This week's Budget was well trailed. We knew George Osborne would introduce a few policies of which we thoroughly disapprove. The new inheritance tax (IHT) allowance for houses, for example. The British are quite obsessed with houses enough already. Any rise in the IHT allowance should have been a general one: what makes a "family house" more important than a favourite picture or classic car? It's silly, to say nothing of mildly unkind to those who haven't indulged in the UK's top hobby of constantly upsizing and hoping to make tax-free capital gains.
Then there is the cut in pension tax relief allowance for those earning over £150,000 (tapered from £40,000 to £10,000). This will be an administrative nightmare for high earners (many of whom won't know how much they earn in a year until that year is nearly over) and for their accountants. It's a complicated crowd pleaser of the kind I wish governments would have the confidence to give up. And of course there are the changes to dividend tax. Why so complicated? Why not just tax dividends as income at the same rate as income and be done with it?
That said, we also find quite a lot in the Budget to approve of. We have long campaigned for a rise in the minimum wage to stop the taxpayer subsidising the profits of big corporations via tax credits. So we like Osborne's new living wage policy.
Subscribe to MoneyWeek
Subscribe to MoneyWeek today and get your first six magazine issues absolutely FREE
Sign up to Money Morning
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
Don't miss the latest investment and personal finances news, market analysis, plus money-saving tips with our free twice-daily newsletter
We have also often noted that it is not possible for productivity in the UK to improve without a shift from high welfare (that creates an incentive for part-time work) to higher wages. So we think we like Osborne's reform to child tax credits, housing benefit, the benefits cap and the new obligation for the young to "work or learn".
Finally, we're very interested in the cut to the tax relief buy-to-let investors can claim. Read Andrew MacNally's column and you'll get a sense of just how wrong it is for us to use our tax system to create an incentive for using debt over equity. Buy-to-let investors will complain, saying that they are businesses and should be able to write off interest as other businesses do. We hope things are moving the other way that future budgets will stop all businesses claiming tax relief on interest and that our economies will become more stable as a result.
This wasn't the radical Budget we allowed ourselves to daydream of on Wednesday morning. No huge shift towards taxing unearned wealth over earned. No cancellation of all taxes bar a land value tax. Not much simplification at all. No sweeping away of government departments we don't much need (see my interview with Douglas Carswell next week for more). No caps on the total amount of all tax reliefs anyone can claim. And no solutions to intergenerational inequality, the democratic deficit inherent in modern central banking (see cover story), the over-reaching of the NHS or the (entirely related) vast public debt. But in all, it moved enough things in the right direction to have been worth watching.
-
Coventry Building Society bids £780m for Co-operative Bank - what could it mean for customers?Coventry Building Society has put in an offer of £780 million to buy Co-operative Bank. When will the potential deal happen and what could it mean for customers?
-
Review: Three magnificent Beachcomber resorts in MauritiusMoneyWeek Travel Ruth Emery explores the Indian Ocean island from Beachcomber resorts Shandrani, Trou aux Biches and Paradis
-
Beat the cost of living crisis – go on holidayEditor's letter As inflation rages, energy bills soar and the pound tanks, what’s a good way to save money this winter? Go on holiday, says Merryn Somerset Webb.
-
How capitalism has been undermined by poor governanceEditor's letter Capitalism’s “ruthless efficiency” has been undermined by poor governance, a lack of competition and central banks’ over-enthusiastic money printing, says Andrew Van Sickle.
-
Don't be scared by economic forecastingEditor's letter The Bank of England warned last week the UK will tip into recession this year. But predictions about stockmarkets, earnings or macroeconomic trends can be safely ignored, says Andrew Van Sickle.
-
The biggest change in the last 17 years – the death of the “Greenspan put”Editor's letter Since I joined MoneyWeek 17 years ago, says John Stepek, we’ve seen a global financial crisis, a eurozone sovereign debt crisis , several Chinese growth scares, a global pandemic, and a land war in Europe. But the biggest change is the death of the “Greenspan put”.
-
The wolf returns to the eurozone’s doorEditor's letter The eurozone’s intrinsic flaws have been exposed again as investors’ fears about Italy’s ability to pay its debt sends bond yields soaring.
-
Things won't just return to normal – that's not how inflation worksEditor's letter You might think that, if inflation is indeed “transitory”, we just need to wait and everything will return to “normal”. But this is a grave misunderstanding of how inflation works, says John Stepek.
-
Car hire and the strangeness of the post-pandemic economyEditor's letter A global shortage of hire cars and unusually high hotel occupancy rates sum up the post-pandemic global economy in a nutshell, says Merryn Somerset Webb, with enhanced demand meeting restricted supply.
-
Why we need to get a grip on our governmentEditor's letter Our government is trying to do too much, enacting policies that are destructive to the private sector. It needs to drop the the feel-good nonsense and create policies that lead to long-term wealth, says Merryn Somerset Webb.
