Been saying this for a long time myself...

Starmer must introduce wealth tax after Labour wins election, top Blair aide says https://www.theguardian.com/politic...fter-labour-wins-election-top-blair-aide-says

And if its a blairite saying it its not exactly communism/hard-left/loony left economics is it? Economic inequality in a country which is still one of the richest in the world is a disgrace and has been allowed to develop deliberately from Thatcher onwards. Readjustment of taxation would help address calls for growth, would help millions of people and would boost spending. Needs to be sensibly addressed and explained to the public that this needs to happen in some form to boost the economy and help millions who are struggling. No political party will publicly say anything like this however as the fear of being called 'The high tax party' will make sensible debate impossible.

 

The highest rate of income tax was 99% was around the second world war. Then from 1971

In 1971 the top rate of income tax on earned income was cut to 75%. A surcharge of 15% kept the top rate on investment income at 90%. In 1974 the cut was partly reversed and the top rate on earned income was raised to 83%. With the investment income surcharge this raised the top rate on investment income to 98%, the highest permanent rate since the war.[citation needed] This applied to incomes over £20,000 (£263,269 as of 2023).[7]

The Government of Margaret Thatcher, who favoured taxation on consumption, reduced personal income tax rates during the 1980s in favour of indirect taxation.[14] In the first budget after her election victory in 1979, NOTE --: the top rate was reduced from 83% to 60% and the basic rate from 33% to 30%.[15] The basic rate was also cut for three successive budgets – to 29% in the 1986 budget, 27% in 1987 and to 25% in 1988; The top rate of income tax was cut to 40%.[16] The investment income surcharge was abolished in 1985.

Under the government of John Major the basic rate was reduced in stages to 23% by 1997.
ETC.

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I'm not saying return to 98% but how do people on the 50% rate manage on say £500k. Which means an income of. -:

On a £500,000 salary, your take home pay will be £276,032.40 after tax and National Insurance. This equates to £23,002.70 per month and £5,308.32 per week. If you work 5 days per week, this is £1,061.66 per day, or £132.71 per hour at 40 hours per week.

This from 2022
The average under-23 player in the Premier League earns 2.13 million British pounds PER YEAR in basic pay, while 23-29 and 30-plus year old players earn an average of 3.52 and 3.17 million British pounds respectively.9 Dec 2022

Bless their cotton socks. I think the word earn is a massive misuse of the English language. 'Get' would be more appropriate.

Indirect taxation eg Vat affects everyone regardless of income.

There are many btw who would not shirk at paying more and have openly said so. But there are those who hide income. Threaten to move abroad to tax havens etc. Shame on them.

 

Footballs are earning the money though, the money involved in football is insane and they are the ones entertaining us.

 

Just an observation and I understand why you think that as earnings.
It's just a case of your interpretation of earn and mine they obviously differ. Nowt major.
How I see it. Maybe it's a generation thing or just me I don't know.
Eg.imo.
Nurses earn.
Earn is a general term Imo for those who provide a service.
Footballers, entertainers, get paid.

 

Exactly. It's one of the few examples of workers benefitting the most fron their labour.I do think we'd still have plenty of world class footballers if pay was less though!

 

Both parties have promised not to put taxes up (bar energy company windfall taxes and abolishing the VAT exemption for private schools). This is against the backdrop of a record tax burden. It would be a massive wedge issue for any re-election campaign, and might limit Sir Keir to one term.

Beyond that, a wealth tax is not a simple thing to devise because of the complicated ways in which wealth is held. In his excellent book "Follow The Money", Paul Johnson explains that there is already an element of wealth taxation in things such as council tax, stamp duty, IHT and CGT. (See pp. 56-66) He suggests that tackling the inequities and inequalities in those taxes might be a better way to address the fairer taxation of wealth. I'm inclined to agree with him.

 

Suppose that once a week, 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.
And the tenth man (the richest) would pay £59.　
So, that's what they decided to do.

The ten men drank in the bar every week and seemed quite happy with the arrangement until, one day, the owner caused them a little problem. "Since you are all such good customers," he said, "I'm going to reduce the cost of your weekly 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 realized that £20 divided by six is £3.33 but if they subtracted that from everybody's share then not only would the first four men still be drinking for free but the fifth and sixth man would each end up being paid to drink his beer.　

So, the bar owner suggested that it would be fairer to reduce each man's bill by a higher percentage. They decided 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 (a100% saving).
The sixth man now paid £2 instead of £3 (a 33% saving).
The seventh man now paid £5 instead of £7 (a 28% saving).
The eighth man now paid £9 instead of £12 (a 25% saving).
The ninth man now paid £14 instead of £18 (a 22% saving).
And the tenth man now paid £49 instead of £59 (a 16% saving).　
Each of the last six was better off than before with the first four continuing to drink for free.　

But, once outside the bar, the men began to compare their savings. "I only got £1 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 £1 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 only got £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 week 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 to pay for even half of the bill!　

And that, boys and girls, journalists and government ministers, 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 might not show up anymore. In fact, they might start drinking overseas, where the atmosphere is somewhat friendlier

 

Cheerio!

 

This is ******** though, isn't it? For a start a quick Google tells me that you've copied this from an American analogy and just changed dollars to pounds, so who knows the figures are even close to correct (do 40% of people who are drinking age pay no tax? I very much doubt it).

Also this doesn't account for the proportion of income that tax represents. If the tenth man pays £59 out of £2,000,000 he's getting a lot better deal than the 9th man paying £18 out of £100,000.

There's also the concept of diminishing marginal utility of capital.

In short, it's facile to the point of being pointless.

 

That's a stupid analogy @WF3Red . That tenth man has made his riches off the back of the others for a start. And he will have more money than he ever can spend. He won't feel the effect of a tax rise the same as someone who is living more hand to mouth.

 

Odd that the better off people who's kids go to private school are against VAT....

 

Not sure if I made the point well Helen. I sometimes pay what I think is stupid money to be entertained so it's not knocking the profession so to speak. It is what it is.
In my first post re footballers. How many of those u23's. (And I assume rightly or wrongly thats anyone on a professional contract. 18-23.) Actually get to entertain anyone whilst on those salaries. Most end up on peanuts in comparison. When they actually entertain so to speak at a much lower level.
I've been told on many occassion I never earned a penny in my life. (Jokingly of course shurrup Juddy ) As I was an engineer sparky and supposedly sat on my arse doing bugger all all day. . A mate sparky once said in response. "If I'm sat on mi arse that means the jobs running." Lol.
It's only how I interpret the term.

 

The 10th man is wealthy enough to pay for everyone’s drinks and still be wealthy enough not to really notice

 

I'd be quite happy to see the max wage for a footballer reintroduced. The biggest issue is it would have to be sanctioned by the world governing body. Or those at the top of the ladder will ply their trade outside of the uk. Not as I'd be bothered if they did. It'd allow more to come through from the academies.
During the late 60's'/70s British clubs were the dominant force in europe. With very few people from outside of the uk and ireland playing for em.

 

So long as they spend it. If they hoard wealth then it does nothing of benefit.

Is that still true when you account for other factors such as inflation? Aside from that it helped lead to the massive disparity between the rich and poor.

The richer you are the less you need the money.

 

You’re having a laffer

 

I cannot afford to drink