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Darn. Third.
In reality, I would be considered to be someone who has been socially mobile. Three things were responsible:
Intelligence
Hard work
Parental expectation
I would suggest that without all three it is very difficult for working class kids to achieve what is regarded as normal for their middle class contemporaries.
Ensuring the average person has a job which can pay for their core needs and a bit more is where the government should really be focused.
https://twitter.com/davieclegg/status/937406024000180224
When will we get crossover for Yes in indyref II & Leave in EUref II?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WMMSmwzOTg
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_Scottish_independence_referendum,_2014
Q. What's Damian Green's favourite breakfast cereal?
A. Porn Flakes!
(I thank you!)
Hard work and dedication was all I needed.
Plus I was from recent immigrant stock.
It would have been a tougher ask in rural Afghanistan.
Oh, and working class my arse!
In my workplace (graduate scheme at listed company on stock exchange) those with rich parents have a mortgage within 2 years of starting (all with bank of mum and dad loans), thus being able to acquire an asset of rising value, while the minority without said parental wealth work just as hard but spend a ridiculous amount on rent, meaning they save a few hundred quid a month tops, living like monks. Having asked around, this is very common among many grad schemes in London across various industries - teaching, financial services, law, retail etc. Prospect of massive taxation on inherited assets is frightening but personally I see this as increasingly necessary (along with a decrease in income tax/increase in personal allowance) in order to prevent huge inequalities getting worse. Can’t speak as much for the regions save that jobs market tends to concentrate around London which is not necessarily a good thing.
Interestingly, outside of London, most of my mates have houses and have had since their late 20s. Largely without help from BOM&D, either.
Edit: And welcome!
*Thanks to my father being on the mortgage and the deposit from my Grandma.
As TUD will tell you, Yorkshiremen are southerners.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/dec/03/tony-blair-confirms-he-is-working-to-reverse-brexit
Thanks to my hard work and dedication I paid off my mortgage within five years and repaid my parents/grandma, even though they didn't want it.
Plus if you work in the City you should be able to buy a property within a decade of graduation, certainly if you buy outside central London.
I wish more Tories had second thoughts.
" It's the same the whole world over,
It's the poor that get the blame,
It's the rich that get the pleasure,
Ain't it all a bloody shame."
That is more pertinent as in many ways Labour, certainly under Corbyn, is anti-meritocratic and believes in rewarding people who are well-connected or politically right-on, rather than talented - Corbyn himself being a classic example.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/dec/03/trump-mcdonalds-binges-screaming-fits-book-lewandowski-bossie
So thanks to them I bought a house in central London in 2000 and sold it in 2006.
Near perfect timing.
I know my life would be much more different I had grown up in Darnall instead of Dore.
Where you came from shouldn't be important, it's all about where you're going.
But, needs must in the family, we help each other
The tory clause iv is going to be reversing this;
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7021357.stm
Anyone disagree?
Another benefit I had was that I was the only grandchild.
I am off to bed. Have a good week everyone.
Commiserations.
Come join those of us on the centre-left building Britain's new social democracy.
It'll take time, but we'll get there.
There’s more chance of me joining the BNP than joining or voting for a Corbyn led Labour party
"Laffer is currently an economic adviser to Kansas Governor Sam Brownback, who in 2012 zeroed out state tax liability for approximately 330,000 of the top wage earners in the state.[15] The state, which had previously had a budget surplus, experienced a budget deficit of about $200 million in 2012. Drastic cuts to state funding for education and infrastructure have been implemented because of the budget deficits."
He is so discredited, it is amazing anyone still quotes him.
The curve he described "The basic concept was not new; Laffer himself says he learned it from Ibn Khaldun and John Maynard Keynes."
It also describes nothing except that tax rates of 0% and 100% will generate no revenue. Anything in between more. Where the sweet spot is no-one knows.
Quotes from wiki.
TL;DR their conclusion:
At the moment, the best evidence we have still suggests that raising the top rate of tax would raise little revenue and make, at best, a marginal contribution to reducing the budget deficit an incoming government would face after the next election.
In any event, there's nothing to stop us raising the overall tax take closer to 50% GDP. Tories on here and elsewhere will tell us that will trash the economy as it has in other countries that have tried it such as, er, Denmark, Sweden and Norway (although strangely these countries seem to be managing their high-tax economic disaster pretty well last time I looked).
Timor-Leste and Eritrea are the only nations with a tax take of more than 50% of GDP.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Government_spending
From a veil of ignorance, most people would choose equality before the law and some form of social security / safety net, with a degree of taxation as redistribution, but I'm willing to bet very few would set that amount at 50% of GDP, thus rendering it invalid from an implied social contract.
Everyone will have a different answer to the question of "how much of a person's wealth is it fair to take off them (by force, if necessary) and give to someone else", but I suspect very few would agree to 50% or more.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tax_revenue_to_GDP_ratio
But in any event they all seem to agree that the Scandanavian countries tax at a higher percentage than the UK and last time I looked they seem to function at least as well as we do.
The Tories could have removed the defict very quickly in the years following 2010 by raising the % of GDP tax take to Scandanavian levels... but no, they pursued their neoliberal dogma, and ended up doubling the national debt.
If it is too difficult for even the best placed people (those on graduate schemes), it is totally impossible for anyone less fortunate.
But there is a simple solution if you want to buy somewhere: move out of London and the South East.
What is the point of trying to get a job either if the welfare state is so generous it easily meets all your needs above and beyond basic necessities?
The vast majority would agree on those basic principles Rawls sets out.
However, for the past 40 years we have, as a society, via the democratic process, chosen lower taxation where possible.
For many it isn't working.
If people vote for 50% taxes, then that is what we will have. If not, not.
And quite right too!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
2. See how the their high tax rates make Norway and Denmark such terrible places to live: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/norway-denmark-un-world-happiness-report-us-money-a7639256.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_tax_revenue_to_GDP_ratio
But tbh 6/10 or 5/10 both say to me that having low tax rates is not really a significant factor in predicting economic performance.
It isn't right that some people go to work and get paid £100,000 and can easily buy a house and build up assets, whilst others go to work and get paid £15,000, cannot ever buy a house and have no assets.
What we see is that the people who are in the former category convince themselves that they deserve their wealth, when in fact they are just lucky, chose the right industry and have the right skill set.
Everyone is just doing work at the end of the day. Everyone should have a basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, coverage of basic living costs, holidays etc. The wage should be a reflection of the actual responsibility that you have and your performance at work.
The end game is the rich have to choose between paying more tax and having a revolution where they lose all their assets.
No idea of the provenance of that statement though.
Luxembourg is not much higher either at 36.5%.
So a clear majority are closer to 35% or under in terms of tax take as a percentage of gdp than they are to 50%. Indeed the OECD average tax take of 34.8% is almost exactly the same as the UK rate of 34.4% and even the EU average of 35.7% is not much more than the current UK tax rate.
Argentina is the closest to a developed nation above the replacement rate.
It would seem to me that it is far more cultural than purely economic.
EDIT: Sad face by accident.
A basic right to housing, childcare, healthcare, a minimum wage for basic living costs etc is not the same as a right to home ownership or a foreign holiday every year, you get those by earning more.
It's so obvious I can't see why the Tories didn't go for it!
Nobody ever works hard or grafts or has talent or skills - and therefor high salaries are all luck ?
Dearie me.