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Guaranteed the only way they’ll think will solve the issue is higher taxes. The uk has run out of ideas and the only option seems to be taking people’s money aw

Guaranteed the only way they’ll think will solve the issue is higher taxes. The uk has run out of ideas and the only option seems to be taking people’s money away.

drcongo 3y ago
I'm guessing you're not UK based?
- gumballindie 3y ago
  I am, and taxation is atrocious.
  - mk89 3y ago
    Are taxes high and services/schools/hospitals so bad you need to pay privately?
    - gumballindie 3y ago
      The NHS (public healthcare), is unusable. They are taking the piss, having two hour lunch breaks at surgeries, pushing everyone towards main hospitals which are overcrowded. Schools are a gamble, it’s called the post code lottery - the masses obviously say the “rich” are sending kids private, but anyone who wants decent schooling goes private. Increased small business taxes, increased software contractor regulation, are literally killing the industry. Cities are going bankrupt due to mismanagement yet folks keep demanding tax hikes as if that’s going to fix the fundamental issues of this country. I’ve never seen the UK in such a bad state. Potholes everywhere while the government is yet to be held accountable for misspending money.
      - mk89 3y ago
        I am a bit surprised to read this about the UK. Is this everywhere or just in some regions? Anyway, the issue is not the taxation but the misuse, then?
        gumballindie 3y ago
        Tax hikes coupled with higher interest rates and an increased cost of living are making a dent. For software developer, contractors in particular - the only way to reach something that somewhat resembles US pay - are now subject to tightened regulation called IR35. Contracts "inside" IR53 are taxed just like regular pay even if done via an LTD and you can't claim expenses. This regulation is meant to catch disguised employees, but large clients don't want to risk it. In reality what's happening is that contract work is sent to outsourcing companies, one of which is the prime minister's wife's father Infosys. And that's one example. Outside tech there are all sorts of "traps": people's wages are increasing only to be caught up in higher tax brackets essentially meaning their pay is still low. Factoring in what I wrote about taxes, col, and interest raters, everyone is much poorer now than before. A lot of low income earners are squeaking about further tax hikes as if that's going to improve their lifes somehow. It's a crab mentality. In regards to regions, it naturally varies, but overall the situation is the same everywhere. For instance, the second largest city just went bankrupt and I suppose those people are in for a ride. The region where I live, despite being the type that pays the tax so many yearn for, roads are filled with potholes, and the local surgery constantly complains about how much work they need to do. Friday, 2 PM it's closed for the weekend, and each day there's a two hour lunch break. You can't make this up. But throughout schools, hospitals, complain about being understaffed, including private companies, yet when they try and increase wages to attract talent, said wages are immediately taxed. I can go on for ages, but something's way off about the country and it seems like a lot of factors are converging and forming a perfect storm.
        KaiserPro 3y ago
        Its not direct taxes that people is causing pain for those on lower income. taxation for people on £250k is very different to those on £25k Sure _graduates_ are feeling the pinch of tax. No, the cost of living is driven by three things: Rent. Staple inflation (food, basic travel, etc) fucking fuel prices. If you're outside of london and you are earning the average of £27k after tax its £1800 a month. rent for a two bed place is between £850-1200 a month, thats going to go up your heating is £250 a month (thats doubled ) your food bill has doubled Your car insurance has gone up to £1k a year Thats the real squeeze. Yes taxing them harder is bad. However taxing someone on £250k a year a bit more, fine they can fucking take it. removing the ridiculous contractor loophole where you can go from 45% income tax to <30% even if you earn megabucks is great.(hello IR35) Now increase captial gains tax.
      - rmvt 3y ago
        what i've seen with the nhs is doctors avoiding care/exams in order to save ££ (i suspect as guidance from above). i've heard these takes on public schools but they failed to explain what's actually bad about them. could you provide more detail? as for the sw contract industry, the way i see it more like closing a loophole where contractors were essentially working as permanent employees but ended up paying less taxes. outside ir35 contracts are a thing and the fact that there's less of those is probably an indicator that they were indeed used as a loophole. tax hikes might help, it just depends on whom.
        sdfghswe 3y ago
        > i've heard these takes on public schools but they failed to explain what's actually bad about them. could you provide more detail? I'm also very interested to hear about this.
        ilikerashers 3y ago
        https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/aug/20/private-school-england-twice-as-likely-top-a-level-grades https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/aug/20/private-sc... Your kids likely to do better in a private school. Hard to say all public schools are bad, there are just fewer good ones and it depends where you live. It's like you either play a public/grammar school lottery or pay your dues.
        sdfghswe 3y ago
        Thanks for the link, but A) from that link it's not possible to tell if there's causality between those two, and B) it doesn't tell me what exactly is "bad" about the "bad schools", which is what I wanted to know.
        ilikerashers 3y ago
        Poor funding, demographics, crime, academic underperformance. There isn’t a consistent factor, just a combination of the above. Teacher pay and conditions are also worse in state schools.
      - bowsamic 3y ago
        I moved to Germany and it’s so much better here. I’m terrified of moving back to the UK because the quality of life is so much worse there across the board, particularly for healthcare and public services
      - thebruce87m 3y ago
        NHS have always been fine when I’ve needed them. They could not have done more for my dad during his cancer treatment. Same for my MIL as she deals with arthritis. And my FIL for cataracts. I have zero complaints.
    - benjaminwootton 3y ago
      This is exactly what it’s like. Our NHS is literally close to collapse. It can be a 2-3 week delay to see a GP if you jump through the hoops such as visiting a surgery to book at 8am. For accident and emergency you can find yourself waiting for 8+ hours on a good day. For operations you could be waiting for years. The number of people who die whilst on waiting lists is growing by the month. I believe there are 7 million people on waiting lists. Finding an NHS dentist is like unicorn hunting. Paying privately is the only way to access healthcare. There is no hyperbole in this post. These numbers are real across the vast majority of the country. I could write the same about the police. There are whole classes of crime they have given up on. Usually the ones which aren’t revenue generating.
  - Nextgrid 3y ago
    Agreed that taxation is atrocious. But the problem isn't taxation per-se but who pays the taxes. Paying ~40% taxes at 100k, effectively ending up with 60k, which considering the current cost of living, insane rent crisis and general inflation, is a major problem. Paying ~40% taxes on a few millions? I think that's fair and isn't going to inconvenience anyone or put them in a precarious situation.
giantg2 3y ago
Can't do much about the demographics with the aging population. They probably can't or won't do much on the business/economy. Seems the only thing left to do is raise taxes, or cut services. This is really a similar thing we're seeing in other countries with aging populations. Even look at the US social security - raise the tax to support it, or reduce the services.
gloryjulio 3y ago
The only way it will work in ideal world is to let the rich and old to cough out some shares to let the average young population to have better chances and willing to have more kids. But we will never reach that point
- toomuchtodo 3y ago
  The young will leave for better pastures when they can, and when they can't, they'll just stop having kids and the locale will die out. Sad watching the old and wealthy choke the future to death, but that's humanity for you.
HWR_14 3y ago
The government has to tax to pay for things. Birmingham has been legally constrained to raise taxes at a maximum of 5% per year, even with the massive inflation in the past few years. A 10% increase this year (what they are asking for) will still put them at an (inflation adjusted) lower tax rate than 2019.
- gumballindie 3y ago
  It also has to spend money well, stimulate growth, and whole lot of other things than taking people's money away to patch things. The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS.
  - fakedang 3y ago
    > The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS. This is akin to political suicide though. Remember, the conservatives' Brexit battle cry was 300 million pounds for the NHS.
    - gumballindie 3y ago
      Well it’s either the NHS, the tories, or the country. Labour dont have a plan either. Taxing everyone to death is patchwork. The UK is in deep, deep, trouble and it ain’t the politics causing it. It’s the culture of making one bad choice after the other.
      - fakedang 3y ago
        Between the three choices you mentioned, it's pretty obvious the Tories are going to take down the country before taking down either themselves or the NHS. Although in all fairness, the quality of service in the NHS has already gone down for both doctors and patients.
  - KaiserPro 3y ago
    > The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS So we have a shortage of doctors, nurses and hospital places. Currently the state keeps a lid on costs because it sets the wages of about 1 million people nationally (more or less, its complicated, but doctors are paid in grades, and those levels are nominally set nationally, same with nurses, however scotland, wales and NI have some level of independence.) We have huge pent up demand (7 million people on the waiting list) And we have a limited and shrinking skilled workforce. It takes a good 12 years to train a doctor. 6 to train a nurse. what do you think will happen to wages when the whole thing is privatised? Yeah, so privatising healthcare isn't going to make things cheaper. especially as the NHS is pretty cheap per head by EU standards.
Nextgrid 3y ago
Taxation is not a problem. The only problem is who pays the taxes. With inflation and the current cost of living, nobody making under 50k (100k in London) should be paying any. The people at the top, who already only pay effectively single-digit percent rates of tax should be footing the bill and paying their fair share (technically if they were playing by the same rules the common working man is subject to, they should be paying ~50%). Of course, those same people that are meant to be paying the tax are sliding checks to politicians' pockets to ensure this doesn't happen, or are the politicians themselves.

Guaranteed the only way they’ll think will solve the issue is higher taxes. The uk has run out of ideas and the only option seems to be taking people’s money away.

drcongo 3y ago

I'm guessing you're not UK based?

gumballindie 3y ago
I am, and taxation is atrocious.
- mk89 3y ago
  Are taxes high and services/schools/hospitals so bad you need to pay privately?
  - gumballindie 3y ago
    The NHS (public healthcare), is unusable. They are taking the piss, having two hour lunch breaks at surgeries, pushing everyone towards main hospitals which are overcrowded. Schools are a gamble, it’s called the post code lottery - the masses obviously say the “rich” are sending kids private, but anyone who wants decent schooling goes private. Increased small business taxes, increased software contractor regulation, are literally killing the industry. Cities are going bankrupt due to mismanagement yet folks keep demanding tax hikes as if that’s going to fix the fundamental issues of this country. I’ve never seen the UK in such a bad state. Potholes everywhere while the government is yet to be held accountable for misspending money.
    - mk89 3y ago
      I am a bit surprised to read this about the UK. Is this everywhere or just in some regions? Anyway, the issue is not the taxation but the misuse, then?
      - gumballindie 3y ago
        Tax hikes coupled with higher interest rates and an increased cost of living are making a dent. For software developer, contractors in particular - the only way to reach something that somewhat resembles US pay - are now subject to tightened regulation called IR35. Contracts "inside" IR53 are taxed just like regular pay even if done via an LTD and you can't claim expenses. This regulation is meant to catch disguised employees, but large clients don't want to risk it. In reality what's happening is that contract work is sent to outsourcing companies, one of which is the prime minister's wife's father Infosys. And that's one example. Outside tech there are all sorts of "traps": people's wages are increasing only to be caught up in higher tax brackets essentially meaning their pay is still low. Factoring in what I wrote about taxes, col, and interest raters, everyone is much poorer now than before. A lot of low income earners are squeaking about further tax hikes as if that's going to improve their lifes somehow. It's a crab mentality. In regards to regions, it naturally varies, but overall the situation is the same everywhere. For instance, the second largest city just went bankrupt and I suppose those people are in for a ride. The region where I live, despite being the type that pays the tax so many yearn for, roads are filled with potholes, and the local surgery constantly complains about how much work they need to do. Friday, 2 PM it's closed for the weekend, and each day there's a two hour lunch break. You can't make this up. But throughout schools, hospitals, complain about being understaffed, including private companies, yet when they try and increase wages to attract talent, said wages are immediately taxed. I can go on for ages, but something's way off about the country and it seems like a lot of factors are converging and forming a perfect storm.
        KaiserPro 3y ago
        Its not direct taxes that people is causing pain for those on lower income. taxation for people on £250k is very different to those on £25k Sure _graduates_ are feeling the pinch of tax. No, the cost of living is driven by three things: Rent. Staple inflation (food, basic travel, etc) fucking fuel prices. If you're outside of london and you are earning the average of £27k after tax its £1800 a month. rent for a two bed place is between £850-1200 a month, thats going to go up your heating is £250 a month (thats doubled ) your food bill has doubled Your car insurance has gone up to £1k a year Thats the real squeeze. Yes taxing them harder is bad. However taxing someone on £250k a year a bit more, fine they can fucking take it. removing the ridiculous contractor loophole where you can go from 45% income tax to <30% even if you earn megabucks is great.(hello IR35) Now increase captial gains tax.
    - rmvt 3y ago
      what i've seen with the nhs is doctors avoiding care/exams in order to save ££ (i suspect as guidance from above). i've heard these takes on public schools but they failed to explain what's actually bad about them. could you provide more detail? as for the sw contract industry, the way i see it more like closing a loophole where contractors were essentially working as permanent employees but ended up paying less taxes. outside ir35 contracts are a thing and the fact that there's less of those is probably an indicator that they were indeed used as a loophole. tax hikes might help, it just depends on whom.
      - sdfghswe 3y ago
        > i've heard these takes on public schools but they failed to explain what's actually bad about them. could you provide more detail? I'm also very interested to hear about this.
        ilikerashers 3y ago
        https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/aug/20/private-school-england-twice-as-likely-top-a-level-grades https://www.theguardian.com/education/2023/aug/20/private-sc... Your kids likely to do better in a private school. Hard to say all public schools are bad, there are just fewer good ones and it depends where you live. It's like you either play a public/grammar school lottery or pay your dues.
        sdfghswe 3y ago
        Thanks for the link, but A) from that link it's not possible to tell if there's causality between those two, and B) it doesn't tell me what exactly is "bad" about the "bad schools", which is what I wanted to know.
        ilikerashers 3y ago
        Poor funding, demographics, crime, academic underperformance. There isn’t a consistent factor, just a combination of the above. Teacher pay and conditions are also worse in state schools.
    - bowsamic 3y ago
      I moved to Germany and it’s so much better here. I’m terrified of moving back to the UK because the quality of life is so much worse there across the board, particularly for healthcare and public services
    - thebruce87m 3y ago
      NHS have always been fine when I’ve needed them. They could not have done more for my dad during his cancer treatment. Same for my MIL as she deals with arthritis. And my FIL for cataracts. I have zero complaints.
  - benjaminwootton 3y ago
    This is exactly what it’s like. Our NHS is literally close to collapse. It can be a 2-3 week delay to see a GP if you jump through the hoops such as visiting a surgery to book at 8am. For accident and emergency you can find yourself waiting for 8+ hours on a good day. For operations you could be waiting for years. The number of people who die whilst on waiting lists is growing by the month. I believe there are 7 million people on waiting lists. Finding an NHS dentist is like unicorn hunting. Paying privately is the only way to access healthcare. There is no hyperbole in this post. These numbers are real across the vast majority of the country. I could write the same about the police. There are whole classes of crime they have given up on. Usually the ones which aren’t revenue generating.
- Nextgrid 3y ago
  Agreed that taxation is atrocious. But the problem isn't taxation per-se but who pays the taxes. Paying ~40% taxes at 100k, effectively ending up with 60k, which considering the current cost of living, insane rent crisis and general inflation, is a major problem. Paying ~40% taxes on a few millions? I think that's fair and isn't going to inconvenience anyone or put them in a precarious situation.

giantg2 3y ago

Can't do much about the demographics with the aging population. They probably can't or won't do much on the business/economy. Seems the only thing left to do is raise taxes, or cut services. This is really a similar thing we're seeing in other countries with aging populations. Even look at the US social security - raise the tax to support it, or reduce the services.

gloryjulio 3y ago

The only way it will work in ideal world is to let the rich and old to cough out some shares to let the average young population to have better chances and willing to have more kids. But we will never reach that point

toomuchtodo 3y ago
The young will leave for better pastures when they can, and when they can't, they'll just stop having kids and the locale will die out. Sad watching the old and wealthy choke the future to death, but that's humanity for you.

HWR_14 3y ago

The government has to tax to pay for things. Birmingham has been legally constrained to raise taxes at a maximum of 5% per year, even with the massive inflation in the past few years. A 10% increase this year (what they are asking for) will still put them at an (inflation adjusted) lower tax rate than 2019.

gumballindie 3y ago
It also has to spend money well, stimulate growth, and whole lot of other things than taking people's money away to patch things. The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS.
- fakedang 3y ago
  > The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS. This is akin to political suicide though. Remember, the conservatives' Brexit battle cry was 300 million pounds for the NHS.
  - gumballindie 3y ago
    Well it’s either the NHS, the tories, or the country. Labour dont have a plan either. Taxing everyone to death is patchwork. The UK is in deep, deep, trouble and it ain’t the politics causing it. It’s the culture of making one bad choice after the other.
    - fakedang 3y ago
      Between the three choices you mentioned, it's pretty obvious the Tories are going to take down the country before taking down either themselves or the NHS. Although in all fairness, the quality of service in the NHS has already gone down for both doctors and patients.
- KaiserPro 3y ago
  > The only option as it stands is privatising the NHS So we have a shortage of doctors, nurses and hospital places. Currently the state keeps a lid on costs because it sets the wages of about 1 million people nationally (more or less, its complicated, but doctors are paid in grades, and those levels are nominally set nationally, same with nurses, however scotland, wales and NI have some level of independence.) We have huge pent up demand (7 million people on the waiting list) And we have a limited and shrinking skilled workforce. It takes a good 12 years to train a doctor. 6 to train a nurse. what do you think will happen to wages when the whole thing is privatised? Yeah, so privatising healthcare isn't going to make things cheaper. especially as the NHS is pretty cheap per head by EU standards.

Nextgrid 3y ago

Taxation is not a problem. The only problem is who pays the taxes. With inflation and the current cost of living, nobody making under 50k (100k in London) should be paying any. The people at the top, who already only pay effectively single-digit percent rates of tax should be footing the bill and paying their fair share (technically if they were playing by the same rules the common working man is subject to, they should be paying ~50%). Of course, those same people that are meant to be paying the tax are sliding checks to politicians' pockets to ensure this doesn't happen, or are the politicians themselves.