The EU debate - Part III

I didn't use that phrase directing it at you personally mate, but that's how a policy like that would be viewed.

I think you're living in cloud cuckoo if you think that the recipients of a billionaires will would be defined by taxation policy though mate.

If you look at the 'old money' set in the UK, they tend to be asset rich and cash poor, and this is largely due to generation after generation paying death duties on sprawling family estates, often having to incur debt in order to pay what's due and keep the family home.

If you massively increased death duties, then you'd encourage more people to simply find ways around it and the net gain to the treasury would be likely to be zip.

 

Taxes have been the cause of debate,argument and even revolutions ever since the idea came into being. Nobody is ever happy with them but most people nowadays see the purpose of them. To arrive at an equitable system is all but impossible. Personally I would rather have sales based taxes rather than income based one as there would be little scope for evasion. There would have to be varying rates from exempt for essentials, food and utilities etc through one or two higher rates for less essential items to a highest rate for non essential goods and luxury items, such as plasma TVs and accountants fees. I accept that it unattainable but it is possible to move some way towards a change of emphasis from taxes on income to taxes on spending.
I await the abuse

 

An alternative view would be money left at the end of your life is wasted anyway.

The economy needs money moving, not wrapped up in material possessions.

Share it while you're alive so you can see any pleasure it brings.

 

I do have a problem with it, Steven. I'm ok with paying tax, but when I'm the one doing all the work and the Gvt gets paid more than I do, that's where I start to have a problem with it.!

 

The U.K. Is the only country I know of where profit on the sale of your house is not taxed.

 

It is isn't it? Capital gains on or am i barking up the wrong tree? or do you mean if it was your primary residence ?

 

****inell. I completely agree with everything you said there. The UK economy is storing up all sorts of problems precisely because so much wealth is locked up in property. So half the country thinks they are rich while the other half either can't earn a decent living or can't find a place to live. The housing market is ****ed, the jobs market is skewed towards the places where property is prohibitively priced, and when the property owners die their kids and grandkids might, if they are lucky, inherit enough to put a deposit on a home of their own. Meanwhile, anyone with nothing to inherit is stuffed from the outset. The whole system is ****ed, and the best way to overcome entrenched privilige and division is to tax inheritance. Asquith's Liberal government knew this 100 years ago; if you want a fairer society, start everyone off on a level playing field, and **** relying on inheritance; you should be able to make your own way in the world without an inheritance anyway.

Rant over.

 

Primary residence or not, you pay tax here. You do in the US. And you do in Holland, where my brother lives.

 

Starting with a level playing field is fine, but will it ever remain one?

I can visualize that in 100 years or so the system would go back to being as unbalanced as it is now. It seems to be human nature.

But then successive Gvt's have only themselves to blame. Many U.K. People rely on the equity in their houses as their pension. Let's face it, do you think any pensioner does more than merely exist on nothing but the state pension.

Most can't even do that.

 

Yeah i thought so. You wrote "The U.K. Is the only country I know of where profit on the sale of your house is not taxed." which reads as you don't pay tax on the profit of your house? I was just clarifying your message

 

Good shout that, as you'd be taxing based on consumption, which would in turn be in line with your true income.

However, it would only work if there was very tight control over imports and it could lead to the high earning frugal paying less tax, and the high spending middle bracket paying more, and possibly low earners paying even more, pro rata, than they do now

 

You don't pay tax on the profit on the sale of your house here.

He lives in Spain

 

Don't you have to pay capital gains i thought?

 

I was assuming he knew that!...

 

On primary residence, No...

 

No, not on your primary residence, only if you're selling property that you've been renting out or are flipping.

 

Thanks.

 

The issue is one of lifespan.
If I live to 100 then my kids won't see a penny until they are 70 and their kids probably won't see any of it until their 40s.

If you have extra money then better to invest it in your kids now than have them looking at you based on your value when you die.

 

Stop crying about tax, we all pay it

But the billionaire will have paid more tax in one year than you will in 10 lifetimes, stop moaning

 

The **** difference does that make.
You are supposed to pay an amount in accordance with your income.
How much tax I paid is irrelevant