Here comes the tax rises

[papa smurf]

i suspect life expectantcy will go down under labour

[OLD BOY]

One of our friends was absolutely disgusted with Labour for suggesting they will abolish the Winter Fuel Allowance. She said she always puts that money away for her holiday.

[thenry]

Benefit fraud

https://www.report-benefit-fraud.service.gov.uk/details

[Sirius]

I always say that Labour will squeeze you till your pips squeak and then they will squeeze you some more. A mate of mine once said the motto of a Labour MP would be "what's yours is mine but what's mine is my own".

Originally Posted by papa smurf

It's not enough to live on

I assume you joking as it clearly is enough to live on, my daughters would all love to be getting 33K a year.

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by Paul

I assume you joking as it clearly is enough to live on, my daughters would all love to be getting 33K a year.

1. Single person
Are you wondering how much money do you need to live alone in the UK?

You’ll need an estimated monthly expenditure of around £2,242. This includes housing costs, food, utilities, transport, and other everyday expenses. A single person living in the UK should also budget for additional costs such as: Holidays. Entertainment. Trips.

2. Couple
Couples can expect their monthly expenditure to be around £3,900 to cover housing costs, food, utilities, and transport. Most couples also consider leisure activities for a comfortable lifestyle. However if overdone, they may affect financial stability.
https://www.lendingstream.co.uk/blog...0council%20tax.

"Live Comfortably" is not the same as "live on".

[nffc]

Originally Posted by papa smurf

i suspect life expectantcy will go down under labour

Depends how much they blame the Tories for killing all the old people off during Covid, of course...

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Damien

They can grasp it.

This is all confected outrage. When we talk of workers we generally think of people whose income comes from their direct labour. People on salaries or self-employed.

We don't think of people who gain passive income from investments.

No honest person is that confused about this and thinks they're not workers because they own a few thousand pounds worth of shares or they have some savings gaining interest. When we talk of class in this country this divide is now probably the most important one, the answer to the question of if you need to work or not.

There is plenty to criticise about this budget regarding workers, i.e increasing the employers' NI contributions will indirectly tax workers. You can argue Labour never should have made this promise at all and instead should reverse last year's NI cut because it was never budgeted for in the first place. You could also argue that by far the biggest tax increase in tomorrow's budget will be that the tax bands are once again being frozen pushing more people into the higher tax bands despite inflation eroding the values of those salaries. An honest budget would go back to last year's NI rate and tell everyone upfront about the freezing of the bands. The tax burden on the middle-class is already very high so there isn't much scope to increase it beyond those measures anyway.

But instead of those substantive points, we get this disingenuous nonsense. Just liars everywhere arguing fiction between each other. This budget is a tax increase on workers, the last Tory budget was an tax increase on workers, it's needed because the economy has no growth and nobody is confused what workers mean.

This is a great post. Very clear & concise as to the challenge and who should be contributing more. Now compare the vast majority of the posts that followed it to this one:

I am dreading tomorrow, I am pretty certain they will take us from behind with no KY whilst all the time telling us how good it will be for us. I just hope winter is not that bad this year so we don't all freeze to death waiting in the queue for the soup kitchens.

Rest assured they don't give a damn if you do freeze to death they hate old folk

The Islington elite don't care about us real people. Just so long as they get their freebies. All those who voted for "change" should realise that rest of us have been short changed.

i suspect life expectantcy will go down under labour

One of our friends was absolutely disgusted with Labour for suggesting they will abolish the Winter Fuel Allowance. She said she always puts that money away for her holiday.

I always say that Labour will squeeze you till your pips squeak and then they will squeeze you some more. A mate of mine once said the motto of a Labour MP would be "what's yours is mine but what's mine is my own".

I suppose it is Quality not Quantity that counts ...

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by Damien

They can grasp it.

This is all confected outrage. When we talk of workers we generally think of people whose income comes from their direct labour. People on salaries or self-employed.

We don't think of people who gain passive income from investments.

No honest person is that confused about this and thinks they're not workers because they own a few thousand pounds worth of shares or they have some savings gaining interest. When we talk of class in this country this divide is now probably the most important one, the answer to the question of if you need to work or not.

There is plenty to criticise about this budget regarding workers, i.e increasing the employers' NI contributions will indirectly tax workers. You can argue Labour never should have made this promise at all and instead should reverse last year's NI cut because it was never budgeted for in the first place. You could also argue that by far the biggest tax increase in tomorrow's budget will be that the tax bands are once again being frozen pushing more people into the higher tax bands despite inflation eroding the values of those salaries. An honest budget would go back to last year's NI rate and tell everyone upfront about the freezing of the bands. The tax burden on the middle-class is already very high so there isn't much scope to increase it beyond those measures anyway.

But instead of those substantive points, we get this disingenuous nonsense. Just liars everywhere arguing fiction between each other. This budget is a tax increase on workers, the last Tory budget was an tax increase on workers, it's needed because the economy has no growth and nobody is confused what workers mean.

I'm sure I will see an increase in my tax today because my main source of work is a contract that has been placed inside IR35.

There are many that are on contracts like myself who pay employer NI and the apprentice levy as well as employer NI, income tax and for umbrella company services. These people are not all well paid, when all the costs are added up some are on similar wages in their pockets to permanent employees, but it looks like they are going to take a hit.

I have just renewed what was my main contract on terms that are a maximum of 3 days a week, there's just no point working 5 days and the extra I inevitably ended up doing on the weekend. I'm now going to stick rigidly to 2.5/3 days per week.

The problem I have been working on as the engineering lead is costing in excess of £1m every working day until there's a fix in place, and it was on hold for 10 weeks while the civil servants got their act together renewing the contract. They introduced a weeks delay while they attempted to cut my day rate by a small percentage. (I just accepted it because we all want to get on with the job)

It means that making it not worth my while to work a full week by double taxing me with IR35 is going to cost the taxpayer a hell of a lot more every day than the extra tax they collect off me.

[ianch99]

Originally Posted by Escapee

I'm sure I will see an increase in my tax today because my main source of work is a contract that has been placed inside IR35.

There are many that are on contracts like myself who pay employer NI and the apprentice levy as well as employer NI, income tax and for umbrella company services. These people are not all well paid, when all the costs are added up some are on similar wages in their pockets to permanent employees, but it looks like they are going to take a hit.

I have just renewed what was my main contract on terms that are a maximum of 3 days a week, there's just no point working 5 days and the extra I inevitably ended up doing on the weekend. I'm now going to stick rigidly to 2.5/3 days per week.

The problem I have been working on as the engineering lead is costing in excess of £1m every working day until there's a fix in place, and it was on hold for 10 weeks while the civil servants got their act together renewing the contract. They introduced a weeks delay while they attempted to cut my day rate by a small percentage. (I just accepted it because we all want to get on with the job)

It means that making it not worth my while to work a full week by double taxing me with IR35 is going to cost the taxpayer a hell of a lot more every day than the extra tax they collect off me.

In percentage terms, this does not represent the majority of contractors. If they made "similar wages .. to permanent employees", they would not be contractors. They do it because the overall remuneration is better and in most cases, significantly better.

[Escapee]

Originally Posted by ianch99

In percentage terms, this does not represent the majority of contractors. If they made "similar wages .. to permanent employees", they would not be contractors. They do it because the overall remuneration is better and in most cases, significantly better.

It depends on the industry and role, many people enjoy contracting for the flexibility and the challenge. Just like some are happy with zero hours contracts, not all people have the same mindset as those working in the public sector.

Where there are specific specialist skills required for a defined period of time, it would be rather silly and underhanded to employ someone for a period of time and then lay them off when the work is complete.

The left are more concerned about taxing an individual due to jealousy than they are about the value that the individual contributes and saves the tax payer.

Originally Posted by Damien

They can grasp it.

This is all confected outrage. When we talk of workers we generally think of people whose income comes from their direct labour. People on salaries or self-employed.

We don't think of people who gain passive income from investments.

No honest person is that confused about this and thinks they're not workers because they own a few thousand pounds worth of shares or they have some savings gaining interest. When we talk of class in this country this divide is now probably the most important one, the answer to the question of if you need to work or not.

There is plenty to criticise about this budget regarding workers, i.e increasing the employers' NI contributions will indirectly tax workers. You can argue Labour never should have made this promise at all and instead should reverse last year's NI cut because it was never budgeted for in the first place. You could also argue that by far the biggest tax increase in tomorrow's budget will be that the tax bands are once again being frozen pushing more people into the higher tax bands despite inflation eroding the values of those salaries. An honest budget would go back to last year's NI rate and tell everyone upfront about the freezing of the bands. The tax burden on the middle-class is already very high so there isn't much scope to increase it beyond those measures anyway.

But instead of those substantive points, we get this disingenuous nonsense. Just liars everywhere arguing fiction between each other. This budget is a tax increase on workers, the last Tory budget was an tax increase on workers, it's needed because the economy has no growth and nobody is confused what workers mean.

I was wrong about this! They won't extend the freeze beyond the already announced one until 2028.

That's a surprise.

[papa smurf]

Originally Posted by Damien

I was wrong about this! They won't extend the freeze beyond the already announced one until 2028.

That's a surprise.

Don't beat yourself up we all make mistakes now and then

[thenry]

No we don't

You've been told. End of