Inheirtance tax of 10%

No one with more money will be better off, a Labour government will make sure of that.

For married couples leaving their estate including their main home to their children or grandchildren, they'd be worse off for estates under £1.33m, better off over that.

At the moment they'd pay no IHT on an estate under £1m.

Anyone with assets more than the nil rate bands would benefit from this lower rate. The nil rate band is currently £325k and residence nil rate band of up to £175k, so £500k.

I can’t find anything more than headlines on it, but presumably he would intend to scrap agricultural and business reliefs, conditional exemptions, etc, so individuals with those types of assets may be worse off.

I'd be interested in the provenance of the research, it doesn't seem as detailed as wren-lewis's. But even if it's accurate and there's no difference economically between the parties then:

(1) that destroys the right wing press stance that Labour are terrible for the economy, which has been their constant theme for around 40 years.

(2) If their performance on the economy is the same, then surely it's better to vote labour as you get the same economic performance but also investment in public services, more social cohesion, less racism, better safety nets etc. Remember it was Labour that set up the NHS.

{3} if we hadn't voted in the Tories we wouldn't have had Brexit (which was entirely about the Tory party, not what was good for the UK). This alone should be enough to stop anyone voting for the conservatives or reform for a generation.

Yet this research concludes there is no meaningful difference. Research eh?

https://theconversation.com/have-labour-or-the-conservatives-run-the-uk-economy-better-in-the-past-50-years-new-research-233370

At what amount will the 10% become advantageous to people over the 40% that people pay now

Here you go, someone that knows more than most of us about economics, Simon Wren Lewis, a professor at Oxford and one of the most respected economists working on the UK. He's looked at the past 40 years and concluded the the conservatives are "terrible" at running the economy.

https://mainlymacro.blogspot.com/2021/03/why-are-conservatives-so-bad-at-running.html?m=1

Well done on cherry picking a period in our history immediately after a global financial crash to attempt to demonstrate your point.

Id love to see your evidence that left wing parties are better for the economy in the UK.

And why should the state have it?!

You do presumably know that left wing parties (labour and the democrats) tend to be better for the economy than the right? GDP per head of population tends to rise faster under the left (at more than its long term trend of 2% pa) and slower under the right.

The 14 years of the Tories were particularly bad for gdp growth - which as any A level economics student would tell you was no suprise because under Cameron & Osborne's policy of austerity they stopped spending so the entire economy shrunk, or grew very slowly, and in turn tax revenue shrunk.

However under the left the fiscal deficit tends to shrink, so the left tends to run something closer to a balanced budget whereas under the right taxes fall and the deficit increases.

It's easy to demonstrate - when Cameron took power in 2010 the country's total debt was approx £1trn. Their objective was to reduce spending and reduce this debt. They totally failed, total debt grew to £2trn by 2020 (pre COVID). And in the meantime public services crumbled.

So if anyone is a fiscal hawk and wants the country to run a more balanced budget they should vote for the left. The fact that you also tend to get improvements to public services, a less polarised society, less inequality, a more caring and compassionate society is just a nice little bonus.

Genuinely the right are terrible for the long term health of the economy. If the Tories are not good for the economy then it begs the question "what are they for?".

@Philgooglemail thank you. I have enjoyed this thread and find a lot of what you have posted really interesting.
I know that people have really varied views on IHT but whatever perspective people have, it’s always interesting to have measured, informed posts on here.

If we buy the white goods for a house we live in while househunting, that's entirely legit. We are taking cash from our estate to pay. The figures are fairly trivial even in total. £4k max?

And a comfortable bed. That's the top priority!

Let me be the first person to say that I am working out all my various options to ensure that the estate DH and I have created through work alone is transferred as tax-efficiently as possible to our children. We inherited very little, and passed what we did receive down a generation by DoV, to our DC who is just buying a modest 2-up 2-down Victorian cottage in a Midland City. As we have money saved, we shall pay for the fridge, freezer, washing machine and dishwasher. It works for us. When we sell our family house, we'll live in it while we wait for the house we want.

They can mitigate IHT - that’s not tax avoidance. Trusts are set up for many reasons, it’s not always tax driven.

Oh yes - given tax was duly paid, lucky him, I'm sure it made a huge difference! It doesn't change the fact that it's no more deserved by him than the next 22 year old on the bus, but life isn't fair and it's no different to a lottery win.

The stupid comment I was referring to was that someone with a £9m estate is a hoarder. That is a stupid comment.

Labour = levelling down not levelling up

They can help mitigate or avoid IHT depending on the type of trust as long as you survive 7 years.

Trusts don’t “avoid” IHT though - if they did they would have been stopped long ago.

Sounds no worse than the UK, but I don't think being the deceased's independent middle aged offspring or not financially dependent on the deceased grandchild or nephew/ niece/ sibling etc should get you out of paying tax on a large inheritance.

As a tax adviser I think the opposite would be true, more planning work would be done if more were to be caught. As it is just now, about 5% of estates lay tax and a couple can die with up to £1m of assets without paying tax. With a proposed 10% flat rate they’re suddenly paying £100k of tax on death.

Well quite.

The only arguments against it seem to be rather Veruca Salt style foit stamping "but I don't want my heir to pay tax!" or nonsense about already having paid tax, when obviously all money is taxed again and again - get your net income, use it to buy some shopping, pay VAT, use it to buy a house, pay stamp duty.

Why would inheritance be an exception? There is no reason except the foot stamping "I want this to be an exception and should get my way even though I'll be dead because I'm special!"

Taxing rich dead people always seemed to be a better strategy than raising that money from poor living people

I believe the tax free allowances depend on your relationship to the deceased and then different tax rates depending on the amount received after your allowance has been deducted.