A wealth tax on the value of property is a bad idea

67 Responses

1. 1

   25/09/2012, NeutronWarp9 wrote

   Sadly, it is not PC to use the word Eskimo anymore - it's Inuit.
   We all know adding a further tax to the existing array of taxes is just another way of obtaining revenue. Does road tax go simply towards the upkeep of our roads? No. The whole system is a farce.
   Perhaps it would be easier to use a super computer or two to tax everything and simply allocate every citizen an allowance?
   To argue wealth redistribution has its limits would be fine if the process had actually started in any meaningful sense, but to criticise this new tax, albeit an inevitably imperfect one, as 'unfair' seems to be a weak argument.
   Obviously, the rich will cry wolf long before they feel any pain and the alternative is the hoi polloi get miffed and take it off them.
   

2. 2

   25/09/2012, Agnostic wrote

   Perhaps the best wealth tax would be an inheritance tax which has less exclusions and avoidances. At the moment, forestry and agricultural land attracts an exemption from IHT, so landed families don't pay IHT. This also attracts city investors seeking to limit IHT exposure, pushing up land prices. On top of that agricultural subsidies give welfare benefits to some of the richest people in the UK. Stop it!

3. 3

   25/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

   Most of the wealthiest make and keep their wealth due to a corrupt 'playing field'; the same 'playing field' which makes it harder for others to make and keep wealth.
   
   In the absence of either:
   a) extensive levelling of the 'playing field' or
   b) tremendous feedback of mostly ill-gotten gains of the wealthiest into society
   the Middle Classes are, in my view, doomed.
   
   Do nothing drastic to change the status quo ... well, don't say I didn't warn you.
   
   

4. 4

   25/09/2012, Boris Macdonut wrote

   #3 Rick.You are correct. Merryn is very wrong. Stamp duty is not a wealth tax.It is a tax on the fidgetty who move house a lot.
   ~1Neutron. Eskoimo is the correct term term for those asiatic types who live near the North Pole. They include Aleut, Yipuk an indeed Inuit peoples. Using the term Inuit is as wrong as calling The Netherlands , Holland. But then, accuracy was never one of your strong points.

5. 5

   25/09/2012, dr ray wrote

   The other problem with a wealth tax was pointed out by Jeremy Warner yesterday.
   Many ordinary wage earners accumulate wealth during their working lives largely as property and pension and then run it down during retirement.
   A wealth tax would therefore simply tax people who are older and had taken care to provide for their retirement.
   To me this is the best argument for not declaring income and savings I could have come up with.

6. 6

   25/09/2012, dr ray wrote

   Al Rick @#3
   
   As I read it you seem to be supporting the idea of a wealth tax but want to protect the middle class. The little detail released on the wealth tax indicates it will be levied on the 10% highest earners (presumably since earnings are easier to measure than assets) This equates to a new tax on people with an income of 50K pa. Hardly the super rich is it. More like an extension of the middle rate tax band.

7. 7

   25/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

   @ 4. Boris
   
   It's that long since we agreed on something that I'd forgotten what we did agree on, until now.
   
   Stamp Duty would be nearer to being a wealth tax if integral %age threshholds were inserted at every £0.125m from 1% @ £0.125m through 2% @ £0.250m through 10% @ £1.125m through 17% @ £2m, etc,etc ... The fact that they don't, in consideration of the corrupted 'playing field', illustrates an example of THE corrupted 'playing field'.
   
   The same type of corruption goes for Council Taxes, Inheritance Tax, etc.
   
   How about introducing several extra Bands to the Council Tax (in much the same way as my suggestion for Stamp Duty) and appropriately reducing subsidies from Central Govt to Local Govt?

8. 8

   25/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

   @ 6. dr ray
   
   I have no reason to dispute any of what you say. My idea of 'wealthy' may well coincide with yours.
   
   I don't make the rules!

9. 9

   25/09/2012, Boris MacDonut wrote

   #7 Rick. Excellent idea, especially the council tax which is annually recurring. The Stamp duty one means 100% at £12million and dear old Nick Ross's purcahser would face a levy at 300%. That would concentrate a few foreign billionaire's minds as to whether they really wanted to shelter ill gotten gains in prime London.

10. 10

    25/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    Boris, with any luck it would trigger a HP crash!!
    
    
    dr ray
    
    I should have added that if the proposed new wealth tax comes to pass it will be another nail in the coffin of the Middle Classes; the really wealthy will probably escape relatively unscathed, by design of course! Rotten to the core.

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    25/09/2012, Roberto Birquet wrote

    I find I agree with half what Merryn writes. This is the other half. First, it is unfair to insist that any tax would be on top of others. A little lazy, frankly. You have to compare taxes.
    MSW:
    In the FT today, Janan Ganesh claimed that a wealth tax on property would be "a correction of the vast and unequal accumulations of wealth left behind by a rigged housing market". But once you start down that road where do you end?
    
    That's not the point. Ganesh is right. UK FTBs pay taxes to keep banks alive and, by extension of govt bank policy, to keep house prices high so that they can't afford them. It's sick. Think of those taxpayers, and not the wealthy who did not earn that wealth. We should use property/land taxes to first cut VAT: to give consumer economy a boost, and when economy gets back (it will, no idea when); then to replace some income tax and employer NI contributions. Stop taxing wealth creation (ie work).

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    26/09/2012, Dream Jeanie wrote

    I've always seen stamp duty as akin to VAT - and been grateful that it's not 17.5%, as I see no logic to why sanitary protection should be subject to VAT (it's not like women have the option of renting it) and houses shouldn't. It's clearly not a wealth tax, as it's perfectly possible to hold wealth and avoid it, or to be pretty poor, but to have to move lots and pay a lot of it.

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    26/09/2012, Mark Wadsworth wrote

    As Jeremy Warner also said yesterday, the bit which the Home-Owner-Ists miss out:
    
    "Taxing land value, in other words, is the equivalent of taxing an economic rent – it does not discourage any socially desirable form of wealth creation. Moreover, in a world where both income and capital are increasingly mobile, there are obvious advantages in taxing the physical; it is less easily avoided.
    
    So in an ideal world, you might indeed want to tax land more, while reducing income and other forms of capital taxes to compensate. Yet I’m quite sure that’s not what the Liberal Democrats have in mind."

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    26/09/2012, Mark Wadsworth wrote

    cont.
    
    Let's just replace Council Tax, IHT, SDLT, CGT, IPT and the TV licence fee with a flat land value tax (this would work out at about 1% per annum on the current value of a house - so for ninety per cent of households, it would be much the same as their current council tax bill).
    
    It amazes me that a flat tax on incomes is seen as loony right wing (it's a good idea) but a flat tax on land values is derided as loony left (it's also a good idea). Whence this myth that earned income is a more suitable subject for taxation than collecting or enjoying location rent/values?

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    26/09/2012, Dream Jeanie wrote

    On the subject of revenue raising, yes, that's what taxes are for. Governments need revenues to offer things like the NHS, schools, the police, child benefit, street-lighting, libraries, pensions or care for the elderly (to name but a few). If we are happy to have fewer of those benefits, government won't need to raise as much revenue.
    
    In a democracy, we get to vote for the party whose views are the closest to our own in terms of where taxes should be raised and what the revenue raised should be spent on.
    
    However, I do get the impression most people don't vote or think like that, as so many people seem to see a complete disconnect between the payment of taxes and the money government has available to spend. It's almost like they think all taxes raised go to politicians personally & that the services government provides are as free to provide as they are at the point of need.
    
    The UK (or any country) could tax and spend radically differently if its citizens wanted it to.

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    26/09/2012, dr ray wrote

    This "bash-the-rich" narrative is now becoming farcial.
    I heard someone on the radio this morning saying it was crazy to give Alan Sugar a free bus pass. This is being used as justification to end universal benefits (?NHS, ?state pension) on the rich. In practice of course I doubt Alan Sugar uses the bus very much but the elderly do use the NHS so making anyone with say more than 16K in savings (which is the threshold for means tested benefit) pay for medical care would be very worthwhile.
    Be careful what you wish for

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    26/09/2012, Mark Wadsworth wrote

    Dream Jenie: "many people seem to see a complete disconnect between the payment of taxes and the money government has available to spend. It's almost like they think all taxes raised go to politicians personally & that the services government provides are as free to provide as they are at the point of need."
    
    Exactly, this is at its most extreme with pensioners, who wail about paying on average £6,000 tax per household each year, but receive about three times that much in terms of pensions, free NHS and other subsidies (mainly on housing).
    
    Who do they think is paying the difference?

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    26/09/2012, dr ray wrote

    Hot off the press. Alan Sugar confirms he does not have a bus pass. Economy saved.
    
    "Lord Sugar hit back at Mr Clegg’s remarks. The Labour peer said: “The twit Nick Clegg moaning about me having a bus pass. Idiot, I don’t have one.”
    
    Telegraph today

19. 19

    26/09/2012, max wrote

    Merryn makes the assumption that the super rich ACTUALLY pay any of these taxes. Mostly they DON'T.
    I prefer the idea that our land and property is not available to be purchased by foreigners and neither is it available for BTL schemers.
    That will tell you the real value of our properties for use by the RESIDENTS of this island (be they british or not).
    
    @Critic Al Rick - you make some good points. The middle class are doomed. They even write articles dooming themselves in moneyweek and Daily Telegraph all the time.

20. 20

    26/09/2012, robin wrote

    I say we get rid of income tax entirely. We should get rid of any form of tax that dampens economic activity. Get rid fo stamp duty too.
    
    Then introduce 100% IHT. What exactly is the rational that children should inherit wealth from their parents?
    
    It should be easy to make a fortune by contributing to the economy. It should not be easy to automatically inherit a role in society to which you are not qualified.

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    26/09/2012, A London wrote

    In an Islamic state there is only 1 flat tax which is a 2.5% wealth tax on net assets (excluding your main home). Assuming total UK surplus wealth is worth £4 trillion, this will generate £100bn in revenues for the poor.
    
    Lets also do away with housing benefits, etc to bring the property market back into equilibrium.
    
    This will do away with any tax avoidence, halve the HMRC payroll count and eliminate the 100,000 pen pushers (tax advisors) and make the economy super-efficient overall.

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    26/09/2012, A London wrote

    Prisionor's should also repay Her Majesty's cost of housing them when they exit prison (as used to happen 100+ yrs ag0).

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    26/09/2012, A London wrote

    ..sorry my error, UK personal wealth is over £10 trillion, plus add non-personal wealth to that

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    26/09/2012, dr ray wrote

    @A London
    I don't think your example is particularly illuminating. In most Islamic states the major part of the population is bare-ar5ed poor and the rest have their wealth overseas. For the oil states government revenues come from oil exports not taxation. Most of the Islamic contries also have very different demography to the UK with many more young people.

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    26/09/2012, Roberto Birquet wrote

    Mark
    It amazes me that a flat tax on incomes is seen as loony right wing (it's a good idea) but a flat tax on land values is derided as loony left (it's also a good idea).
    --------------------
    The lower paid have to spend around the first £15,000 nett in order to stay alive: rent or mortgage, bills, food, transport to work etc. If they have kids, it's even more.
    
    So any flat tax on incomes would hurt lower paid more, unless at least you pushed the threshold for paying tax much much higher. Also, as more money is made from money, and with the classical, if initially Marxian, definition of capital: self-expanding money, then the richer will earn a lot more because they can spare capital. This is among the major reasons that the rich get richer, while poor and middle classes do not, unless they were fortunate enough to get a mortgage before 2001, and have had bancks and govt (and taxpayer) guarding them since 2007.
    

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    26/09/2012, Roberto Birquet wrote

    Even Adam Smith dismissed the idea of a flat income tax based on ability to pay. Among the certain aspects of Adam Smith, many of his so-called (eg, workers and technology are the wealth creators, not entrpreneurs or the wealthy) acolytes often forget. But a well-designed wealth tax would mean incentives for wealth creation rather than accumulation.
    
    Beyond our politicians.

27. 27

    26/09/2012, Baxter Basics wrote

    I can't understand why there isn't an additional tax solely eligible for those earning over, say, about £60,000 p.a., levied upon porn channel rental, rent-boy rental, second home allowances, Westminster office refurbishments, duck-pond refurbishments and the like. It's almost like the typical purchasers of such fripperies are somehow excluded from the steely gaze of the inland revenue. Can any sage here possibly come up with an explanation for this curiously exempt class of individual?

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    26/09/2012, Mark Wadsworth wrote

    Roberto: "any flat tax on incomes would hurt lower paid more"
    
    We can make the effective rate progressive with a Citizen's Income or Personal allowance (which can apply to income tax or land value tax, of course).
    
    For example, let's say a median earner in £150,000 home pays £1,500 council tax (1% of house value) and (say) £5,000 PAYE on his £25,000 salary (average 20%).
    
    A high earner in £1 million house pays £2,500 council tax (0.25% of house value) and (say) £90,000 PAYE on his £200,000 salary (average 45% or so).
    
    What's so terrible about making everybody pay X% PAYE on his earnings and Y% of the value of his house such that our median and higher earners still pay much the same in total, juggling the personal allowance to suit so that lower earners pay net nothing anyway?
    Don't muddle things up with the personal allowance, that is of course very important but is an add-on from a maths point of view and overlaps with the welfare system anyway.

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    26/09/2012, Boris Macdonut wrote

    #16, 18 &24 .I have to say I agree with drray. Cleggs idea to deny bus passes to people who never use buses is ridiculous. It won't effect the revenues of the bus companies or save anything other than a bit of admin.
    As for a flat tax of 2.5% in Islamic countries. Do they manage to provide free education ,healthcare, roads and pensions on that pittance?
    #28 Mark the system is not about neat maths. It is about fairness and helping the needy. In your example the tax on £25k is £3,400. The tax on £200k is £75,000.

30. 30

    26/09/2012, Bob wrote

    As someone who has just bought my family home (yes, I am the lucky one), I wouldn't have a major issue with paying a land value tax based on the added value of new community services boosting my property price, but this could only be payable on the sale of my property...
    An annual tax - forget it... I don't have the cash... and the reason is, I've just given 9% (by my calculations) of my wealth in Stamp duty... !!!
    

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    26/09/2012, Mark Wadsworth wrote

    Boris, I'm all in favour of helping the needy. So how about abolishing VAT and NIC which destroy business and create unemployment (thus increasing the number of 'needy' people) and replacing the whole thing with a flat income tax (no more than 20%) and a fairly high LVT - and using the proceeds to fund a decent Citizen's Income or Citizen's pension for all!
    
    For sure, Poor Widows In Mansions may have to downsize, but where are they happier? In a multi-million pound Chelsea Mews on pensions credit of £130 a week, or in a nice two-bed flat with a Citizen's Pension of £200 per week?

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    26/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    @ 15. Dream Jeanie
    
    You say:
    
    1) "... many people seem to see a complete disconnect between the payment of taxes and the money government has available to spend"
    
    2) "In a democracy, we get to vote for the party whose views are the closest to our own ..."
    
    Well, as I see things:
    
    a) In this so-called democracy we get to vote for a choice between different sets of puppets whose strings are pulled by Parasites (rich, poor and intermediate).
    
    b) As far as the non-Parasites (the useful and self-supporting) are concerned it doesn't make a great deal of difference whichever set of puppets is in power; they're equally treacherous.
    
    c) There is a complete disconnect between what a democratic govt should be doing (representing the long term interests of the majority) and what it is doing (raping the useful and self-supporting whilst fostering a load of Parasites whilst 'feathering its own nest'.
    
    

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    27/09/2012, Boris MacDonut wrote

    #31 Mark. I am with you as regards abolishing Employer's Nics. An insidious and bad tax. I would not like to see VAT abolished, but severly reduced to say 10% with no exemptions.
    Land Value Tax is an excellent idea that faces too many vested interests, currently protected by he who doesn't know his Latin(stand up Eton toff D Cameron) despite his Oxford ecucation.
    Please don't call your scheme a Citizen's pension.People do not like such references. It has been found that more people use a Village Hall when it is called that. Change the name to Community Centre and interest tails off.

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    27/09/2012, runningoutofink wrote

    Come on MW, give Boris MacDull a job already! He puts in more hours and fills more column inches than most of your staffers combined, clearly a soul crying out for a legitimate audience for his dogma. And clearly unemployed.

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    27/09/2012, Roberto Birquet wrote

    Mark28 whatever else about your philosophy on tax, you are wrong with your figures...
    .. a median earner in £150,000 home pays £1,500 council tax (1% of house value) and (say) £5,000 PAYE on his £25,000 salary (average 20%).
    
    Standard rate PAYE is 32% (20% tax and 12% NI - a fancy name for tax). you may want to think the government taking 12% of your earnings thru PAYE is not income tax, but it is. You can change names of things, but they remain what they are.
    If I called a tiger a little kitten, would you go and stroke it?
    

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    27/09/2012, Boris MacDonut wrote

    #35 Well pointed out Roberto. The Tax and Nics combined on a £25k income is £5,400 (21.6%). On the £200k income (not allowing for pension contributions) it is £82,200 (41%). Eight times the income doubles the tax rate, but means you still take home 6 times as much as the ordinary chap.
    A flat taxc of say 25% above £10,000.Means the nfirst still pays £5,000 while the latter only parts with £47,500. So assuming the richer guy is worth £1million we'd need a 4% annual wealth tax to make up the shortfall, plus a whole new tranche of snoopers at HMRC to assess annual worth.

37. 37

    28/09/2012, Ellen wrote

    Land (or house) Value tax will hurt people who live in London the most when you look to see the dreadful dumps hundreds of thousands of pounds get you there in stark contrast to what you will spend for huge gated properties in say, Lincolnshire. Also, Families with children are disproportionately hit by property tax as they need houses big enough to house their children.
    
    The idea of a locaton tax - which presumably means taxing people more if they are able to avail of better infrastructure, is very unfair as those who need to eek out a living the most are the people likely to migrate to the cities. To slap an extra tax on them for taking the initiative to go to the place where they can be the most productive is not good.

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    28/09/2012, Dream Jeanie wrote

    @Critic Al Rick,
    Are you a Daily Mail reader or did you come to those opinions independently?
    
    There is no way in 1000 charcters I can even start to list how good the UK has it and how relatively uncorrupt our politics is (although my list of what they do with your tax is a good start).
    
    Sure, democracy doesn't work as well as we'd all like, but at least the potential is there and the system gives us all positive things it would be hard to organise without it.
    
    I used to be a lot more cynical until I left the UK to work in Germany and realised just how much benefit I had been getting from living in the UK. I recommend the experienceof living and working abroad - either you'll realise what you had or you'll like the new place better and stay. Either way, you win.

39. 39

    28/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    My opinions are based on common-sense interpretations of my own observations and experiences in life, mostly confirmed by what I read in blog from such as the D M to Mindful Money.
    
    The UK may even now be one of the least corrupt countries in the world, but that is not an admission that that level of corruption is anywhere close to acceptable; not if you value your future freedom.
    
    As I see things, what TPTB do with our tax is primarily concerned with fulfilling their own agendas whilst controlling and placating the masses with, amongst others, 'facade', token gesture services.
    
    Democracy has been corrupted so much by treacherous politicians that anyone in the UK, even, who currently thinks he/she is living in a state other than one effectively run by the Parasites (rich, poor and intermediate) is deluded, by self and/or propoganda.
    
    If you think so-called democracy, at this level of corruption, will ever bring about a so-called recovery then you can dream on ... Jeanie.

40. 40

    29/09/2012, Mikecambrai wrote

    The fundamental problem which causes high house prices is the shortage of available land. Low availability leads to higher prices - fact.
    The land market has been constrained since 1947 with a population of 50m until we now have a population of 61m.
    This constraint is by the 'planning authorities' (who couldn't plan a scouts jamboree), and the NIMBY's.
    People have a right to houses, and this land is our land although most of it was taken and allocated to various courtiers over the past 1000 years.
    Sticking plaster over the cut will not cure the disease.
    

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    29/09/2012, jenny wrote

    I think Nick Clegg has got the idea of a wealth tax idea because his wife is Spanish and they have a wealth tax where you pay a small percentage of your worldly wealth every year, doubt he could think of it himself!
    
    I would abolish all taxes and use VAT exclusively. That way, you spend, you get taxed, people who cant afford to spend pay less tax. Different percentages for necessary and luxury goods.
    
    No trouble with the 'cash society' or the immigrants paying their way!

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    29/09/2012, Beltayne wrote

    I think 'robin' is an appropriate name for someone who believes in 100% IHT. Do you not think that this would result in a massive 'grey' exodus allowing funds earned in the UK over many years to be spent overseas. This would be of great benefit to the foreign country at great expense to th UK.

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    29/09/2012, Hard To Please wrote

    I suggest principles of taxes based upon simplicity; fairness; transparency; and incentives. We employ armies of people to take it off us; another army to assess if we should have some of it back; others to argue over it! None of it adds to our wealth.So to start the ball rolling 1.Personal All'ce to be liveable basic sum, then flat rate; and only support 2x children per family (don't need more citizens than now) 2.Tax spending not saving 3.Green = consumption so inc a personal energy/water all'ce with tax being paid on the excess 4. 100% IHT but retain reasonable lifetime gift all'ces.

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    29/09/2012, Geoff wrote

    The idea of 100% IHT is a nonsense with parents passing the home to offspring with agreements to live until death only one of the many ways of avoiding the tax. While this could also have its problems it would be one way of avaiding such a tax and no doubt mant other loopholes would be found. We know we have to stimulate consumer demand but not at the expense of weakening a fragile economy through drawing in cheap imports. Lets make investment in industries simpler.

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    29/09/2012, Hard To Please wrote

    Do those people who want to abolish the House of Lords also want to be able to pass everything on to their children?...How did the H of L get created then? Hypocrisy or what? I don't understand why someone who has to go in to a Home should keep it just to pass it on with a large tax deduction. My parents worked into their 70's and struggled to buy a home but Dad died 10yrs ago, Mom paralysed and in a Home since...all that money gone in fees...but it's called the Cost of Living! So, perhaps increase the savings level before contributing...but then the family house goes in the pot: Mom can never go back to it. It's very evenly handed and fair...even though I've lost my inheritance! Simple principles would mean a fairer society and one where the 'rich' pay their 'fair' share because the rules are consistent.

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    29/09/2012, Let's-Be-Sensible-Now wrote

    Capital Gains Tax on owner-occupied residential property is such a bad idea that I am astonished that you have seriously proposed it. I set out my reasons below. (Although this being neither an essay nor a paid article, I have probably missed something. Further, it is being written in a hurry to avoid missing the moment.)
    
    Some people rarely move. Indeed, some people never move. It is not unusual to hear of people owning the same house for fifty years, and there are probably some cases of up to eighty years. If people stay in their houses until they die, they are not subject to CGT (although the rules could obviously be changed). This creates another anomaly; if the house is sold to meet care costs, perhaps shortly before death, then CGT would be payable.
    
    (Too many characters - see continuation)
    

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    29/09/2012, Let's-Be-Sensible-Now wrote

    Finally, such a tax has not the slightest chance of being introduced, so why waste time on it?
    
    There is only one tax on property which makes any sense at all; tax on the notional income from property equity. At my age, having no mortgage, I would be one of the losers from such a system. I raise it partly as a matter of intellectual honesty, but also because there is very little chance of it being introduced.
    
    (Too many characters - see continuation)

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    29/09/2012, Let's-Be-Sensible-Now wrote

    I'm afraid that, in my attempt to send a comprehensive argument, much was left out. If the publishers care to contact me, I will send the rest.

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    29/09/2012, Hard To Please wrote

    Agree with Geoff re making investment in industry easier and more profitable. Abolish NIC means fewer people engaged in non productive tax collection ( in I Rev and Co's); simpler system producing cost savings; Co's would have higher profits and therefore pay higher taxes anyway. But I would make such as Training and R&D tax free activities in order to incentivise business to greater competitiveness...producing greater profits...producing more tax...as well as providing gainful employment for people and the corresponding benefits of self esteem and social cohesion...saving on govt expenditure...who then need to collect less tax etc

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    29/09/2012, Engineer wrote

    We must simplify the tax system. Remove NIC, have a high threshold to protect the poor. Thow out the tax book, and start again with a limit of two pages of rules.
    Taxing wealth cannot work, nobody knows how much every individual is worth. The rich will always find a way round the tax system unless it is so simple even Nick Clegg could understand it.
    100% IHT will only catch a few for a short time, then everyone will know how to avoid it.

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    29/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    Following on from what I put @3.:
    
    It's the greed of the very rich Parasites that's got us into this Mess. Only they have the wherewithal to get us out of it. If it was done intentionally then there is no way they will want to get us out; if it was done unintentionally then there's a chance, depends upon how incompetent and/or arrogant they really are.
    
    One thing is for sure, if incomes and expenditure (with continuing tax avoidance loopholes) remain the primary source of taxation revenues the economy is stuffed.
    
    Whilst the Truly Private Sector is saddled with subsidising the extravagances and inefficiences of the Cartel, etc Sector (bastion of very rich Parasites, and others) and extravagances, inefficiences and vastness of the Public Sector (bastion of rich Parasites and others) it will not improve w.r.t. global competitiveness - no chance of reversing Balance of Payments Deficit.
    
    cont ...
    
    

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    29/09/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    ... cont
    
    Whilever, all else remaining equal, cutting Public Sector jobs reduces overall tax take, and we have a climate where demographics and inflation, if nothing else, are increasing Treasury expenditure, nothing is happening to reduced Budget Deficits, quite the contrary.
    
    Quite simply, if the very rich Parasites don't cough up enough from their ill-gotten gains then economies in the West are teetering on the edge of a death spiral.

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    30/09/2012, Maxsdad2004 wrote

    Who benefits most from the society we live in? The rich. They and their wealth are protected by law and custom. Shouldn't they fork out more for the benefits they get from civilisation? You may say that, in the main, they do, however, there is one glaring exception: the super rich who can pay to have every tax loophole exploited. They need to pay their way.
    What do people think happens with the money paid to the government in taxes? It is used by the state to buy goods and services from the private economy, making a lot of people rich in the process.
    Last week's topical subject, The Magna Carta, reminds me of a point of principle: no taxation without representation. Surely this should also work in reverse! We should all pay income tax if we have an income, no matter how small.
    Regarding Robin's proposal to have 100% inheritance tax I can say that most people have little hope of enjoying a fantastic lifestyle but their hopes for their children make them work so much harder.

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    30/09/2012, Terry Pugh wrote

    The main economic challenge for any country is to produce goods or services of adequate quality to meet the customer's needs at a competitive price. To achieve this we have to maintain the lowest possible production costs.By artificially inflating the price of houses we indirectly increase our costs ( workers need to increase wages to pay for homes) or directly where a foreign student has to pay higher rent than elsewhere.
    We have already ploughed a disproportionate amount in to our housing stock and we are in danger of wasting money on 'improvements' that do not add value.
    Instead we should invest in high tech manfctring,design,media companies along with our much derided but biggest wealth producer - financial services .To do this we need to encourage investment in new and existing enterprises and there need to be tax incentives. the rich should be encouraged to invest in these companies as opposed to property and agricultural land, where their investment distorts the market.
    

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    30/09/2012, grunebird wrote

    I thought the whole set-up of "democracy" is a giant Ponzi scheme?
    We urgently need Land Reform here. Millions of acres are held by a few land-owners, land which can't even be looked at by the rest of us! Primogeniture keeps it going. And there are huge tax breaks for this and that to big land-owners.
    Also, what's wrong with adding a few more bands upwards on the CT banding so that owners of huge properties pay more? As it stands, band H is the ceiling whatever the value.

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    30/09/2012, grunebird wrote

    I have never understood why the government thinks it is a good idea to sell council houses (apart from the obvious in the few "good" areas of London). If the stock diminishes through sales, UK can never keep up by building on new-cost land with new-cost materials. And what is the use of new builds which aren't rationed to owner-occupiers? A whole estate of new builds can be bought by a few (or one?) buy to let investors.

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    02/10/2012, Dream Jeanie wrote

    @Critic Al Rick,
    
    Poor you. It sounds like you feel helpless in a world spiralling out of control. Was it better 10 years ago? 20? 50? If you think it was, then perhaps you should stop reading newspapers. A key difference between now and the past is how much information about politicians gets printed in the press and how critical journalists are of policies.
    
    If you think it wasn't, console yourself with how much you and everyone around you has despite the apparent incompetence and corruption of those running the show. Many improvements in recent history have been for the better. Try and appreciate them instead of focusing on your worries and the negative. It's not only the negative which is valid and true and will impact on the future. (Note I used the words "not only", as you are not wrong,that it does also have an impact)

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    02/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    @ Dream Jeanie
    
    It's not me I'm bothered about; hopefully I'll be out of it before the Fantasy Crunch.
    
    Jeanie, I hardly looked at a newspaper before 2 years ago; but I suspected TPTB had lost the plot (or something) 25 years ago, 1987. An experience I had shortly after that time confirmed my suspicions and dispelled any complacency I had for the wisdom of mankind; a complacency which I would respectfully suggest you appear to still have.
    
    Pleasant dreams.

59. 59

    02/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    @ Dream Jeanie
    
    It's not me I'm bothered about; hopefully I'll be out of it before the Fantasy Crunch.
    
    Jeanie, I hardly looked at a newspaper before 2 years ago; but I suspected TPTB had lost the plot (or something) 25 years ago, 1987. An experience I had shortly after that time confirmed my suspicions and dispelled any complacency I had for the wisdom of mankind; a complacency which I would respectfully suggest you appear to still have.
    
    Pleasant dreams.

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    03/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    @ Dream Jeanie
    
    IMO the disconnect of TPTB with sensibility began (this time) with the freeing of currencies from the gold standard (1971?). Since then the prime objective of TPTB has been to feed its gluttony with, it would appear, either total disregard for the longer term (incompetence) or a goal for the longer term (yet to be realised - conspiracy).
    
    In the meantime economies in the West have gone awry; the UK has sold-off most of its 'family silver' and undergone further massive asset stripping whilst getting further & further into debt.
    
    You say: "Many improvements in recent history have been for the better". Maybe, but they haven't been paid for.
    
    And now the Middle Classes are being made the sacrificial lamb in order to sustain the fantasy of 'relative well being' of the masses. When the Fantasy Crunch comes there will be a NWO; what remains of the Middle Classes in the West will be largely converted to swell the Working Classes (or the unemployed).

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    04/10/2012, Dream Jeanie wrote

    @Critic Al Rick,
    
    I'm glad you're not worrying yourself by reading stories in the newspaper. Can I suggest that you stop worrying for other people? It sounds like you're not in a position to do anything for other people, and that you expect to be alright yourself.
    
    Our concerns today are so much more minor than 50 years ago. Instead of "are we going to destroy our entire planet through war and nuclear destruction?" and "will we survive at all?" the questions are currently "are we living beyond our means?", "are we not going to be as wealthy in future?" and "has who will pay our taxes been decided fairly?". These are small fry compared to "are we all going to be killed?". It's even possible some of Moneyweek's tax ideas will be adopted & won't have negative unexpected consequences and we may therefore pay more fairly in future.
    

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    04/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    @ Dream Jeanie
    
    I'm bothered but I'm not worrying; actually, I find it quite entertaining!
    
    I worked very hard all my working life and wondered why I didn't do better financially. Now I know, it wasn't so much my inadequacy as it was the corruption of the 'playing field' - makes things easy for some and more difficult for others, much more difficult for the rest.
    
    I see our concerns today as being compounded, even related. I see that mankind is, in so many ways, pioneering its own extinction as well as 'shooting itself in the foot' economically.
    
    If you'd had my experiences in life you'd appreciate why I find the flounderings of mankind to be so entertaining.
    
    There's others finding it entertaining too, especially the flounderings in the Eurozone. Some are even stocking up with popcorn!

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    04/10/2012, Boris MacDonut wrote

    #60.Rick Ever think of yourself as a glass half empty person?

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    05/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    No, I don't dear Boris; nor do I (usually) do things by halves.
    
    I think of myself as an all or nothing sort of person; so you might say a glass empty person or a glass full person.
    
    I'll tell you something though, it isn't me that's crazy; what's the point of having your glass half full or half empty?

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    06/10/2012, Boris MacDonut wrote

    #62 Glass empty it is then.

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    06/10/2012, Critic Al Rick wrote

    Cheers ... your round!

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    09/10/2012, Roberto Birquet wrote

    Ellen 36
    A land value tax would not hit those moving to cities "to eek out a living", as they would typically not "own" the flat they were renting. They would pay less tax, as their income tax could fall (on an overall tax neutral basis).
    They would gain even further as a LVT would make property investment less profitable, leading to more affordable/land homes for FTBs. It would also make other investments, such as work or shares more profitable. So investment in actual wealth creation would become more attractive with obvious long-term benefits for the country.
    Much lower investment and prices in German properties has not done them any harm.

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