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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to think Adelle is greedy, ignorant and ungrateful?

179 replies

MrIC · 26/05/2011 10:55

www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2011/may/25/adele-tax-grievances

Surely most people would just be pleased that they'd earned £8 million, and grateful to the general public for spending so much money on her music?

Also, while she clearly doesn't realise trains have been privatised, she presumably never plans to use a road or pavement again - as clearly her tax bill couldn't go towards paying for them? Likewise I imagine she never plans to avail herself of the police, fire or ambulance services? Nor of course is she benefiting financially from the various free-trade agreements (worked out at the taxpayers' expense) that allow her to sell her music overseas and thus get such a whopping tax bill? She make think state schools are shit, but she went to one - who does she think paid for it?

Why is it the more money people seem to earn the stingier they get?

OP posts:
GwendolineMaryLacey · 26/05/2011 11:30

No idea who she is so I won't let her worry me.

knittynoodle · 26/05/2011 11:30

Didnt she make all that money by pinching Bob Dylans 'Feel My Love'? Angry

reelingintheyears · 26/05/2011 11:32

The whole 'i can't go out now because i'm famous' which is what i think she is implying by not being able to use the trains is daft.

There are very few 'celebrities' that i would actually recognise and i would never approach them if i did.

She looks a pretty girl but not outstandingly stunning or recognisable without make up and fake eyelashes.

SuePurblybilt · 26/05/2011 11:32

I think you mean ruining Bob Dylan's 'Feel my love' there kittynoodle

CurrySpice · 26/05/2011 11:33

She didn't pinch it, she covered it. And wrote many songs herself.

She's just being a bit of a silly little girl. I take VERY little notice of the political ramblings of any slebs tbh

I moan about oaying taxes. I don't begrudge it, but I still have a moan Wink

CurrySpice · 26/05/2011 11:33

What I meant to say is that she won't be making pots of money out of that cover - Bob Dylan will

Runninupthatbill · 26/05/2011 11:40

I was going to buy both her albums but that has kind of put me off (sometimes it's best not to read interviews from musicians). I know she's (relatively) young and inexperienced but that just seemed like a really vulgar/churlish thing to say - even with goading or prompting from an interviewer.

MilkNoSugarPlease · 26/05/2011 11:49

God she annoys me! I won't lie, I do moan about paying tax sometimes, when its a difficult month she I could do with the extra money....but I do not begrudge paying it....regardless of train times! I think there is a huge difference

I'm 22 so I don't think her age is anything to do with it!

silverfrog · 26/05/2011 11:57

she's young, she's silly.

I look at our tax bill and think "fuck. that's a lot of money"

and I have a moan about it occasionally (over things like not being able to find a state school that can cope with dd1, and not being able to get some of ehr health issues taken seriously, etc)

that doesn't mean I begrudge it, thoguh.

just that I htink it is a lot of money, and that (in some areas) we as a family do not always seem to get value for money.

and then I remember what we do get, and still think it is a lot of oney, but that it needs paying etc.

this was one strand of thought of Adele's - and yes, she was unwise to spout off to the newspapers about it.

but honestly - if any of you were faced witha bill for £4million - would your first thought be "oooh, how lovely. a nice big whack of tax - that'll pay for some hospitals/schools/bobbies on the beat" or would it be "fuck. that's a hell of a bill"

fatlazymummy · 26/05/2011 12:06

Nothing out of the ordinary here. I'm sure most of us have been shocked about our tax bills. In the 70's a lot of celebrities [the Rolling Stones come to mind] pissed off into tax exile. She does need to learn to be more careful about what she says in public, especially interviews.

nijinsky · 26/05/2011 12:08

No, I don't think she's any of those things. And from a tax point of view, she's paying far more tax than me. She is just expressing what many of us think when seeing how much tax we pay in our pay statements.

Its a bit like the government criticising companies for making "obscene profits". Anyone who pays lots of tax is criticised, yet they still pay lots of tax. They can't win. Would it be better if they made obscene losses.

I certainly have more time for her than a hypocritical wife beater like Sean Connery, who has lived abroad in a low tax regime country for years, yet still sees fit to lecture Scots on how to run their country.

minipie · 26/05/2011 12:11

I don't moan about paying tax. Anyone who earns a lot has got there partly through hard work, yes, but also (probably mostly) due to luck - good genes, good parenting, right place at the right time. It's entirely fair to share the proceeds of that luck with other people who haven't been as lucky.

Adele should remember that the reason she earns such a lot is mostly because she was lucky to be born with a good voice, and lucky to be in the right place at the right time and be given a record contract. Only a little bit is due to her own efforts. Rather less than £4m worth I'd say.

InmaculadaConcepcion · 26/05/2011 12:16

A £4m tax bill would make you gasp, it's a big figure.

But you wouldn't have that bill if you hadn't earned a minimum of £8m in the first place.

Hence why it seems a touch churlish to make a deal about it.

inappa · 26/05/2011 12:18

If I was losing 50% of my income in tax I'd be pretty happy so I don't think shes being unreasonable

inappa · 26/05/2011 12:25

unhappy not happy

bibbitybobbityhat · 26/05/2011 12:27

Well, she's very young and not the brightest.

BovrilonToast · 26/05/2011 12:30

At least she's actually paying her tax - and not using some loop hole that expensive accountants find for the rich...

ApocalypseCheeseToastie · 26/05/2011 12:31

Meh, she's crap n'all

PinotGrigiosKittens · 26/05/2011 12:32

Who is Adele? Shock Blimey.

She has said some very very silly things, but she is young. True, I was married and pregnant at her age and therefore much wiser but she'll regret what she said soon enough.

Til then, her Music Label who are making a fortune off her should give her some PR advice, pronto.

Miggsie · 26/05/2011 12:33

I expect her accountant is deeply relieved she is talking this crap to a journalist, and not to him.

ikoto · 26/05/2011 12:33

I don't think she's been greedy, she's paying far more in then she is getting out and that narks her which I think is a more than understandable reaction to be honest

Hammy02 · 26/05/2011 12:36

I think the comments were probably taken out of context. I've seen her in interviews and she is really bubbly, really funny, and self-depracating. If she said it in all seriousness, fair enough, she's an idiot, but if she said it in a 'farking hell, 4 million quid, yer having a larf' kind of way, then so what.

CeliaFate · 26/05/2011 12:42

She's only early twenties though. That sort of indignant, self-righteous ranting is what we all did, she's just done it in print so it'll come back and bite her in the arse unfortunately.

piratecat · 26/05/2011 12:43

it's time to do this

!!

InmaculadaConcepcion · 26/05/2011 12:45

ikoto, that's how the tax system works, when it works properly. Those who can afford to pay more do so and subsidise those who pay least. It wouldn't work if people paid only for the services they used - the majority of the population couldn't afford it, for a start.

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