To actually not mind paying tax?

In answer to the question in your last paragraph.

Your neighbours children are educated and not roaming the streets. They will therefore become the doctors, nurses and care workers who will take care of you in the old age you are saving for. (And the sanitation workers, the retail workers, the accountants, the brick layers, and all the other jobs needed for the society you live in to function.)

There is a rule of law. If someone strolls down your street shooting people, the police will come and they will be taken away and put in front of a judge in a court of law, and then kept in prison.

The streets are lit. There is investment in industry to create jobs. There are national parks that you can visit (and that safeguard biodiversity and the ecological health or the nation). There are national vaccination programs. There is arts funding. You know that musician you liked when you turned the radio on? They will have been impacted in some way, even if indirectly.

These and more are what your taxes are paying for, so don’t claim that you don’t benefit. You benefit by being able to live in a society that brings all of this together, and that’s why we all contribute.

I am after being made redundant and not even being allowed JSa (at the time) when I should of been entitled to it.

Yet everyone wants more and I end up stumping up for it and handing over more of my money because people say they need more help and want more handouts and i get fuck all for it, not even a safety net if i fall on hard times. So how about there is enough help and how about people saying we shouldn't being tapping up others for more money it isn't fair.

Oh and what taxes are paying for me? I have private health care, private dentist, I don't have children so no childcare no need to use state education. I have my own private pension so I don't need to rely on state pension incase it ends up being means tested. I'm trying to use what disposable income I have to put away to cover my care costs when I'm older as I won't have children to rely on.

This.

If the number of net beneficiaries is ever increasing, more and more money is needed to keep propping up services that can’t cope with the ever increasing demand.

They haven't the expenses of childcare. They can get partnered up - or not - and have children. Mothers and children need support so we don't end up with Victorian baby farmers - working mothers even more so.

If you don't mind my saying, you sound awfully bitter.

And what tax breaks can a single childfree person get? Love to hear what you want this group of people to have....since they get duck all

We should certainly be giving healthy tax breaks for childcare. It's astronomically expensive in the UK.

I've no issue with tax, I use public services and I want those less fortunate than me (particularly children and disabled people) to all have a good quality of life. I can't expect that to happen without taxation.
People who use public services and complain about tax drive me mad. What's been worse recently has been working class people having their wage topped up with benefits complaining about how labour will increase tax and we need Reform in government. They are blind to the fact they are the ones who would be worse off with a right wing government.

You must be on about £265k - well done you on both fronts.
I suspect you're in minority though.

@nearlylovemyusername I paid £102k between income tax and NI last year. Obviously on top of that there is council tax, VAT etc.

If I could actually see a Dr, have a decent state school for my kids, and more importantly have the same for everyone else in society, along with revival of surestart centres, social care, etc so that people generally are happy, accomplished, well rounded and able to achieve what they want to in life (which benefits everyone), I would happily pay another £20-30k or more.

@bunchofforgetmenots

@AgeingDoc
@Roundeartheratchriatmas

Can you please specify how much more taxes you're happy to pay? In £?

The reason for asking is that people usually say they are happy to pay more when they mean couple of hundreds or so and usually they assume PAYE taxation.

If my assumptions of what's coming are correct, then someone on £125k+ will pay in a tune of £15-20k+ more via changes in pensions and dividends/interests taxation. This is excluding current childcare threshold. Before everyone jumps in about "tiny number of people" - it's going to be over 1m people in this tax band in 12 months.
If you're in this bracket and have at least one DC in private, your extra tax will be over £25k pa - still happy to pay more?

And let me repeat my question posted earlier - what extra share of your estate you're happy to take from your kids and pass to HMRC? or your own inheritance?

Statistically, people reach this level of pay later in life, 40+ or later (of course there are early stars etc but still) at the peak of their careers. Such taxation kills incentive to work so they will reduce hours or retire early. I've been trying to find a consultant privately for my SEN DC - all experienced ones have many months long waiting list, despite sky high fees. Why? they only work 1-2 days a week.

Yes the taxation of middle or high income single parents is really unfair. At a salary of £51k, you pay far more tax than two parents each on £25k. If you make much more, you lose child benefit and then childcare support despite a couple on double the income potentially still getting it. And it’s harder to earn the money in the first place because you’re doing everything yourself.

I’m on £80k but after childcare I’m left with £2k per month. If I paid another 10% tax on the top part of my income I’d be left with c.£1,750, which isn’t really viable to live on. I’d be worse off making over £100k due to the loss of childcare subsidy.

Our household pay thousands a month in tax and I’m more than happy to. Providing it goes where it’s supposed to, public services and supporting the most vulnerable.

Also happy to pay and think higher taxes probably safe money anyway.
Pay higher taxes or pay for dental treatment and knee replacements yourself.
Spend £1 on Sure Starts, libraries, and sports centres or spend £3 on prisons, benefits and youth offending.
Pay higher taxes or pay to fix the damage potholes did to your car.
And so on.
I think low taxes are just short sighted and will cost us all more in the long run plus lead to a less pleasant place to live.

I'm in Scotland, so already pay nearly £2k more than I would if I was in England.

For a long time I was happy with this. It felt like a fair price for free prescriptions, better access to NHS dentists, and the fact that the people on the lowest incomes were paying less tax.

As time has gone on, I feel the balance has shifted. So many more people are paying extra tax and fewer people are paying less. I don't see the value any more.

I'd be pleased to pay more tax and see it spent on NHS, social care, education, housing, poverty, clean rivers, etc. I'm on low-middle income, no benefits and am single parent, but its really worth paying for things that make a better quality of life for everyone.

Not happy to pay more. There isn't much to show for what you pay.

Thats what conservatism is

DH and I are both higher rate tax payers who would be happy to pay more income tax if we were confident it was actually going to improve public services. We don't want to contribute to things like dodgy PPE deals and new boats for party donors though...hopefully less of an issue going forwards but let's see what happens.

Absolutely not happy to pay more. Like many in the thread we are paying around 100k just in income taxes in our household before you even think about capital gains tax, or VAT + extortionate council tax, and for all of this we are not getting a great service.

It is not right for a small percentage of people to pay huge sums of money in tax, and it’s also not right for those lower earners to be made to pay still quite a bit of tax when they can’t afford it. The whole system does not work.

Taxes should be reduced across the board and state reliance also drastically reduced and streamlined. People sat on benefits needs to be drastically cut down on and wastage in all of the services needs to be reduced. The government should be ashamed of wasting everyone’s money tbh, and people sat on benefits talking about higher earners should pay more taxes should also be ashamed of that.

I’m sure the basic services like NHS could be provided much more efficiently and even with that - many higher earners are paying for private health care on top of paying so many taxes, so paying over the odds for it and not even using it.

In principle I don’t mind paying tax. And I wouldn’t grumble if it wasn’t for the following:

First, the U.K. is unbearably crowded. Here in Essex I’m surrounded by ghastly rabbit hutch houses all jammed on top of one another. It’s also noisy. I was woken at 2 am this morning by the screeching and exploding of boy racer cars. If the U.K. (and the world generally) wasn’t so crowded, I could find a nice quiet place to live. But to find peace and quiet in the U.K. you need money - lots and lots of it. The noise and lack of personal space is awful and is really impacting my mental health. If I had a bit of garden, and a bit of space, I’d be content. I really wouldn’t want much else. But to have those things I need to save every penny. I also don’t want to live around violent and unpleasant people. Again, that takes money.

Second, so many of the people who receive welfare don’t deserve it. My cousin is basically Vicky Pollard. She’s ignorant, rude and violent. She’s had three children by different men, and is a lazy, useless mother who has brought them up to be as lazy, rude, anti-social and entitled as she is. Needless to say she’s never worked and has spent most of her life on welfare. In return for the tens of thousands of pounds wasted on her, society has got three ignorant, uneducated, unskilled kids who will be nothing but a drain.

Third, I don’t trust left-wing governments to spend the money wisely. If they used it to preserve beautiful buildings, keep the museums and art galleries free, repair the roads, maintain the armed forces, improve public transport, fund proper degrees (physics, chemistry, engineering, biochemistry, even the study of Shakespeare and medieval art), etc, it wouldn’t be so bad. But they’ll blow it on ‘diversity and inclusion managers’, ‘de-colonising the libraries’, social housing for illegal immigrants, and so on. The left have a genius for wasting public money.

Obviously that’s a bit simplistic. I know there are many, many people who need and deserve help. Though I sound heartless I’m really not. I do care about the good people, and I do want to help them. But I’m realistic. The NHS is another example. If something is free, people will take, take, take. It’s human nature. I know people who are constantly at the doctors and treat it like a day out. The slightest twinge in their knee, or a blocked nose, and off they go. The more money you pour into their GP surgery, the more often they’ll visit.

Kind of struggling now so higher taxes are not welcome I am afraid. I also get caught with private dentistry costs and podiatry as no help available. Pay rises have been scant for a decade or more. Worrying times

Happy to pay tax.

Not happy that we have shit public services and that the NHS is so useless I have to pay a second time to access healthcare.

I actually dont want to pay more. I'm a single parent wit no help from my DCs other parent and I'm taxed a LOT on every penny i earn, I get no personal allowance and carry a huge tax burden. What I would like to see is 1. money being more appropriately and accountably spent 2. the super rich paying their fair share and 3. there being incentive to actually work.

My partner pays the higher tax rate and I'm on the lower one and I'm not happy about paying more tax. Go after the tax dodging corporations and leave the public alone.

This is me too, and how I feel. I'm a single parent with no support and feel like I am expected to pay for quite a few things I am excluded from accessing.