[Closed] Nick Clegg in growing a pair and actualy talking some sense shocker!!!

If you tax the rich too much they will just bugger off. I am not rich, but get fed up with taxing those who have done well for themselves.

For example. All my local bridleways are overgrown and a lot of the roads I ride along are rubbish strewn. If you were to say the unemployed on welfare had to contribute 3 days a week to bridleway clearing and tidying up in the community and the other 2 days job hunting, the government could save money.

The welfare bill in this country is massive and that is what needs to be tackled. I am also in favour of those who genuinely cannot work or care for disabled ones, should be given priority over an able bodied person who chooses not too.

You should have to work for welfare and not just accept it is your given right to have them.

You are Ian Duncan Smith and I claim my council tax relief and bowl of gruel!!! 😀

I have nothing useful to add to the above, except this:

[img] [/img]

I'm sure Mr Clegg will be the first to pony up given his privileged background. In fact, there's nothing stopping him from paying more to various charities who've had their funding slashed under this government.

Just another media sound bite from this hypocrite.

If you tax the rich too much they will just bugger off. I am not rich, but get fed up with taxing those who have done well for themselves.

NB if my tax went up 10%, I might moan about it, but I'd still live in the UK - not that I'm rich by any means.

Do I detect a Libdem conference coming up?

If you make people on welfare work, the argument goes, that it takes away work from the 'marketplace' i.e. that work could be done by businesses and not artificially undercut by the state!

I'm not convinced the welfare bill in this country is that big compared to others either, there are compelling arguments that we live in a low tax/low spend economy. But then I am a left wing, hand wringing, bleeding heart liberal, sorry about that!

Either way though, Nick Clegg can't do anything to make the Lib Dems gain what they've lost so it's all a bit pointless. Wish he'd just go.

Well, seeing as Hollande's plan to do very much the same in France seems to be spectacularly backfiring in exactly the same way the 'right wing loons' said it would, I'd suggest that Osborne has a point!

http://www.cityam.com/latest-news/french-bankers-escape-hollande

Funny how a discussion on the rich almost always turns into a welfare debate.

The welfare bill is massive, you are right. However, doesn't that indicate that more taxation might be useful? With that extra revenue the government could put people back to work.

FFS we don't need to increase tax on anyone, just close the tax evasion/avoidance loopholes so that everyone pays what they should [i]now[/i].

You should work for at least minimum wage.

Have to say, I've never really understood the whole [i]"make the rich pay more tax"[/i] thing.

Surely income tax is a percentage of income, so those with high incomes [i]do[/i] already pay more without the need to introduce higher and higher percentage bands?

Plus of course I suspect the very wealthy get much of their money from investment rather than salary, or pay expensive accountants to avoid the income tax - so it probably isn't really that effective anyway and ends up hurting the [i]well off[/i], rather than the wealthy.

Besides all that, I suspect Clegg is just trying to regain a little bit of credibility as he no doubt realises that the coalition will ultimately split and he needs to make some serious amends to regain disaffected LibDem voters.

FFS we don't need to increase tax on anyone, just close the tax evasion/avoidance loopholes so that everyone pays what they should now.

this ^^^^

The benefits bill is effing massive due to the Tories blindly believing the old Thatcherite assertion that high unemployment is a 'price worth paying' for their mindlessly myopic ideology

For example. All my local bridleways are overgrown and a lot of the roads I ride along are rubbish strewn. If you were to say the unemployed on welfare had to contribute 3 days a week to bridleway clearing and tidying up in the community and the other 2 days job hunting, the government could save money.

Sounds good, but probably not.
At the moment they pay people to sit on their arses, and they don't pay people to clear bridleways. To save money, any alternative will have to cost less than this.
If we were to do what you say, we would still pay them the same amount, but also have to pay for for foremen to check they're doing what they're told, middle managers to assign tasks to foreman, some monsterous IT system, hundreds of people managing said IT system, equipment, transport to and from sites etc. So I don't think there's a money saving case to be made. There might be an ideological case to be made, but that's different.

The tax burden needs to be shifted away from income, which is easily hidden away offshore, to wealth.

GrahamS, the country's (self inflicted) recession is longer than the government expected. Something has got to give. Who do you suggests bare this extra cost. Those who can or those who can't?

However, doesn't that indicate that more taxation might be useful? With that extra revenue the government could put people back to work.

Alternatively, just think what the public might do with all that money the government take off them instead - like spend the weekend mountainbiking in Wales, creating jobs in hotels, cafe's, bike shops, etc.

Wikipedia tells me that the UK collected £600billion in tax in 2008, we borrowed more on top of that.

Part of me thinks we shuold look at how we spend this money before going looking for more.

Presumably this is the same Nick Clegg who was telling us all about the Lib Dems local property tax a while back - under which most of us would "save" by paying 3% of the property value each year instead of council tax?

...The same Nick Clegg who hadn't actually bothered to work out that for most of the country, that would mean a substantial hike in the amount of tax they were paying for local services. Maybe all of those people were "rich" and needed to pay more?

... or the same Clegg that argues for Transparency except when it impacts him http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9198272/Nick-Clegg-wants-to-let-MPs-keep-family-fortunes-under-wraps.html

What gets me riled about Clegg is that he's the archetypal Eurocrat - having filled his pockets with unreceipted expenses and allowances during his time as an MEP, he then has the audacity to lecture us on the need for people to pay more - ostensibly so that the "system" can continue to waste money on the type of ridiculous expense arrangements that he, his wife and his merry LibDem chums have done very nicely out of.

What we really need to hear is the reforming voices who can argue the need for good public services at a tax level that is affordable / sustainable. Clegg's comments are just more self-serving guff - exactly the same sort of cobblers we heard before the last election when he basically promised the world to anyone who would listen.

just think what the public might do with all that money the government take off them instead - like spend the weekend mountainbiking in Wales, creating jobs in hotels, cafe's, bike shops, etc.

Or funneling it through their wife's offshore bank account in Monaco?

[quote=flanagaj ]If you were to say the unemployed on welfare had to contribute 3 days a week to bridleway clearing and tidying up in the community and the other 2 days job hunting, the government could save money.That could be easily achieved by the local council creating more jobs and employing these folk at the standard minimum wage. Is that what you meant?

If the rich are paying no taxes anyway - what difference will it make if they bugger off or not? This is a serious question.

The tax burden needs to be shifted away from income, which is easily hidden away offshore, to wealth.

isn't wealth also hidden away offshore?

Surely income tax is a percentage of income, so those with high incomes do already pay more without the need to introduce higher and higher percentage bands?

I haven't read the original link, but though a sleepy haze this morning I thought he was talking about alternatives to income tax, mainly as those with higher incomes are quite good at hiding that income. But I think mt has probably hit the crux of the matter.

If you tax the rich too much they will just bugger off. I am not rich, but get fed up with taxing those who have done well for themselves.

Not all rich people are selfish and greedy.

The award-winning author of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time has said rich people should pay more tax to save others being hit by government spending cuts.

Mark Haddon, whose book has sold more than two million copies, spawned a stage version and is being adapted as a film by Brad Pitt, said he was ‘not asking just an economic question but a moral one, too'.

He said he had put his opinions in a letter to his MP, sent in February, which read: [b]'I'm a wealthy person. Austerity measures introduced by the coalition have caused real suffering to many people, but my comfortable life hasn't changed in the slightest.

'Why have I, and people like me, been asked to contribute nothing?'[/b]

http://www.****/news/article-2187581/Mark-Haddon-author-The-Curious-Incident-Dog-Night-time-said-rich-people-pay-MORE-tax.html

Alternatively, just think what the public might do with all that money the government take off them instead - like spend the weekend mountainbiking in Wales, creating jobs in hotels, cafe's, bike shops, etc.

That's an argument for more people getting paid more.

Isn't wealth hidden offshore

It's difficult to hide a house abroad...

That's an argument for more people getting paid more.

Like a living wage perhaps? That way we, as taxpayers, stop effectively subsiding the profits of companies like Tesco by boosting their employees subsistence-level wages with tax credits, housing benefit, council tax relief etc

A one off hit on 'the rich' is unlikely to deal with the UK spending deficit or the increasing UK debt. And this talk of 'living within our means' or being 'in this together' seems unconvincing. Nations surf on a sea of debt to maintain 'growth'.

Anyone know how income tax, NI & VAT revenues compare to corporation tax, capital gains and inheritance tax revenues? How much difference would further tax increases on the ~10% of higher income tax payers (40% or above) make?

And of course there's the [url= http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laffer_curve ]Laffer curve[/url] argument already raised

[i]Decades ago it could be foreseen that something of this kind was going to happen. Ever since the nineteenth century our national income, dependent partly on interest from foreign investments, and on assured markets and cheap raw materials in colonial countries, had been extremely precarious. It was certain that, sooner or later, something would go wrong and we should be forced to make our exports balance our imports: and when that happened the British standard of living, including the working-class standard, was bound to fall, at least temporarily. Yet the left-wing parties, even when they were vociferously anti-imperialist, never made these facts clear. On occasion they were ready to admit that the British workers had benefited, to some extent, by the looting of Asia and Africa, but they always allowed it to appear that we could give up our loot and yet in some way contrive to remain prosperous. Quite largely, indeed, the workers were won over to Socialism by being told that they were exploited, whereas the brute truth was that, in world terms, they were exploiters. Now, to all appearances, the point has been reached when the working-class living-standard CANNOT be maintained, let alone raised. Even if we squeeze the rich out of existence, the mass of the people must either consume less or produce more. Or am I exaggerating the mess we are in? I may be, and I should be glad to find myself mistaken. But the point I wish to make is that this question, among people who are faithful to the Left ideology, cannot be genuinely discussed. The lowering of wages and raising of working hours are felt to be inherently anti-Socialist measures, and must therefore be dismissed in advance, whatever the economic situation may be. To suggest that they may be unavoidable is merely to risk being plastered with those labels that we are all terrified of. It is far safer to evade the issue and pretend that we can put everything right by redistributing the existing national income.[/i]

George Orwell, 1948

Well, seeing as Hollande's plan to do very much the same in France seems to be spectacularly backfiring in exactly the same way the 'right wing loons' said it would, I'd suggest that Osborne has a point!
http://www.cityam.com/latest-news/french-bankers-escape-hollande

A good argument for taking advantage of the market situation and increasing taxes to 1% below French levels.
Increase market [u]and[/u] margin.

If you tax the rich too much they will just bugger off.

Any that want to leave, let them go. Parasites.
Why do so many people peddle this sh*te on behalf the self serving elite?

You should have to work for welfare and not just accept it is your given right to have them.

We pay taxes for the welfare state, so when you need to call on that, it is your given right to receive it.

The welfare bill in this country is massive and that is what needs to be tackled.

This sickens me. Blaming the poor for the state of the nation. It's like blaming the blood for the wound.

Any that want to leave, let them go. Parasites.

[img] [/img]

as wrecker notes stop avoidance and make it a crime.
If they leave they can never come back the amoral ****ers
What zimbo says

welfare for work is very expensive as you need to pay someone like say A4E to administer it and that went well and was cheap to boot 😕

Got one that says what they would have to pay if they did not actively avoid tax Zulu?

A couple of thoughts on this debate. Sorry its a long post:

The tax paid by the bottom 50% of taxpayers 24.1% of the total income tax take in the UK (source is the Office of National Statistics)

The tax paid by the top 5% of tax payers is 45.5% of the total income tax take in the UK (source is the Office of National Statistics)

So if the total tax take was £1,000,000,000

the top 5% would pay £455,000,0000
The bottom 50% would pay $241,000,000

If you even out the tax paid across the sample and then do the maths, it works out roughly as each tax payer in to top 5% already paying 11 times as much tax.

The other problem with raising tax endlessly is it reaches a point of diminishing returns where it becomes more beneficial to pay an accountant to tell you how to avoid tax, which actually drives the tax take down rather than up. A good example of how the tax system in the UK works below

Suppose that every day, ten men go out for beer and the bill for all
ten comes to £100...

If they paid their bill the way we pay our taxes, it would go
something like this...

The first four men (the poorest) would pay nothing.
The fifth would pay £1.
The sixth would pay £3.
The seventh would pay £7.
The eighth would pay £12.
The ninth would pay £18.
The tenth man (the richest) would pay £59.

So, that's what they decided to do..

The ten men drank in the bar every day and seemed quite happy with
the arrangement, until one day, the owner threw them a curve ball.

"Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to
reduce the cost of your daily beer by £20". Drinks for the ten men
would now cost just £80.

The group still wanted to pay their bill the way we pay our taxes.

So the first four men were unaffected.

They would still drink for free. But what about the other six men—the paying customers?

How could they divide the £20 windfall so that everyone would get his
fair share?

They realised that £20 divided by six is £3.33. But if they
subtracted that from everybody's share, then the fifth man and the
sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.

So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fair to reduce each
man's bill by a higher percentage the poorer he was, to follow the
principle of the tax system they had been using, and he proceeded to
work out the amounts he suggested that each should now pay.

And so the fifth man, like the first four, now paid nothing (100%
saving).

The sixth now paid £2 instead of £3 (33% saving).

The seventh now paid £5 instead of £7 (28% saving).

The eighth now paid £9 instead of £12 (25% saving).

The ninth now paid £14 instead of £18 (22% saving).

The tenth now paid £49 instead of £59 (16% saving).

Each of the six was better off than before. And the first four
continued to drink for free. But, once outside the bar, the men began
to compare their savings.

"I only got a pound out of the £20 saving," declared the sixth man.

He pointed to the tenth man,"but he got £10!"

"Yeah, that's right," exclaimed the fifth man. "I only saved a pound
too. It's unfair that he got ten times more benefit than me!"

"That's true!" shouted the seventh man. "Why should he get £10 back,
when I got only £2? The wealthy get all the breaks!"

"Wait a minute," yelled the first four men in unison, "we didn't get
anything at all. This new tax system exploits the poor!"

The nine men surrounded the tenth and beat him up.

The next night the tenth man didn't show up for drinks, so the nine
sat down and had their beers without him. But when it came time to
pay the bill, they discovered something important. They didn't have
enough money between all of them for even half of the bill!

And that is how our tax system works.

The people who already pay the highest taxes will naturally get the
most benefit from a tax reduction.

Tax them too much, attack them for being wealthy, and they just may
not show up anymore.

In fact, they might start drinking overseas, where the atmosphere is
somewhat friendlier.

I could be wrong, but shouldn't we be looking at a different way to get the UK out of recession other than just taxing people more, who are probably on the whole doing a more than most to try and get the economy moving...

Got one that says what they would have to pay if they did not actively avoid tax Zulu?

Like who?

Richard Branson maybe?

That graph is slightly missleading as its only income tax the number the top 1% pay goes down quite fast if it included all the other taxes especially nat insurance, vat etc. Which is another problem IMO why is it all so complicated.

FFS we don't need to increase tax on anyone, just close the tax evasion/avoidance loopholes so that everyone pays what they should now.

Clegg is an idiot, "one off" anythings are usually the policies of the desparate or idiots IMO, he's both

That's a lovely, pointless colour chart.
That said, I might do the bathroom in that 21.8% green.

I'm happy to pay tax. It's the rent I pay to live in this society. I'm unhappy about the scroungers who believe that they are entitled to live here at my expense.

its very rare I agree with wrecker but he's right you know.

a_a agreeing with me? Is it too late to change my mind? 😀

It's difficult to hide a house abroad...

/facepalm.

Not when your assets company based in the caymen islands buys it for you, negating the need to pay stamp duty. Then when you come to sell one of your properties you sell the holding company, avoiding CGT.

Did you not know the super rich can afford to employ some very clever accountants?

🙂

A question for Zulu Eleven;

How is anyone that earns, for arguments sake £100k, pays their taxes and might even employ one or two people a parasite?

Would you call a GP on £100k+, and there are lots of those after NuLabours reforms of the NHS, a year a parasite?

Or maybe the head of a big secondary school on $85k, parasite?

What about a senior Airline pilot on £95k, parasite as well?

or is it the perfectly able bodied dude that won't take a job because its not good enough for them and they are better off on benefits that's the parasite?

My view is those that can work should work, and those in genuine need should be looked after, properly, by the state

A question for Zulu Eleven;
How is anyone that earns, for arguments sake £100k, pays their taxes and might even employ one or two people a parasite?

I think you'll find Zulu-Eleven is on your "side", hence his pretty infographic, [url= http://singletrackmag.com/forum/topic/nick-clegg-in-growing-a-pair-and-actualy-talking-some-sense-shocker#post-4123364 ]it was zimbo that called them "Parasites"[/url].

zimbo: That's a lovely, pointless colour chart.

Seems quite informative to me. Illustrative of the fact that the top 25%, who [i]apparently[/i] "don't pay enough income tax", are actually contributing nearly half (47%) of our national income tax revenue.

What is your objection?

Alternatively, just think what the public might do with all that money the government take off them instead - like spend the weekend mountainbiking in Wales, creating jobs in hotels, cafe's, bike shops, etc. or [b]paying down debt, which is the natural reaction in a recession when handed extra money[/b]

when the government failed to push for global tax reform and sorting out tax havens they lost the battle here. Clegg in particular has failed- we expect our tory part leaders to have inherited a fortune stashed away in a tax haven, they are after all just out for themselves. The libdems were supposed to be different

The point is we all know that the income tax [ it does not show all taxes as i suspect that would drastically reduce the impact as it would be more equal] is designed to redistribute wealth so no one is really surprised to see that the better off pay more – a look at the income tax rates will tell you that.
We all know that many wealthy folk pay a lower rate of tax as a percentage [ please zulu not again] of their income than the "little " people

Its a lovely graph that is designed to have maximum impact and indeed it does.
Hence why I asked what it would look like if they did not avoid tax
What would it look like if you include indirect tax/total tax burden?
It would certainly alter the %
Lies, damn lies and statistics- to be fair it’s a very good chart for the right wingers and it does illuminate a point well

In fair society those that can should pay!
Those that don't want to pay or work should not be treated the same as those that really can't pay for genuine reasons. After all who really cares about those in real need not of the own making, those that seem to shout the loudest are often incapable of differentiating between the two, they reduce he help to those in real need. They are often the same people who think that tax avoidance is illegal. Evasion now that should be criminal with a good sentence to back it up.

Junkyard - without typos, I simply won't believe its actually you thats posting. I've come to the conclusion that you have 7 fingers and 2 thumbs on each hand 😀

The thing with governments is that they waste an awful lot of the taxes they receive and pretty much any one of us could probably Google and find billions spent on something we personally disagree with - whether is benefits, pensions, MP's expenses, Trident etc.

Consequently we all believe that OUR tax is too high and that too little is spent (in certain areas).

And once you get to a point where a payslip shows that your overall deductions are heading to 50%, suddenly you are working for others - not yourself.

@Graham5, bugger! that'll teach me to read more carefully in future!!

I just wonder where "They must pay their fair share" ends. What's fair? I'm by no means loaded but I am sick of the politics of envy.

We have a massive debt and driving out the wealth creators with ridiculous taxation hikes won't help the economy

binners - Member
Blimey! Has the worm finally turned

No, as others have said he has a party conference coming up. Expect lots of sound-bites from Clegg, Cameron and Milliband over the coming weeks together with little, if any, follow-through.

[Nice to see a usually-contentious STW topic debated in a sensible manner. I wonder why? Chapeau les mods, peut-etre?)

Surely income tax is a percentage of income, so those with high incomes do already pay more without the need to introduce higher and higher percentage bands?

Adam Smith:

"The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything very unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion."

I want that on a t-shirt Binners 😉

Gone back to a lap top with a touchpad so i end up with bad spelling and random sentence structure based on where I acidently hit the pad.

Incomprehnsible even to me - there may be a punchline there 😉

And once you get to a point where a payslip shows that your overall deductions are heading to 50%,

Overall tax contributions are higher for poor people than they are for rich people.

Binners! Think you'll find thats me "7 fingers and 2 thumbs on each hand"

Surely income tax is a percentage of income, so those with high incomes do already pay more without the need to introduce higher and higher percentage bands

Nice Adam Smith quite ransos, but isn't that point already addressed by tax free allowances on income?

Even if the income tax rate were completely flat, the higher earners would still pay more* income tax (both as an absolute value and as a percentage of income).

*(provided they didn't avoid it somehow, obviously)

they only pay more if you ignore the % part of your % based tax system

No, assuming (big assumption) that they don't somehow avoid paying the tax, the wealthy would pay more income tax as a percentage of income.

[i]Chapeau les mods, peut-etre?[/i]

[img] [/img]

are you doing a flat rate or a flat rate with a threshold?I missed the post and only saw the quote.

The later makes next to no difference unless you use the margins for the very poor and the very rich to make your %. It still remains the case that everyone, who actually pays tax, pays tax at the same rate above the threshold. the % of their income they loose to tax does differ but you would be hard pushed to call a flat rate with threshold as progressive

Its is more a case of where /how you view it but economists[ a right wing bunch presents their opinions as science] term it a progressive system though i personally think that is stretching the point a bit

Nice Adam Smith quite ransos, but isn't that point already addressed by tax free allowances on income?

Even if the income tax rate were completely flat, the higher earners would still pay more* income tax (both as an absolute value and as a percentage of income).

Two things:

1. The personal allowance means that the rate isn't flat. It goes a very small way to addressing Smith's argument, which is that because richer people have far more disposable income (in both absolute and percentage terms) it's not unreasonable for them to pay at a higher rate.

2. For very high earners, the personal allowance is so trivial as to be barely worth calculating as a percentage.

Anyway, focussing on income tax is a diversion - it's the total tax take that matters.

are you doing a flat rate or a flat rate with a threshold?

Neither really - just making the point that I agree the whole argument that the wealthy don't pay enough income tax is a bit misguided and disingenuous.

Assuming they don't dodge it somehow, they do already pay quite a lot.

richer people have far more disposable income (in both absolute and percentage terms) it's not unreasonable for them to pay at a higher rate.

But don't they pay that when they [i]dispose[/i] of that disposable income (e.g. VAT on luxury goods)?

focussing on income tax is a diversion - it's the total tax take that matters.

Agreed.

Shut down the loopholes. Simplify the rules to manage tax avoidance.
Collect more tax based on relative household wealth, not income.

relative household wealth, not income.

Oh no, here we go again....!

Oh, hold on a minute. Something's changed...

😉

The award-winning author of [b]The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time[/b]

Sorry no political pointscoring to add and my graphs are rubbish.

I agree the whole argument that the wealthy don't pay enough income tax is a bit misguided and disingenuous.

Assuming they don't dodge it somehow, they do already pay quite a lot.

Not nearly enough though but I am too the left of [s]you[/s] most people

Shut down the loopholes. Simplify the rules to manage tax avoidance.
Collect more tax based on relative household wealth, not income.

But don't they pay that when they dispose of that disposable income (e.g. VAT on luxury goods)?

As I said earlier, the total tax percentage for rich people is less than the percentage for poor people. There are plenty of VATable items we all use (fuel, clothes) that aren't what you would call luxuries.

Oh no, here we go again....!
Oh, hold on a minute. Something's changed...

Yes, I think we can ALL sensibly agree that overall household wealth is THE ONLY sensible measure of wealth. Can't we? 😉

Ooohh... what's that?.. I can hear someone far, far away (in Edinburgh) screaming at his monitor in impotent rage...

VAT on 'luxury' items? Like hot pasties, or gas? VAT is a shocking tax. One that hits the 'poor' far harder than the 'rich'. Indirect taxation sounds neat when people say 'tax consumption'. It sounds less neat when you realize a 0% taxpayer pays a chunk of income in indirect taxation on daily essentials.

As I said earlier, the total tax percentage for rich people is less than the percentage for poor people.

Hmmm.. any figures or examples for that?

There are plenty of VATable items we all use (fuel, clothes) that aren't what you would call luxuries.

Yep, which is possibly a good reason to make VAT variable depending on the goods/services it is applied to.

It already is to a degree: domestic fuel and energy is reduced rate (5%), food, children's clothes and public transport are zero-rated.

But what constitutes overall household wealth?

Total income + property value + savings + pensions (that are already taxed three times and virtually worthless)?

That approach suggests to me if you've provided for yourself then prepare to be punished for doing so. Its time that people bit the bullet and accepted that both the welfare state and the government employment industry (civil service) need radical surgery as they're unaffordable.

Hmmm.. any figures or examples for that?

Not to hand. Have a look on the ONS website for reports on household income and expenditure.

Yep, which is possibly a good reason to make VAT variable depending on the goods/services it is applied to.

Agreed, but how would such a cut be paid for?

both the welfare state and the government employment industry (civil service) need radical surgery as they're unaffordable.

Its time that people bit the bullet and accepted that both the welfare state and the government employment industry (civil service) need radical surgery as they're unaffordable.

it is perfectly affordable what you mean is politicaly you dont like it

Grahams ggod somethingion here froma quick skim read
Like all of this your politcs and your viepoint matter as much as the actual numbers
Basically the poor pay more but the argument is they also get income from the state from whihc they then pay taxes ; they are net gainers but they do pay a higher % of income on tax than the rich

http://www.ifs.org.uk/publications/4813

take your pick

The government could virtually stop all tax avoidance tomorrow, at a stroke, if there was even the slightest shred of will to do it within Westminster, within any of the parties. Which there isn't

Just heap the burden on the 'little people' instead

But what constitutes overall household wealth?

Combined post-tax income versus number of family members weighted by dependency?
As used here: http://www.ifs.org.uk/wheredoyoufitin/

Agreed, but how would such a cut be paid for?

What cut?

Some essentials are already zero-rated or reduced-rate VAT (fuel, food, kids clothes). You could expand that to other essentials while increasing VAT on non-essential luxury items.

Making it cheaper to live life but more expensive to buy luxuries.

The argument would be over what constitutes a "luxury item" (new car, big telly, some white goods) and what is "essential".

[i]You could expand that to other essentials while increasing VAT on non-essential luxury items.[/i]

It already adds a fifth, how much more do you propose to add - and who decides what is essential? To a Vegan meat is not. To a non-driver (and/or city folk) a car is non-essential.

Heated wing mirrors?

It already adds a fifth, how much more do you propose to add

Whatever is required? I dunno I'm not an economist - just suggesting it as an idea. How does another 5% sound and maybe 10% on extravagant luxuries (caviar, yachts, diamonds, heated wing mirrors)? 😉

who decides what is essential? To a Vegan meat is not. To a non-driver (and/or city folk) a car is non-essential.

Aye, there's the rub.

I think basic food and personal travel certainly come under essential.