Reeves’ Budget Dread

I'm a bit worried about the impact on jobs & pay rises with the increase in employers Nic.
One thing I don't understand though, is I'm a beneficiary of my dh pension. If that was over £325k with his bonds, savings, share of the house, would I as his wife have to pay inheritance tax

Extra money for schools and healthcare, and for mental health and SEND, initiatives to try and crack down on shoplifting by criminal gangs, and funding for homelessness /rough sleeping.
The latter issues have honestly destroyed some urban centres which now feel incredibly unsafe, so im thrilled they are attempting to tackle this.
Funding for capital spending for schools - its ridiculous what a state schools are in and having worked with schools i know it's been next to impossible for them to secure funding even for stuff like replacing a leaking portacabin classroom with a proper building.
Im very pleased with the rise on SDLT for second homes, great stuff.
So yep lots of good!

Wealthyish household here. I think she bottled it and the budget delivered wasn’t the budget originally planned. They spent the first hundred days pissing people off. They had nowhere really to go.

I’ll be impacted by capital gains and inheritance tax but my parents are relatively young. There will be many conservative governments ahead to deal with that.

The only thing that will change for me is I will let a member of staff go that has done nothing wrong. Profit margins are important and I’m not prepared to reduce my own standard of living for someone else. This will become an ongoing theme everywhere.

This. It's quite funny to watch actually.

Don’t be so ridiculous & cringy. You understood.

Basically the employers NI rise will be paid for by lack of wage rises.

Things like NMW rises will be paid for by inflation in the cost of various things. So your Costa is going to cost more etc.

I guess you either agree with these things or you don't.

But it is a stealth budget. Everyone is going to get taxed to pay that 40 billion. It's just that they are being taxed by stealth rather than taxed directly.

Well if you believed the right wing press, they all thought it'd be a lot worse and now they're scrambling.

I haven't had a chance to look properly yet, what are you particularly pleased with?

Omg this! I loved it. So many good initiatives

Totally agree.

My problem with this budget is the change in how debt is measured which will allow her to borrow more. I don’t necessarily have a problem with the borrowing but I don’t like the optics of changing parameters to allow you to do something the original ones wouldn’t.
Potentially the NI hike could backfire too and prevent people taking on extra staff. I’ll watch and see before I feel too optimistic.

I think it’s a pretty marvellous budget. Listened to the whole lot on the radio.

Bravo Labour.

We’re higher earners with no DC in private school and I’m quite relieved not to be hammered tbh (although I spoilt my ballot in July because all parties were appalling).

It’s not made me a particular fan of the Labour government, but it’s not going to impact my life negatively either.

I see remarkably little in terms of personal tax impact at all from this budget after all the pearl clutching and wailing of most of the media for the last week. 🙄

I did not vote Labour but I don’t have any gripes, particularly. Maybe businesspeople’s concerns about employer NICs and the impact on small companies should be addressed. But what exactly are you worried about, OP?

The OP makes zero sense. How can you have a feeling of dread after you know what’s in the budget? Isn’t dread an anticipatory emotion?

Or a ‘striving’ private school parent?
I thought it was pretty decent…

Which points exactly go against the manifesto?

Please be more specific.

I don’t like this Labour party but IMO the budget is very broadly speaking a small step in the right direction.

Also seems wholly in line with what they trailed in the manifesto and since.

I agree.

What exactly are you dreading? How are you personally affected?

Are you a non dom with a private jet op?
I personally thought it was a good budget

I worry about the impact on business with the NI raise, that it wont help promote growth. With public services it will be a bit give with one hand and take with the other. The NHS, schools etc wage bill will go up 1.5%, doesn't sound like much, but in the context of the nhs it's billions.

You understand perfectly well, don't be a knob.

What are you dreading? It seems a fairly benign budget, all in. We’re a wealthy household and it doesn’t really affect us in the slightest (until October 2026 when DH will have to reconsider the cost of his social vaping) so not much to complain about at this end of the income scale; at the other end, rise to NMW, changes to Carer Allowance and UC debt payments are obviously going to benefit many. A few business owners with tight margins may have concerns about NI rises, but that was pretty much from the manifesto, it shouldn’t come as a surprise.