is not a single Labour seat on the council. The council is also building new affordable housing and council housing for locals as part of the Local Plan. However most locals are also property owners who want to keep their homes in the family.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally
Your arrogance and conceitedness that your own area can't go Labour - even while you're boasting of the fact that people can't afford a home of their own and "preserving green spaces" is more affordable than having enough homes on the market - reminds me very much of the former Labour MP for Hartlepool's attitude that his voters had "nowhere else to go".
He was arrogant and wrong and so are you. If people's needs aren't met they can and will look elsewhere.
That's just electoral numbers playing out though.
Imagine being a local councillor for Greenbelt Ward on Smalltown borough council. There's space for new housing in your patch, and some of it isn't that beautiful. There are people who would really benefit from new housing there.
But those people mostly don't live in your ward. There might be a few- young adults who really ought to leave home but can't afford to. But mostly, the people who would be grateful for the new housing live in flats in Smalltown Central, or maybe the ex council houses (now owned by BTL landlords) in Poorbit. Or more likely, in a different town or city altogether.
The people who do live in your ward don't have a problem with high house prices; if they did, they wouldn't be living there. They like living on the edge of the green belt- and, to be fair, they probably paid a bit of a premium on their house to achieve that. If they are more calculating, they may have worked out that more houses will reduce the (relative) value of their place. But even if they haven't done the sums on that, opposing new housing is in their interest.
This isn't about whether things should be this way- this is just the practical politics. What should an ambitious councillor for Smalltown Greenbelt, one who likes being a councillor and wants to be re-elected, do?
From their perspective of course it makes sense, and they usually believe it is best irrespective of it also being practical politics. It's why, unfortunately, you cannot really address housing problems whilst taking much if any account of local concerns and why government policy invariably seeks to bind the hands of local decision makers.
That has its own problems and is far from perfect, but as has been noted ultimately the general public see the planning system as a way to stop things, whilst government sees it as a vehicle to address housing need or encourage specific development (that is, the former see it as a means of saying No, the latter as a means of saying Yes).
And those local councillors may believe it and will usually need to say it to win, but it is often very dishonest. Everyone makes promises they cannot keep, and in local government candidates will inevitably imply they (or the council) have a lot more power than they do to influence or change these things. It's why they are often reduced to promising to 'fight to protect x' or support 'housing in the right place', knowing they can do little about it.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Not in most of London, even flats are unaffordable to buy there.
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
You say that like its a good thing rather than a problem that needs fixing.
And if it can't be fixed, perhaps we should be looking into a 100% Inheritance Tax.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Yes, my wife and I did it for our first flat together and I did it for my own place before we got married in Shepherd's Bush. Police sirens and ambulances all night long, a pretty tiny place but it was cheap as chips. Once we upgraded to our Hampstead place we still managed to find something cheap for the area, well below the area average.
He has this weird obsession with the exact average property price for any specific area. Disregarding that a normally distributed average will have 50% below and 50% above. For somewhere like London I'd actually expect 60-65% of property to be below average in terms of cost because the top of the market is extremely expensive.
The death of Thatcherism needs to be recorded today.
As @TheIFS have pointed out, the tax burden is now heading for the highest sustained level ever. Note it was ever so slightly higher in 1969/70 but that was a bit of a blip. Whereas the govt plans are for taxes to be high for a long time.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
It's odd. I have voted in every GE since I could, starting at age 18 in 1979 (Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; to be young was very heaven.)
Well I it is still around 50/50 vote/do not vote among young people, so a fair old number will have voted every election since they could.
I'm not sure what the answer to the problem is, as I'm not sure exactly how the problem arises (no doubt it has many factors). Things like bemoaning safe seats or lack of targeting probably isn't it, since turnout overall used to be higher and that had to include a youth element which was higher. And despite our moaning we're not a gerontocracy (yet), and even if we were that had to start somewhere.
The question is what people have to vote for.
Even in 2001 almost every one of my friends at uni voted. But half the population didn't, which it wouldn't surprise me is primarily made up of the non-uni young.
I'll be honest its hard for me to put myself in their shoes but if you're a young 18 year old who dropped out of school and is working a minimum wage job, doesn't have kids, isn't looking for housing at the moment as living with mum and dad still and are much more interested in going out with mates and getting laid than paying attention to politics . . . what party is actually appealing for your vote?
If even those "youth campaigners" in politics are talking about Tuition Fees, or Palestine, or the Climate Crisis . . . none of which is that interesting to you . . . then who is addressing your concerns?
The shocking thing on that chart is the falloff in voting by the middle-aged. Up to '92, maybe even '97, part of the same cluster of points as their older counterparts. Then, in 2001, turnout fell and it's not really recovered since.
Now, 2001 was a very boring election (I was abroad at the time, and it simply didn't occur to me to set up any sort of expat vote), but why did the dip affect that age band so much, and why has turnout stayed so low?
The cunning plan of this tax move is to further and permanently shift the tax burden from the rentier class to the working poor. By hypothecating the "Health Levy" on the kind of taxes poor people pay, it leaves the way clear to reduce some of the remaining taxes rich people pay at the point when they decide to reduce taxes overall. They may reduce capital gains tax etc, but the Health Levy stays.
Part of the Tories' "some are more level than others" agenda, it seems...
More than that, it's effectively tying increases in NI (or this new version thereof) to NHS worship, which will make it much, much easier to crank the tax further in future. The narrative will be "It's for Our Beloved NHS, if you don't approve of the rises then you must hate Our Beloved NHS and therefore deserve to die a slow, painful death." It's genius, when you think about it.
Inheritance tax will probably be abolished around the same time as the NHS Solidarity Levy increases to 15%.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
Good point about the IHT mitigation strategies. It might not even be possible realistically to squeeze an extra £12b a year out of IHT given these strategies (the classic being starting to give stuff away 7 years from death).
The death of Thatcherism needs to be recorded today.
As @TheIFS have pointed out, the tax burden is now heading for the highest sustained level ever. Note it was ever so slightly higher in 1969/70 but that was a bit of a blip. Whereas the govt plans are for taxes to be high for a long time.
Those six biggest historical tax increases – funny how most of them were under the self-proclaimed low tax party.
Well, perceptions don't always match reality. If that's true it might be the low tax impression helps sell raising taxes, counterintuitively, as people buy that if they are raising things it must be it is necessary, not profligate spending plans.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Not in most of London, even flats are unaffordable to buy there.
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
A first time buyer in London isn't going to be buying a family home though, or do you really think that there's a gigantic market of unsold 1 bedroom flats? Also, it really depends, if you go to somewhere like high Barnet you can probably get a 1 bed for what counts as a reasonable price in London. Some friends of my wife bought a 2 bed in Bermondsey last year for £290k which is pretty good for what they got.
You chat so much shit about London but you don't live here and you don't really know what goes on here either.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
There are already more property owners in the North and Midlands than London percentage wise. They are also getting closer to the South in home ownership too.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
Yes. You are meant to govern for everybody, not just the average and above. And I come from Lancashire, but thanks for the insight.
Yes and most Northerners already own their own properties and so they do not have a problem with lacking assets.
Most Londoners don't and most Southerners who don't work in London increasingly don't and without an inheritance from grandparents or parents they won't. They need inherited assets more than Northerners do
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
Your making the same mistake as you did yesterday. Now again I don't know who is right, but your quoting of average prices is meaningless as most people will pay much less than the average price because the spread of prices is uneven. I thought you finally got this yesterday.
As soon as you make an assumption about a fact it is no longer a fact but an opinion. And you relentlessly jump to invalid assumptions. It is a an impressive skill.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You really shouldn't have to factor in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, though. The best thing about the Captain Ska Liar Liar video in the 2017 campaign was that it ended with the single word VOTE. Not VOTE FOR X just VOTE. And that's the answer for the disgruntled young. Fucking VOTE. How difficult is that to understand or to do?
Nigh on bloody impossible, it would seem:
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
It's odd. I have voted in every GE since I could, starting at age 18 in 1979 (Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive; to be young was very heaven.)
Well I it is still around 50/50 vote/do not vote among young people, so a fair old number will have voted every election since they could.
I'm not sure what the answer to the problem is, as I'm not sure exactly how the problem arises (no doubt it has many factors). Things like bemoaning safe seats or lack of targeting probably isn't it, since turnout overall used to be higher and that had to include a youth element which was higher. And despite our moaning we're not a gerontocracy (yet), and even if we were that had to start somewhere.
The question is what people have to vote for.
Even in 2001 almost every one of my friends at uni voted. But half the population didn't, which it wouldn't surprise me is primarily made up of the non-uni young.
I'll be honest its hard for me to put myself in their shoes but if you're a young 18 year old who dropped out of school and is working a minimum wage job, doesn't have kids, isn't looking for housing at the moment as living with mum and dad still and are much more interested in going out with mates and getting laid than paying attention to politics . . . what party is actually appealing for your vote?
If even those "youth campaigners" in politics are talking about Tuition Fees, or Palestine, or the Climate Crisis . . . none of which is that interesting to you . . . then who is addressing your concerns?
The shocking thing on that chart is the falloff in voting by the middle-aged. Up to '92, maybe even '97, part of the same cluster of points as their older counterparts. Then, in 2001, turnout fell and it's not really recovered since.
Now, 2001 was a very boring election (I was abroad at the time, and it simply didn't occur to me to set up any sort of expat vote), but why did the dip affect that age band so much, and why has turnout stayed so low?
Yes, overall turnout has crept up ever since then (only going down, a little, in 2019), but because of that band it doesn't look likely to return to 20th century levels.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
There are already more property owners in the North and Midlands than London percentage wise. They are also getting closer to the South in home ownership too.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
Yes. You are meant to govern for everybody, not just the average and above. And I come from Lancashire, but thanks for the insight.
Yes and most Northerners already own their own properties and so they do not have a problem with lacking assets.
Most Londoners don't and most Southerners who don't work in London increasingly don't and without an inheritance from grandparents or parents they won't. They need inherited assets more than Northerners do
They don't need inherited assets, they need the problem fixing at its root cause so they can get on with their own efforts.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
It's the inevitable fallout of the new gerontocracy. Well-to-do olds and their expectant heirs constitute a large and growing fraction of the electorate - once again, I refer to research from 2019 (https://blogs.bath.ac.uk/iprblog/2019/05/21/the-rise-of-the-grey-vote/) indicating that, factoring in propensity to vote on top of pure demographics, about a third of the entire electorate is over 65 and fully half is over 55. There are no prizes for guessing from which age groups the Conservative Party draws the bulk of its support. Moreover, especially following Brexit and the consequent decline in net international immigration, the electorate continues to age.
We are a democracy, and well-to-do, mortgage-free geriatrics and their ageing heirs (typically mortgaged property owners looking forward to fat legacies that will pay their way to early retirement and more besides) are a large, perhaps even dominant, constituency within the electorate. They are numerous, they vote enthusiastically, so they typically get what they want. It is as simple as that.
You'd think in a decent world the well to do old people would stop to think about the world they're creating for their children, and grandchildren and potentially great grandchildren.
Too much to hope for it seems. "Give us everything and when we die you may be able to inherit some of it after we're gone" seems to be the order of the day.
It could be that a lot of people in the West are anxious about the rising power of countries like China, which makes them far more conservative about things like inheritance. 50 years ago people in western countries weren't so bothered about whether or not they were going to inherit anything because most were confident about the future and didn't have to worry about competition from other parts of the world in the same way as they do now.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
19 people out of 20 don't leave enough to pay IHT in the first place. It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large. Secondly there's a lot of administrative shit you inevitably have to deal with on the death of a parent, IHT or not. Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on.
The death of Thatcherism needs to be recorded today.
As @TheIFS have pointed out, the tax burden is now heading for the highest sustained level ever. Note it was ever so slightly higher in 1969/70 but that was a bit of a blip. Whereas the govt plans are for taxes to be high for a long time.
The cunning plan of this tax move is to further and permanently shift the tax burden from the rentier class to the working poor. By hypothecating the "Health Levy" on the kind of taxes poor people pay, it leaves the way clear to reduce some of the remaining taxes rich people pay at the point when they decide to reduce taxes overall. They may reduce capital gains tax etc, but the Health Levy stays.
Part of the Tories' "some are more level than others" agenda, it seems...
More than that, it's effectively tying increases in NI (or this new version thereof) to NHS worship, which will make it much, much easier to crank the tax further in future. The narrative will be "It's for Our Beloved NHS, if you don't approve of the rises then you must hate Our Beloved NHS and therefore deserve to die a slow, painful death." It's genius, when you think about it.
Inheritance tax will probably be abolished around the same time as the NHS Solidarity Levy increases to 15%.
Can I point out I predicted the beloved NHS gambit yesterday?
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Not in most of London, even flats are unaffordable to buy there.
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
You say that like its a good thing rather than a problem that needs fixing.
And if it can't be fixed, perhaps we should be looking into a 100% Inheritance Tax.
It'd be fixed PDQ then.
Nope, it would be worse. London would be 90% renter then given continued foreign investment and immigration rises
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
You are wrong about this. There is decent entry level housing available in parts of the south east at that price level. Maidstone, the medway towns, lots of places. The average price means little - obviously this is massively inflated by larger housing.
Maidstone average price £341,785.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
The average price is a not a good metric when looking at affordability. You need to look at the price of cheap properties for first time buyers. And the reality is that in significant parts of the region you can buy properties at this level, usually flats, if you have two incomes and are able to save, even if you are both on low incomes. I know, because I did a few years ago, as did all my neighbours.
Not in most of London, even flats are unaffordable to buy there.
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
A first time buyer in London isn't going to be buying a family home though, or do you really think that there's a gigantic market of unsold 1 bedroom flats? Also, it really depends, if you go to somewhere like high Barnet you can probably get a 1 bed for what counts as a reasonable price in London. Some friends of my wife bought a 2 bed in Bermondsey last year for £290k which is pretty good for what they got.
You chat so much shit about London but you don't live here and you don't really know what goes on here either.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
And Andy Burnham's proposal. And so obviously just, it's hard to see what the fuss is about.
No it is not just, it would hammer average families in the home counties and home owners in London and reduce the rate of home ownership there even further
But benefit average families and home owners north of the Watford Gap. That looks on average like justice to me.
They don't need it, those north of Watford on average incomes can already afford to buy, unlike those on average incomes south of Watford
There's that bit where Alan B'Stard says: I hate queers almost as much as I hate the poor. You seem to go one step further, in not even admitting that the poor actually exist.
There are already more property owners in the North and Midlands than London percentage wise. They are also getting closer to the South in home ownership too.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
The situation wrt housing in London and the south-east is spreading north all the time. Property prices in the south Midlands, for example, are not that far behind the south-east.
There's probably some reason that governments have avoided abolishing NI and rolling it into income tax, I just don't know enough about it to speculate what that might be. Any thoughts?
Mostly the over-65s exemption, and that it is an effective disguise for the actual income tax rate on employees under £50k salary.
Minor issues are the different rates on the self-employed, the relationship of number of years’ contribution to pension entitlement and carve-outs for non-employment income.
That’s just employee NI. Employer NI is really great, because most people aren’t employers and don’t see it. Government can also announce a 1.25% rise that’s actually a 2.5% rise without most people noticing.
Then of course there’s the whole IR35 mess, which only exists because of NI and could be scrapped if NI was scrapped.
There’s also that a number of people view it as a ‘good tax’ simply because of the label (hence the new ‘Health & Social Care Levy’ tag).
The same trick worked for the frozen not frozen council tax with the "social care precept".
Such bullshit around. Ageing population with higher expectations = higher and higher taxes every few years, unless some fantastic new paradigm is broken.
I always felt like my party was on the side of people worked hard and got on with life. People who wanted to supply for themselves and not rely on others.
But its not anymore. Its tax, after tax, after tax loaded upon workers now literally in order to redistribute to those few who want bigger inheritances.
Its sick.
I don't believe in tax and redistribution, but if you're going to have tax and redistribution then redistribute to the poor and not spoilt rich kids who want a bigger inheritance.
Ridiculous attitude from a well off Northerner.
In the North those on average incomes can buy their own homes without any assistance with few problems, in the South and London those on average incomes need an inheritance or gift from their family to buy.
You don't know my financial status, I've never shared that. But if the house prices are too high in the South there's solutions available for that. Perhaps start by constructing more homes to ensure prices come down as people can buy somewhere to live. That could be a start.
What is someone without a gift or inheritance supposed to do in your eyes? At least in my book, people have somewhere to live even if its a new build that takes a year or two to get developed.
It would only make a limited impact as long as London remains a global city with the consequent impact on the commuter belt.
It would require every new house constructed in the South to be affordable housing only available to local first time buyers who had lived there for 10 years or more, a severely restricted immigration system and a ban on foreign investment into London property to make any significant difference.
Plus most southerners want to preserve their countryside and greenbelt
Those all seem like reasonable ideas. Better than relying on handouts from parents or grandparents something not everyone can do.
At the moment you can only really afford to buy on your own if you live north of Watford.
In London and the Home Counties unless you are a high earning professional, senior executive or work in the City then essentially you need to inherit to buy
This is just factually wrong. There are lots of properties in the south east for £150k. They can be bought by two working people on minimum wage with a £15k deposit and a 90% LTV mortgage.
Outside of Luton and Hastings and Margate there aren't.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
Your making the same mistake as you did yesterday. Now again I don't know who is right, but your quoting of average prices is meaningless as most people will pay much less than the average price because the spread of prices is uneven. I thought you finally got this yesterday.
As soon as you make an assumption about a fact it is no longer a fact but an opinion. And you relentlessly jump to invalid assumptions. It is a an impressive skill.
No because your point was irrelevant as rather than the mean wage if you went for the lower median house price you would also have to go for the median lower wage, so the discrepancy was little different
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
19 people out of 20 don't leave enough to pay IHT in the first place. It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large. Secondly there's a lot of administrative shit you inevitably have to deal with on the death of a parent, IHT or not. Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on.
The average home in London and the South East is now hit by IHT without the Osborne married couples allowance
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
I agree about council tax - just adding a few more bands at the top (and one at the bottom to help the really poor) would be politically easy and profitable.
Is there any polling evidence on this supposed hatred of IHT, though? I've never met anyone who mentioned it, and when I inherited money from my mother it was an unexpected windfall, making it pretty painless to let the Treasury take a slice. I'd have thought it much less unpopular than taxes that you pay every year.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
19 people out of 20 don't leave enough to pay IHT in the first place. It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large. Secondly there's a lot of administrative shit you inevitably have to deal with on the death of a parent, IHT or not. Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on.
" It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large."
So, can you see why the proposal is not in the realm of practical politics?
"Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on".
It is only paid by the rich (& feckless) as you concede in your first sentence, "19 out of 20..."
You have to trust your family. Then it is very easy. That is why I said it is paid by people who distrust their family more than HMRC.
Of course, I am not privy to whatever acrimonious relations persist amongst the members of the family @IshmaelZ -- but most people trust their family more than HMRC.
Hence, it is easy to avoid.
As you say, only 1 out of 20 pay it -- and not the richest 1 in 20. So, it is grossly unfair, as currently implemented.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
19 people out of 20 don't leave enough to pay IHT in the first place. It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large. Secondly there's a lot of administrative shit you inevitably have to deal with on the death of a parent, IHT or not. Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on.
" It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large."
So, can you see why the proposal is not in the realm of practical politics?
"Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on".
It is only paid by the rich (& feckless) as you concede in your first sentence, "19 out of 20..."
You have to trust your family. Then it is very easy. That is why I said it is paid by people who distrust their family more than HMRC.
Of course, I am not privy to whatever acrimonious relations persist amongst the members of the family @IshmaelZ -- but most people trust their family more than HMRC.
Hence, it is easy to avoid.
As you say, only 1 out of 20 pay it -- and not the richest 1 in 20. So, it is grossly unfair, as currently implemented.
Twit.
Only one in twenty estates exceeds £325,000, the level at which IHT becomes payable. If you have £325,000 in assets including your main residence, how much of that do you think you can give away on the basis that, Hey, I'll be fine for a minimum of the next seven years, on the balance?
I think you are the poster who thinks that Boadicea was a Welshman. I never thought you would surpass that, so props for your ability to surprise.
Is there any polling evidence on this supposed hatred of IHT, though? I've never met anyone who mentioned it, and when I inherited money from my mother it was an unexpected windfall, making it pretty painless to let the Treasury take a slice. I'd have thought it much less unpopular than taxes that you pay every year.
I think the problem with IHT is that the rich can easily avoid it.
Is there any polling evidence on this supposed hatred of IHT, though? I've never met anyone who mentioned it, and when I inherited money from my mother it was an unexpected windfall, making it pretty painless to let the Treasury take a slice. I'd have thought it much less unpopular than taxes that you pay every year.
I think the problem with IHT is that the rich can easily avoid it.
I like taxes that the rich can't avoid.
That is why I like property taxes.
What about modernising VAT (now we aren't in the EU, totally free choice), and ensuring plenty on high end items?
Anybody who has been to something like a CostCo can see what nonsense what is VATable and what isn't.
OK, so the issue is that some people's inheritances get gobbled up when their parents need residential care. It is all a bit of a lottery who loses out and who keeps the jackpot.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
I've always thought that IHT had a lot going for it, but if you are looking for Labour to go into bat against the interests of aged homeowners then you may be waiting a very long time. They whinged that the Tories were taking the 8% pension increase away, after all.
Increasing IHT to the level needed to raise the extra £12billion the levy raises is not politically deliverable imho. The public hates IHT. It may not be rational but there you have it.
I think this is correct. It is a hated tax by the public.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
19 people out of 20 don't leave enough to pay IHT in the first place. It is hated by the voting public, not the public at large. Secondly there's a lot of administrative shit you inevitably have to deal with on the death of a parent, IHT or not. Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on.
Better to have a wealth tax in the form of a property tax. Much harder to hide or avoid.
Comments
"The main points of the programme include:
A National Care Service Bill to implement reforms to the care service and a pledge that funding for social care will rise by at least £800m over the lifetime of the parliament
A new system of "wraparound" childcare before and after school and during the holidays
A collective pardon for miners convicted of various offences during strikes in the 1980s
Extra funding for frontline healthcare and mental health services
A fox control bill to strengthen the law on the use of dogs in hunts
A new law for stronger regulation of the sale of fireworks"
So basically, two main policies funded by Boris's announcements today and...what? I am surprised that the promise of a pardon for witches was not more prominent. It is at least as central to the many problems of modern Scotland as this lot. The summary also ignores the fact that most Parliamentary time will once again be spent on arguing about the transgender bill.
If it's Deutsche do not touch with a barge pole no matter how much they offer you.
Have too much bother on to follow politics these days. Have I missed anything important? Or is it just the usual?
Allie Hodgkins-Brown
@AllieHBNews
·
17m
Wednesday’s FINANCIAL TIMES: “Johnson defies rebels and unveils £12bn tax rise for health and care” #TomorrowsPapersToday
We're in the middle of a historical reversal of the North/South political divide, like the USA in the Civil Rights era where the South is going to go Red and the North is going to go Blue. But its not Brexit (as much as people want to say that) its the economy and housing in particular.
If most people in the South can't afford a home of their own, then most people in the South are going to vote Labour. Its already happened in London, and its already spreading out from there.
When Labour does next get into power, its going to be with huge chunks of the South going Red for the first time. There's no divine reason Epping Forest can't be one of them.
I know all about avoiding Deutsche. I heard about their infamous parties.
James Melville
@JamesMelville
·
1h
Sweden 🇸🇪 has announced they will be removing almost all remaining covid restrictions (of which there were significantly less than most countries) - this includes numbers limits on gatherings and distancing in restaurants.
I imagine that you are perfectly well aware that, when Margaret Thatcher made her "no such thing as society" remarks, she said that people must look after themselves first, and then their neighbours. I think we ought to consider the possibility that wealth has become so hard to accrue, is so valuable, and therefore so jealously guarded, that the horizons of a great many property owners don't extend beyond themselves and their families anymore. People don't care about their neighbours, some because they are selfish but others because they feel that they can't afford to. That's the Conservative voter base.
The grown up Parliament in Westminster can deal with matters like international relations, war, defence, security etc
So the kiddy Parliament in Holyrood can deal with what toys to buy (free tuition, free NHS parking or whatever), fiddling around with difference for the sake of it . . . and planning for another referendum. Because even the First Minister, even the governing party, even the opposition parties don't think that the governing party in Holyrood is really in charge so they agitate and do playground politics instead.
Because the government in Holyrood isn't serious - but its never been serious since it launched.
If you want a serious government in Holyrood, you need a Parliament that is taken seriously and voted for seriously. And that's only going to happen if Holyrood becomes independent and cuts the apronstrings with Westminster.
So the way to make it fair and remove the uncertainty is to impose a significant increase in Inheritance Tax to cover these costs. That way, everyone takes a partial hit, rather than all or nothing.
Fairness for all. And it doesn't clobber the working age folks whose parents are poor and wouldn't be leaving them a pile of cash anyway.
That's my proposal. Now over to Labour to either adopt it or come up with something better.
Boris is home and dry.
I don't disagree however that the Midlands and the North are becoming more Tory as London has become more Labour and parts of the South are moving to the LDs too.
However Brexit is a factor as well as home ownership, remember lots of Londoners who can only afford to rent in the capital move to the Home Counties to buy. So there are still plenty of home owners in the South, just most of them work in London or for London firms if they WFH now, not locally. They also bring their anti Brexit London cultural values with them too
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2020/oct/28/scotland-to-pardon-hundreds-convicted-in-1984-miners-strike
https://www.lawscot.org.uk/news-and-events/legal-news/support-found-for-wide-ranging-miners-strike-pardon/
https://www.lawscot.org.uk/media/371173/2021-06-04-crim-miners-strike-pardon.pdf
The witches are long dead - but many of the convicted miners are not.
The other points are issues of major importance. And you will recall that the Scots were already doing rather more than the equivalent south of the border, and that some revision of the arrangements is both necessary and immediately important politically in view of the news this mornijng with its knockon effects on the budget.
It's an established phenomenon, of which most of us are aware. I've no idea if this is the product of laziness, despair, nihilism or something else. We need some Millennial input on this topic.
He was arrogant and wrong and so are you. If people's needs aren't met they can and will look elsewhere.
But they don't have such a broken "devolution" settlement or such a dominating, federal government as we have.
Indeed the average house price in the South East is £424,800
https://www.zoopla.co.uk/house-prices/south-east-england/
There just seems to have been a complete fuck up at the top of the government. The treasury bean counters want the money and will now bitch that the economy is taking a massive hit from 2023 onwards and wonder why working age people aren't spending as much money while the oldies pass their assets on to already wealthy middle aged children who have no need for them.
I should be a target Tory voter - working class northern homeowner, semi-manual worker, now branching out as an entrepreneur, living in a Tory marginal.
I'm incandescent over this dogs breakfast. I don't think I've ever been so angry, even when the government was screwing me in the name of saving OAPs from Covid.
They only got one thing right today - cancelling the monstrosity of the triple lock rise. But they've done it all wrong, because they took that hit without fixing the abomination permanently. It's still case that until this nettle is grasped pension spending will keep growing towards the entirety of GDP.
Then they've managed to do everything possible wrong with income tax, NI and social care.
If they wanted to take a political hit whilst raising money, now was the time to merge NI and income tax. Instead, like morons, they have created a third tax where NI sort of behaves like income tax as working pensioners pay it too.
The effect of all this is to raise taxes steeply on everyone except pensioners and BTL landlords. I suppose to make working people angrier, they could spend the proceeds hiring people to wander round slapping us in the face, but that would only be slightly worse.
Having grabbed this cash, their plan is to throw it down the NHS black hole. Good news for aspiring middle managers and IT contractors - there aren't extra doctors and nurses available to hire, so it won't do much for patients. But don't worry, shortly the NHS will be back for a few billion more, with dire threats of collapse if the money isn't forthcoming.
The social care fix(if it happens) is to take all the savings but the last £23k of the poor, unless you've assets over ~£110k. Then you keep everything after the first £86k has gone.
Those whose parents are sitting on £500k in a house in the SE get to inherit north of £400k, (>80%) whilst from my northern house I get to leave about £30k (<30%).
I'm expected to pay extra tax to pay for this.
Everything they have done is stupid. Everything they have done is an attack on workers, just to reward rich oldies.
I doubt I'll ever vote Tory again now. I was already pretty furious with them over Covid (too much lockdown, too little border control), this is the last straw.
What I don't know is who to vote for. The Labour Party isn't serious. Also they are just as keen on workers taxes - they just shovel money to the feckless and public sector fat cats.
Maybe the Lib Dens could finally arrive as the sensible party - but between their nutty Europillia, the zero Covid wing (it seems to have killed their civil liberties beliefs), and their eco-fascism (the green agenda needs scrapping now, the country can't afford it if we're this skint), I'm not hopeful.
Maybe Farrage will ride to the rescue - he's the only serious force who might provide the needed challenge to the Tories on their right. But I'm not sure he's interested.
So IHT needs to raises ≈ 3 x what it is now.
That's a lot of hit for a tax the public absolutely hates.
The North and Midlands might go Tory, the South might go LD, it would not go Labour. See Chesham and Amersham too shortly after Hartlepool.
There is more chance of Labour becoming the 3rd party, confined to inner cities, than there is of Labour winning the South
Imagine being a local councillor for Greenbelt Ward on Smalltown borough council. There's space for new housing in your patch, and some of it isn't that beautiful. There are people who would really benefit from new housing there.
But those people mostly don't live in your ward. There might be a few- young adults who really ought to leave home but can't afford to. But mostly, the people who would be grateful for the new housing live in flats in Smalltown Central, or maybe the ex council houses (now owned by BTL landlords) in Poorbit. Or more likely, in a different town or city altogether.
The people who do live in your ward don't have a problem with high house prices; if they did, they wouldn't be living there. They like living on the edge of the green belt- and, to be fair, they probably paid a bit of a premium on their house to achieve that. If they are more calculating, they may have worked out that more houses will reduce the (relative) value of their place. But even if they haven't done the sums on that, opposing new housing is in their interest.
This isn't about whether things should be this way- this is just the practical politics. What should an ambitious councillor for Smalltown Greenbelt, one who likes being a councillor and wants to be re-elected, do?
My first election when I was 18 is 2001 which is other than 2005 the very low point of young person turnout. Oddly enough today's 18 year olds have a higher turnout than my class or first time voters did. Not that much higher, but higher.
But more significant is that the 18 year olds of 2001 are now just the 35+ year olds of 2019 - and our turnout is much higher now than it was when we were 18.
I think the problem is that you need something to vote for (or against) and as you get older you find things in your life you want to vote for or against, but not all 18 year olds have that or see the point in politics yet. Plus "youth" politics tends to get dominated by a very particular set of young person that does not represent most young people.
Talk about "youth" interests in politics and you hear about Tuition Fees (not relevant to 50% of young people), or the Environment (of great interest to Waitrose youth maybe, but not necessarily to Aldi youth).
Flats, certainly in less upmarket areas, can be had all over the place for £150k, and a wide range are available for less than £200k. The South-East doesn't consist entirely of hugely overheated London and Surrey.
But yes, if you want a nice house almost anywhere in this corner of the country you need to mortgage yourself up to the f***ing eyeballs, absent a very well paying profession and/or the intercession of rich parents.
Even terraced properties in Maidstone sold for £267,899 on average ie higher than the UK average.
https://www.rightmove.co.uk/house-prices/maidstone.html?country=england&searchLocation=Maidstone
I'm not sure what the answer to the problem is, as I'm not sure exactly how the problem arises (no doubt it has many factors). Things like bemoaning safe seats or lack of targeting probably isn't it, since turnout overall used to be higher and that had to include a youth element which was higher. And despite our moaning we're not a gerontocracy (yet), and even if we were that had to start somewhere.
It might simply have been that I was out of education and had a do nothing short term job at the time of the election so had a lot of time to trawl news and discover silly political blogs. But it's not a strategy that can be widely applied.
Epping is also north of Watford.
The median Northerner has more assets than the median Londoner now, it is no longer the land of poor flatcaps and miners renting small terraced houses
Cages for hens? Jeez.
Even in 2001 almost every one of my friends at uni voted. But half the population didn't, which it wouldn't surprise me is primarily made up of the non-uni young.
I'll be honest its hard for me to put myself in their shoes but if you're a young 18 year old who dropped out of school and is working a minimum wage job, doesn't have kids, isn't looking for housing at the moment as living with mum and dad still and are much more interested in going out with mates and getting laid than paying attention to politics . . . what party is actually appealing for your vote?
If even those "youth campaigners" in politics are talking about Tuition Fees, or Palestine, or the Climate Crisis . . . none of which is that interesting to you . . . then who is addressing your concerns?
Part of the Tories' "some are more level than others" agenda, it seems...
https://twitter.com/dsquareddigest/status/1435339464470155271
Maybe in the rest of the South but you cannot really bring up a family in a 1 bed flat
That has its own problems and is far from perfect, but as has been noted ultimately the general public see the planning system as a way to stop things, whilst government sees it as a vehicle to address housing need or encourage specific development (that is, the former see it as a means of saying No, the latter as a means of saying Yes).
And those local councillors may believe it and will usually need to say it to win, but it is often very dishonest. Everyone makes promises they cannot keep, and in local government candidates will inevitably imply they (or the council) have a lot more power than they do to influence or change these things. It's why they are often reduced to promising to 'fight to protect x' or support 'housing in the right place', knowing they can do little about it.
When dealing with the death of a parent, and its associated grief, almost the last thing any child wants is to have to deal with IHT on their parent's estate as well.
And, as IHT can easily be mitigated by smart financial planning, it is even more unfair than NI. The only people who end up paying it are those who die suddenly with no planning and those who distrust their family more than HMRC.
So, I think it is a non-starter as no Gov't would actually ever get elected on such a platform.
The obvious thing is to reform property taxes to ensure those with wealthy property portfolios pay much, much more. Property is hard to hide & reasonably straightforward to value.
The first step to increase the fairness of our tax system is the complete reform of Council Tax. And I believe it is a devolved matter -- so Labour could do this in Wales right now.
And if it can't be fixed, perhaps we should be looking into a 100% Inheritance Tax.
It'd be fixed PDQ then.
He has this weird obsession with the exact average property price for any specific area. Disregarding that a normally distributed average will have 50% below and 50% above. For somewhere like London I'd actually expect 60-65% of property to be below average in terms of cost because the top of the market is extremely expensive.
Now, 2001 was a very boring election (I was abroad at the time, and it simply didn't occur to me to set up any sort of expat vote), but why did the dip affect that age band so much, and why has turnout stayed so low?
Inheritance tax will probably be abolished around the same time as the NHS Solidarity Levy increases to 15%.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/cricket/article-9965567/Twenty20-World-Cup-Ben-Stokes-miss-England-squad-place-finger-injury.html
And Archer is already ruled out.
Or they are just lucky at getting away with it.
You chat so much shit about London but you don't live here and you don't really know what goes on here either.
Most Londoners don't and most Southerners who don't work in London increasingly don't and without an inheritance from grandparents or parents they won't. They need inherited assets more than Northerners do
As soon as you make an assumption about a fact it is no longer a fact but an opinion. And you relentlessly jump to invalid assumptions. It is a an impressive skill.
Thanks in good part to people like Corbyn.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-02-25/in-london-renters-now-outnumber-homeowners
Is there any polling evidence on this supposed hatred of IHT, though? I've never met anyone who mentioned it, and when I inherited money from my mother it was an unexpected windfall, making it pretty painless to let the Treasury take a slice. I'd have thought it much less unpopular than taxes that you pay every year.
So, can you see why the proposal is not in the realm of practical politics?
"Thirdly it is only "easily mitigated" if you are seriously rich, because mitigation strategies require giving away a lot either directly or into trust, while retaining enough to live on".
It is only paid by the rich (& feckless) as you concede in your first sentence, "19 out of 20..."
You have to trust your family. Then it is very easy. That is why I said it is paid by people who distrust their family more than HMRC.
Of course, I am not privy to whatever acrimonious relations persist amongst the members of the family @IshmaelZ -- but most people trust their family more than HMRC.
Hence, it is easy to avoid.
As you say, only 1 out of 20 pay it -- and not the richest 1 in 20. So, it is grossly unfair, as currently implemented.
Only one in twenty estates exceeds £325,000, the level at which IHT becomes payable. If you have £325,000 in assets including your main residence, how much of that do you think you can give away on the basis that, Hey, I'll be fine for a minimum of the next seven years, on the balance?
I think you are the poster who thinks that Boadicea was a Welshman. I never thought you would surpass that, so props for your ability to surprise.
I like taxes that the rich can't avoid.
That is why I like property taxes.
Anybody who has been to something like a CostCo can see what nonsense what is VATable and what isn't.