Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

You can sit and make up "what if's" until the cows come home, fact is they are in the minority. For the majority, this change will not be an issue. Ive never understood why everyone got CB regardless of their income.

Hell, I wish I was earning enough in the first place to be affected by this !

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

But why should a couple, who earn nearly ninety-thousand pounds a year, be treated better than those who earn less? I can see self-employed people fiddling their incomes to balance their earnings more equally, with their partners, to make sure that neither of them earn more than the high rate threshold. It will remove incentives for people to earn higher incomes, reducing potential growth in the economy and lowering tax revenues. If a self-employed person has earned forty-three thousand pounds by March, he is not going to want to earn anymore, becasue he will lose his child benefit. How will they manage self-employed people? Typically, their incomes are not calculated until the end of the tax year. If the previous year they earned less than the higher rate threshold, will they have to repay the child benefit for that year? If they can't repay it, will they be sent to prison?

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Just scrap kids...then no issue. :D

I am then hoping that the apes manage to take over the world

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

This is not a question about whether the state support the children of those who earn a middle income, this is about those who earn less, paying more than those who earn a high income. Then Boy George still has the audacity to continue to quote bad Disney teen movies.

As for your comment about affording children, that is a bit silly and a very stale cliché isn't it.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

I think it is about whether the state should support the children of higher earners, and I think the answer is 'no'. You can argue over what you consider high earners, but the principle seems sound to me.


No it's not. Why do you think it is? In fact, I think there is a case to be made for abolishing child benefits after the second child.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Great, so you're going to completely ignore Ignition's point about the structural deficit by simply re-stating your position.

Way to advance a discussion. Not.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Okay then, why don't they go after those who earn a higher joint income, rather than those who earn a modest single income?

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Because the purpose of the exercise is to cut the structural deficit, not usher in a new age of wealth redistribution.

The moment you go beyond a basic check on whether there's a higher-rate taxpayer in the household, you're in to means-testing territory. Means testing processes do not save money, they cost money.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

I'm guessing it's because 1. It is cheaper to administer and 2. In reality there won't be that many with 'a modest income', as many families where one of the partner earns over £44k will be on dual incomes as well.

As said earlier, the measure is crude, but it's crudeness makes it cheap, and the general purpose of the measure is in the right direction. On balance therefore, I think this is a good move.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

I should add that, until my recent spell of unemployment, I was earning enough to have been caught by this new measure, and as a single earner with my wife looking after then children as a full time mum.

However we used to look at our bank statement monthly and boggle at the amount being paid to us for the simple fact that we decided to have three kids. The money was nice to have, but we certainly didn't need it.

I aspire, in my new life as a self-employed person, to get back to that level of income, and I will not resent the removal of child benefit when I do.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Do you have any statistics to back that up?

It can't be much more expensive than the one they are going to use to identify those who pay tax at a higher rate.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

Do you have any statistics to back that up?

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

I would speculate that the Chancellor, along with the DWP, have a better idea of the costs of these things than yourself.

This is far more controversial if you fancy a go at it.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

No I don't, but it makes more sense than, many families where one of the partner earns over £44k will be on dual incomes as well. Besides, such information it is not so much statistical, as it is practical.

Re: Child Benefit Scrapped For Higher Rate Tax Payers From 2013
 

No I don't. You seem quite keen on quoting a family with two people earning £40k each though. How many of those are around?