AIBU to feel disheartened by earning into the higher tax band?

How are you on Plan 1? I graduated 11 years ago and am on Plan 2?

Same here. It helps that even £50k is far more than I need to live on, so anything above that is a bonus.

@southcoastsammy don't be disingenuous. The amount of benefits a family with DC paying rent and childcare will be far more than a few hundred pounds a month. It can be many times that, especially now the 2 child limit has stopped, and can really close the cap between low earning families and those earning a lot more but not entitled to any help.

Might have escaped your notice but benefit claimants who have fallen out of work, or who claim UC top ups are tax payers too, as are many on sickness benefits. There are ma claimants who use the system according to its original intention - to pay in when you can and take out when you need to. And fiscal drag is it work of the Tories - not normally known for their socialist ideals.

Same, this is trotted out all the time ‘oh I’ll just go on benefits’ - fair play to you if you can live off £500/600 a month. I’d struggle with that.

That would be a single person. That’s quite different to being a single parent, with two or three children, some childcare still needed.

A woman in a council or HA property, having rent and council tax mostly paid, with a couple of young children would probably be as well off/ better off on benefits as earning £50k, much less so with a mortgage. Benefits attract free school meals, free prescriptions (adult), free childcare, Cold Weather payments, NI credits, and don’t forget some partners (not officially living with them) contributing financially.

And this is one of the reasons the election results went the way they did.

I moved into the higher tax rate at a later age and honestly how much tax I pay doesn’t bother me, I am just feeling lucky that I have managed to get here. I say that as someone from a family where 30k seemed an amazing wage, no one in my family or friends have ever paid higher rate tax so maybe that colours my views.

You can do salary sacrifice pension pot (for us its called AVCs not NHS but public sector) and it will bring you under the threshold or if the NHS offer buying holiday that's another one.

I'm in Scotland where to be a higher rate tax payer amount is a lot lower then RUK (£43,633) and is more 42%.

I decided to use AVCs - I still pay a shed load of tax but the difference of AVCs is that my take home pay is about the same without it but I'm also saving for earlier retirement without the reduction hit on my public sector pension.

Oh thanks. My income is lower atm but previously over 50k and lost it, as a single income household 😡

Where I am that's kinda normal. We have the highest taxes in the world. We work for the govt and they let us keep a little to get by.
Hate how little we get on pay day vs how hard we work.

I frame this differently. I'm fairly marginally in the 40% tax band, and anticipate that in the medium- to long-term I'll go significantly deeper.

However, I won't view this as earning more money. I'll view it as earning more time off. We can buy holiday, so I'll keep my money below the threshold by doing this. Once I earn enough that a 4-day week will earn me around the threshold, I'll move down to 4 days. I'll do the same if I earn enough that a 3-day week will do the same.

Once you earn around £3k a month, an extra £500 or even £1000 can't buy as much happiness as the time doing things other than work will.

Labour taxes for the average worker are lower than the OECD average and much lower than our closest European neighbours.

A scottish graduate would not be paying 9% loan repayment - take home is higher

DH dropped a day to 4 days a week, he found the extra time more valuable than the extra money.

pay the extra into your pension

Don’t be ridiculous.

You don’t know 1 person that has chosen to go from earning £50k to being on benefits on less than £12k a year.

It does suck. I’ve recently come into this situation too. I try to reframe it by looking at the overall I receive. My salary pretty much doubled in the last 6 months which helped, but it would have to be a significant increase to move anywhere now
For anyone saying they’d swap salaries with you, there have been so many sacrifices I’ve made in the last few years to get to this point and I’m sure the OP has had them too.

I think it is a poor understanding of taxation and money in your pocket. Firstly I think paying for a degree is wrong. I have never agreed with it so I do totally feel for you there, but on tax, the more you earn the more tax you pay… but the more you earn. You are still earning more just less of it as a proportion. Your pension contributions will go up as well which will mean you will get more back on those savings, which will give you a more comfortable old age.
I speak as someone in the same bracket and guess what? I still have more money in my pay packet at the end of the month, access the the NHS and roads. My children are at college (free) and one who is at uni, is benefiting from my higher earnings from not having to take out a massive student loan, as one he can’t have as much but secondary because we can afford to pay his living expenses.
yup I get it but you are consentrating on the wrong bit.

live within your means and not what you think you deserve and life becomes much easier. We have a choice, I see people everyday in my job who earn minimum wage who struggle to make ends meet,

if someone said you don’t have to pay tax, would I take it, course I would, do I make sure I claim every penny of allowance I can think of, course I do (you should check too, I can claim for professional fees). But the truth is I have always earned more after a pay rise no matter what the tax is, I always want more and feel grumpy, but ultimately I am still better off, and I am better off than most so it is worth it.

Your paying back your student loan isn’t paying tax - it’s reducing debt on money you owe.
put more money in your pension and stop whining.
I have paid very little tax, then ‘normal tax’ the higher tax over the years. I am much better off now paying a load of tax than any other time.
You can always pop off to Dubai…

It does seem that more and more people are choosing that! But, if we ALL did, where, exactly, would the country be??

It's crackers isn't it. I might be wrong but I don't think Labour have made any significant changes to income taxes since they came in. Fiscal drag, the child benefit taper, the personal allowance taper, the annual allowance taper, the 45% top rate - all introduced by the Tories. This isn't to say Boo Tories, Yay Labour - far from it - it's to point out that no matter which government we have the very difficult financial situation we're in will be the same, the ways to deal with it are very limited, and despite what the likes of Farage and various brass-necked Tories are telling you, they won't be able to massively lower taxes and undo this supposed 'socialism' either.

...but as to the OP's original point; if it doesn't seem worth bothering then don't. And how did you not know what the repayment terms on your student loan would be?

Edit: apologies this was meant to quote thepariscrimefiles above.

I think you need to talk to a financial planner. My partners work provide one for them in February March when bonuses and pay rises are sorted. He is just over the £100k by putting more in pension, taking every insurance dental plan private health doctor on demand etc etc it is possible to save a lot of tax whilst not tying up the money long-term. He also has shares they advise on. If they don't have one at your work it would be worth ringing a private one

A lot of people consider the Conservatives from Cameron onwards as a quasi socialist movement. Hence the rise of Reform.