| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? 22:14 - Jun 26 with 11305 views | Melford |
If you are paying a few quid more every month but things do actually improve a bit in terms of stuff like, NHS, housing, social care etc. then I think It's a fair trade-off. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:02 - Jun 27 with 1860 views | Guthrum |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 23:35 - Jun 26 by redrickstuhaart |
Corporation tax is problematic.
Self employed folk get taxed less than employed folk, if they work their earnings through a company. |
In which case they're not self-employed. They are a waged/salaried employee of a company which they happen to also own and take dividends from.
The genuinely self-employed pay income tax and NI on all the profits of their business with no ring-fenced wage/salary to count as expenses against that profit. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:10 - Jun 27 with 1833 views | Herbivore |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 07:44 - Jun 27 by TractorWood |
At some point we have to point to poor spending and value for money. To think more investment in isolation will solve any material issues is naive imo. |
But part of the problem is that so much has been cut to he bone because of austerity that without a significant injection of funding, inefficiency and waste will continue. The country has basically been operating a macroeconomic version of Terry Pratchett's boots theory since 2010: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boots_theory?wprov=sfla1
It's easy to say we need to be more efficient and not waste money but pretty much every public service has been massively stripped back over the last 14 years and they are essentially fire fighting and having to spend vast sums to address various crises that wouldn't occur in an effective and well functioning system. That's not to say there aren't areas of waste but things are so bad right now that we aren't going to be saving billions of pounds through efficiencies without first investing in making sure public and civil services are adequately resourced and fit for purpose. [Post edited 27 Jun 2024 8:14]
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:13 - Jun 27 with 1822 views | Guthrum |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 22:46 - Jun 26 by BlueForYou |
Don’t you think we pay enough already? Aren’t we paying more tax than ever before at present? |
What is the actual metric for this claim that we're "paying more tax than ever before"?
If purely on national tax take, that is just a reflection of massive inflation and consequent earnings increases over recent decades.
If the number of people in higher tax brackets, that is a matter of salary inflation having shifted faster than thresholds.
Basic rates of tax and NI have come down. Personal allowances have gone up. That has reduced the burden not only on those earning under £50k, but also a significant portion of the income of those with higher salaries than that. | |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:14 - Jun 27 with 1823 views | tcblue |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:01 - Jun 27 by DanTheMan |
Yes, although I look at my wife and her tax rate once she becomes qualified will be insane. People don't take into account that the newer student loans have just become another sneaky tax, especially given the likelihood of being actually able to pay it off. |
There's a few 20 something bright young things at my work. All grads, all with at least £70K student debt. All of whom are unable to afford to pay off any capital as the interest rate are around EIGHT PERCENT.
It's outrageous. |  | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:15 - Jun 27 with 1816 views | Leaky |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:02 - Jun 27 by Guthrum |
In which case they're not self-employed. They are a waged/salaried employee of a company which they happen to also own and take dividends from.
The genuinely self-employed pay income tax and NI on all the profits of their business with no ring-fenced wage/salary to count as expenses against that profit. |
Plus when they retire, their state pension is lower than someone whom has been employed |  | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:23 - Jun 27 with 1806 views | Churchman |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 07:40 - Jun 27 by nodge_blue |
I don’t mind high taxes as long as they get spent well and we see an improvement in public services.i think I’m right in saying that right now, when you take tax as a whole, income tax, ni, vat, capital gains and council that it’s already at an all time high.
Some of the solutions have to be found in efficiency and procurement. |
I don’t disagree with you, especially when it comes to procurement. Efficiency? Yes, that too but it’s a catch all word that picks up the Tory principle that there is nothing in government that cannot be done cheaper, quicker and more efficiently by the private sector (that utter turd Francis Maude).
This isn’t always true. Having worked both sides of the fence I know generalisations like that are not right.
It comes down to what you want and what you expect. For example, what I saw in my time in the CS was things like training cut to make efficiency savings. How without training can people work efficiently? They can’t. The CS that I saw doesn’t train people in management. You can gain your tax professional qualifications, get promoted to a high grade and automatically you might wind up with 50 staff. No training. How can that be efficient?
Army numbers will be reduced this year from over 70k to 62k. That’s efficient. An 8% saving. Whoopee! Shame you don’t have an army any more. The two aircraft carriers: I’m told the government meddled with the spec so much to save money when they were building them, they are little more than junk with a propensity to catch fire. Cost efficient? Nope.
If you want the biggest blocker of all to efficiency try Brexit. Instead of allowing goods to flow both ways, add a tier of paperwork, people and facilities to cope with our third country status. Johnson wanted CS numbers reduced to pre 2016. They would be at 2016 if his mob hadn’t imposed Brexit with all its consequences.
If you want to find solutions in efficiency (which we should), I believe you have to understand what you are doing, who you have etc and probably invest money first to realise savings/benefits later. It’s counter intuitive. For sure pursuing the Tory madness of politically driven blanket austerity will make things worse, not better. |  | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:26 - Jun 27 with 1807 views | Herbivore |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:14 - Jun 27 by tcblue |
There's a few 20 something bright young things at my work. All grads, all with at least £70K student debt. All of whom are unable to afford to pay off any capital as the interest rate are around EIGHT PERCENT.
It's outrageous. |
The whole model of HE funding is completely broken. Tuition fees were raised to £9250 a year to better reflect the 'true' cost of university courses and to effectively shift the burden of funding HE on to students. However, even at the time the fees didn't fully reflect the true cost of putting a student through a degree and fees have been frozen at that level ever since. With inflation running wild, universities make big losses per home student under the current funding model. That means that both students and universities are being financially crippled by the government's decisions around how HE should be funded.
Universities have survived through recruiting overseas students to supplement home students, but that has now become a political football too and overseas applications this year have fallen off a cliff due to the ban on dependents joining students on a student visa and the generally unfriendly environment that's been created by the government. As a result, numerous universities - including some very big ones - are barely solvent and some will start going bust soon.
So effectively we're saddling young people with ridiculous levels of debt, serviced at eye watering interest rates, that most will never pay off, all to keep HE chronically underfunded and on its knees. This is a political choice from the Tories, Scotland has a very different model. This is just another in a long line of examples of how utterly sh!t the Tories are and how incapable they are of making decisions that improve rather than damage and impoverish the country whose interests they are meant to serve. | |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:38 - Jun 27 with 1796 views | chicoazul |
Our elite political class have spent the past 20 years proving beyond any doubt that they are incompetent and running the country into the ground, and many TWTDers want to give them even more of their money rather than keeping it for themselves. I will never understand this. What do you think will change or improve? |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:39 - Jun 27 with 1791 views | chicoazul |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 22:49 - Jun 26 by NthQldITFC |
No, you're a caring human being, a part of a society, a friend to people who need a little more help than you do, who might well one day help you when you need it.
We're all in this together. |
Tax is not a moral issue. | |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:42 - Jun 27 with 1788 views | Herbivore |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:38 - Jun 27 by chicoazul |
Our elite political class have spent the past 20 years proving beyond any doubt that they are incompetent and running the country into the ground, and many TWTDers want to give them even more of their money rather than keeping it for themselves. I will never understand this. What do you think will change or improve? |
We have an election on the 4th of July. | |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:47 - Jun 27 with 1779 views | WestStanderLaLaLa |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:38 - Jun 27 by chicoazul |
Our elite political class have spent the past 20 years proving beyond any doubt that they are incompetent and running the country into the ground, and many TWTDers want to give them even more of their money rather than keeping it for themselves. I will never understand this. What do you think will change or improve? |
I dunno, not to watch a loved one on a trolley for 18 hours before getting on a ward? |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:56 - Jun 27 with 1767 views | Pinewoodblue |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 06:57 - Jun 27 by Churchman |
Not naive at all. Just society minded as opposed to the ‘look after number one’ principle the Tories hold so dear. My basic un costed stab would be broadly to do a few things.
1. Increase the tax threshold to £15,000.
2. Increase Income Tax by 2% across the board. That’d mean to somebody earning £45k an increase of £50pm. If you have to tax people, which you of course do if you want public services, progressive income tax is the fairest way of doing it. Those who have the most pay more.
3. I’d employ numbers of tax inspectors to pre Austerity levels and go after those who avoid tax. Why should the wealthiest pay on average 10% when everyone else pays 20%, 40% etc?
I’d also enlarge the teams that go after criminals by taking their assets off them. This is literally 10s of £ millions, but the tories deemed serious crime as not a government priority (CS headcount cut has been no 1 priority) so the teams have been disbanded/cut to the bone.
What I wouldn’t do is a Denis Healey and go mad on high rate tax percentages. While morally it sits ok with me it doesn’t bring any money in. I’d also stop raiding pensions. In the long term it’s self defeating.
Just a few basic thoughts. It’s the Treasury/HMRCs job, when the government allows, to work out what works what doesn’t. It’s where Truss and her fellow idiot went wrong.
There’s much I’d like to see done in terms of how money is managed from the top down and much more besides.
I’m rambling on, but the basic principle applies: if you want public services, you have to pay for them. If you have too much money to care about such things, you still live in this society, will still expect the fire brigade to turn up if your mansion catches fire so you pay. |
Agree with most of that. Would bring back the lower tax band, know it’s a gimmick but it is a vote winner. Would also introduce additional tax band between standard & higher.
What really matter is that all tax due is paid and then spent wisely. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:57 - Jun 27 with 1761 views | Ryorry |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 06:57 - Jun 27 by Churchman |
Not naive at all. Just society minded as opposed to the ‘look after number one’ principle the Tories hold so dear. My basic un costed stab would be broadly to do a few things.
1. Increase the tax threshold to £15,000.
2. Increase Income Tax by 2% across the board. That’d mean to somebody earning £45k an increase of £50pm. If you have to tax people, which you of course do if you want public services, progressive income tax is the fairest way of doing it. Those who have the most pay more.
3. I’d employ numbers of tax inspectors to pre Austerity levels and go after those who avoid tax. Why should the wealthiest pay on average 10% when everyone else pays 20%, 40% etc?
I’d also enlarge the teams that go after criminals by taking their assets off them. This is literally 10s of £ millions, but the tories deemed serious crime as not a government priority (CS headcount cut has been no 1 priority) so the teams have been disbanded/cut to the bone.
What I wouldn’t do is a Denis Healey and go mad on high rate tax percentages. While morally it sits ok with me it doesn’t bring any money in. I’d also stop raiding pensions. In the long term it’s self defeating.
Just a few basic thoughts. It’s the Treasury/HMRCs job, when the government allows, to work out what works what doesn’t. It’s where Truss and her fellow idiot went wrong.
There’s much I’d like to see done in terms of how money is managed from the top down and much more besides.
I’m rambling on, but the basic principle applies: if you want public services, you have to pay for them. If you have too much money to care about such things, you still live in this society, will still expect the fire brigade to turn up if your mansion catches fire so you pay. |
Churchman for Chancellor! |  |
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| The new lot are gonna…. on 09:00 - Jun 27 with 1750 views | Bloots |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:38 - Jun 27 by chicoazul |
Our elite political class have spent the past 20 years proving beyond any doubt that they are incompetent and running the country into the ground, and many TWTDers want to give them even more of their money rather than keeping it for themselves. I will never understand this. What do you think will change or improve? |
….come in and change everything.
They are gonna be different.
You watch!
Honest. |  |
| "The sooner he comes back the better, this place has been a disaster without him" - TWTD User (July 2025) |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:02 - Jun 27 with 1747 views | Churchman |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:38 - Jun 27 by chicoazul |
Our elite political class have spent the past 20 years proving beyond any doubt that they are incompetent and running the country into the ground, and many TWTDers want to give them even more of their money rather than keeping it for themselves. I will never understand this. What do you think will change or improve? |
Running the country into the ground on the basis that if you want literally anything, you pay for it. The pre-Victorian way of doing things. That was a political choice. They set about dismantling the social structure of this country because they didn’t care and thought it unimportant.
I do not want to ‘give them more money’. What I want is more money spent rebuilding this country and provide what I think are the basic necessities of a civilised country. A welfare state that’s properly funded (and run properly), properly funded non political education at all levels in all its forms, defence internally (a decent police force and justice system that isn’t broken through budget cuts and external defence against animals like Putin (3% GDP).
Is this too much to ask or at least strive for? First order of business - sweep out the scum that have done nothing but harm for fourteen years. | | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:05 - Jun 27 with 1739 views | itfcjoe |
The problem currently is there has been a total breakdown of trust in the social contract - we pay our taxes and the state provides us with a decent level of public services. Safe streets, good schools, health and dental care as and when we need it, etc
So really it needs to work the other way, the Govt needs to show that they can offer us better services that are worth paying for before taking the money from us to do so - bit of a catch 22 |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:08 - Jun 27 with 1732 views | Prominent_Blue |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 22:15 - Jun 26 by cressi |
I actually agree. |
If we had a good look at people on benefits and the circa 2.5m off work due to long term illness and weeded out the lay abouts and get them back to work that would raise quite a bit more tax !! Also how about the NHS has a proper shake up and gets rid of tiers of wasted management and diversity posts to actually negate the horrendous amount we have to pay in to prop it up.... | | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:10 - Jun 27 with 1720 views | nodge_blue |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 08:13 - Jun 27 by Guthrum |
What is the actual metric for this claim that we're "paying more tax than ever before"?
If purely on national tax take, that is just a reflection of massive inflation and consequent earnings increases over recent decades.
If the number of people in higher tax brackets, that is a matter of salary inflation having shifted faster than thresholds.
Basic rates of tax and NI have come down. Personal allowances have gone up. That has reduced the burden not only on those earning under £50k, but also a significant portion of the income of those with higher salaries than that. |
https://obr.uk/box/the-uks-tax-burden-in-historical-and-international-context/
Interestingly the graph in there shows other G7 countries still paying more. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:17 - Jun 27 with 1702 views | OldFart71 |
Taxes don't need to go up. They are already at a high equal to the 1950's. What needs to happen, but never does is Governmental waste. We have basically had 14 years of austerity with the Tories in power. Whether due to the previous Labour government I don't know as each blames each over for the state of the economy. But there's no doubt vat waste took place during the pandemic as seen by 1.4 billion of PPE destroyed. As we know various individuals made vast sums of money from this. The NHS has too many people either in charge or tied up with paperwork, same with the police. The legal system ties things in knots where every i needs dotting and every T crossing. All these various tribunals looking into what went wrong with things like the Postmaster/Mistress and Covid costing millions, telling us things we already know. Yet many of these Postmasters/Mistresses have waited 5 years and are still not paid. Councils where potholes aren't filled in, but they are paying out millions for claims and even when they are repaired less than a year later they need repairing again. Who oversees the quality ? No, no need for tax increases. Sort out waste. | | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:25 - Jun 27 with 1677 views | BloomBlue |
Which particular tax are you referencing?
When the Gov went down the road of increasing NI to specifically fund the NHS it came under attack from all sides, not to introduce it.
We also need to simplify tax, why do we have Invome, NI VAT and numerous other taxes. For example why do we even allow trusts, all I've heard for years is create a trust and avoid tax.
I don't know Jamie Dimon*, CEO of Chase bank but a couple of weeks ago he was talking on BBC world while he was in India. He was talking about tax and praising India for their simple tax laws, he made the point European countries have so many tax laws that it ultimately allows people to legally put money into areas that heavily reduces the tax they pay without breaking the law.
While I know he was talking Europe in general and not UK specifically, Keep it simple, reduce the various options.
*I don't think he was championing tax, it was more about the fact they have to invest in huge amounts of resources to make sure investors in Europe aren't avoiding taxes. But the principle was the entire tax system is so complex it's open to avoiding tax. |  | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:27 - Jun 27 with 1675 views | textbackup |
Yep, happily pay a bit more to make things work better…
But I don’t want my taxes to go up to pay for things or people to have a free life. If that’s me a bad person, then so be it. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:27 - Jun 27 with 1672 views | Cheltenham_Blue |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 22:46 - Jun 26 by BlueForYou |
Don’t you think we pay enough already? Aren’t we paying more tax than ever before at present? |
But it clearly isn't covering the cracks, or the potholes is it? |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:28 - Jun 27 with 1666 views | Churchman |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:08 - Jun 27 by Prominent_Blue |
If we had a good look at people on benefits and the circa 2.5m off work due to long term illness and weeded out the lay abouts and get them back to work that would raise quite a bit more tax !! Also how about the NHS has a proper shake up and gets rid of tiers of wasted management and diversity posts to actually negate the horrendous amount we have to pay in to prop it up.... |
Re those on benefits, who are they? Why are they on benefits? Any of them in genuine need? Are the all making a lifestyle choice? I’ve no problem encouraging people to work, but before a blanket label is put on that 2.5m we need to know what they are and why they are not working.
NHS? Yes, it probably needs running better but not having worked in it or understand how it works and is structured, I couldn’t comment on the who or the how. You clearly have better knowledge so I’d be interested in your thoughts. As an aside, I do know NHS England has a poor reputation and there were thoughts about dismantling it more than five years ago (I worked with one or two ex NHS England people for a short while).
I guess what I’m trying to do is avoid the lazy Telegraph/Mail rhetoric line on this. | | | |
| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:32 - Jun 27 with 1659 views | JammyDodgerrr |
I don't mind paying more per month but struggle to accept it when Personal Allowances have been frozen for so long, and will continue to be - combined with the massive wage hikes at the lower levels, we are going to be pulling more people into paying tax than I would assume, ever before.
I wouldn't paying more right now if they said that in two years the allowance would jump to 15k, for example. |  |
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| Am I naive and stupid to not mind if taxes do go up a bit? on 09:40 - Jun 27 with 1626 views | Blueschev |
The Tories attack line on Labour raising tax should they win seems a really weak approach. Everyone can look around and see that public services are falling apart, and most likely share the same opinion as you that they would pay a little more to see an improvement. |  | | |
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