AIBU to not understand why some people seem to have an absolute hatred for rich people in this country.

[Barbierella]

I cannot understand why people find it acceptable to slate rich people as if they are all the same and responsible for all that is wrong in society.

Surely people can understand that many rich people do pay tax and generally are an asset to society? And without the many successful businesses in the private sector we would not have a public sector?

AIBU to think that people who like to lump all rich people into one tax avoiding bunch of tossers can be the very same people who get outraged at the lumping of all out of work people as benefit scroungers?

Neither are ok in IMO.

This country seems to being run for the benefit of rich people, and I mean very rich people - not Gary Barlow or Jimmy Carr, who are rich and quite possibly selfish, but have been dealt with.

The Super Rich have have no accountability or ties to Britain and pay no taxes here so are of no benefit to the nation as a whole. They are like locusts and when they have exhausted all benefits to them, they will take their money and shack up in some other tax haven/money laundering paradise.

I really don't know why Dave and Boris and Gideon suck up to them. Well, I have my suspicions, but I rather hoped they'd be governing for the good of most people in the UK or London rather than their own narrow interests.

i had a wannba communist work for for me once and he banged on about how unfair it was i owned the assests of production. he was willfully blind that i created my asset of production.

most people i meet seemt to take people at face value whether they are rich or poor.

I agree OP. I had someone tell me recently tell me that he wishes he could go to Ascot and shoot all the rich people and take their wealth off them.

I do wonder where rich people got all their money from and I’m concerned that they may not have paid people decent wages or have paid their fair share of tax.
With poor people I’m concerned that they are not on the scrounge.
For someone in the middle like me and my family it can seem as though we’re contributing more than our share.
Perhaps we are thinking in stereotypes about both groups.

I think the 'trickle down' theory has been disputed hasn't it? When do many cannot benefit from soaring house prices. Wages are not rising in line with the cost of living .

Anyway it's not a personal thing, is it. I want my doctor/consultant/lawyer/teacher/nurse paid well. It's more about inequality.

Pirate
In a way you are doing exactly what the OP is talking about. The causes of the recession are more complex than just blaming rich bankers (yes the financial services sector is culpable but not wholly so). You focus on rich bankers but don't mention political pressures, trade imbalances, excessive personal debt, economic imbalances caused by the Euro etc.

www.economist.com/news/schoolsbrief/21584534-effects-financial-crisis-are-still-being-felt-five-years-article

Its too simplistic to blame rich bankers. Its also worth remembering that many people who work in the financial services sector are not rich bankers - I doubt many people working in a bank's call centre fall into that catagory.

And anyway / it's hardly earth shattering to point out they not all rich people are bastards. Of course they aren't!

wealthy people have more power than poor people - I don't judge anyone based on their wealth - I judge them on how they use that power

ConferencePear you are looking at it like a zero sum game. if one person has money, who has it come from?

i sell ideas to large companies that make their people's lives easier. the ideas come from my head. i pay people to assist me. i pay them well because otherwise they would get a job with a competitor.

who looses?

Apparently the highest earning 1% of people in the UK contribute 30% of all income tax. According to 'This is Money'.

On that basis, I would agree that they are an asset to society.

It's too simplistic to simply say 'they will get a job with a competitor' - that very much depends on the market, the skill set, location, etc etc. I'm glad you pay your support team well, but unfortunately that's too often not the case.

the market is boyant and will remain so.

am not trying to simplify everything, merely put my own case.

I don't mix in rich circles, so the only time I hear about rich people is when they are in the news. So Bill & Mellisa Gates, JK Rowling and Warren Buffett get written about for their philanthropy. Apart from them (and similar), it is Gary Barlow/Jimmy Carr-type dodgy tax schemes, large company directors' double-digit income rises year-on-year versus their employees zero hour contracts, bankers who gambled the country into recession still being paid bonuses etc. etc. that reach the news.

SO no, I don't hate all rich people. But I do despise those money-grubbing bastards who screw over the rest of us and who entrench their privileged position so that the rest of society is kept down.

Millie - I just googled your stats there and was directed to the Daily Mail of all places . One reader's response was interesting -

"probably my maths is wrong but 308,000 paying 47 billion a year in tax works out at 152,000 a year each. But they are only earning 150,000 or more?? The fact is that 93% of all earnings are taken home by less that 7% of the tax paying population of about 21 million people. And the rest of us - all 93% of us take home the other 7%. That's about 19 million of us sharing out 7 in every 100 earned!! And in the meantime, tax evasion costs is 90 billion a yar and tax avoidance costs us 80 billion a year"

actualy i agree that some parts of banking has become like a private taxation system, creaming off a margin from everyone else's money.

why can a pension fund charge you when they are performing badly? lack of meaningful competition.

And that's great your personal market is boyant....but so may markets are not so, with those at the bottom falling further and futher behind those at the top. Which is not great.

its the problem of machines and other countries out completing some people in the UK. the solution is education. actually the solution is valuing education.

Some people who are considered rich and in the top 1% of earners are actually taxed at source, are employed rather than employers and are financially contributing huge amounts to society, normally around half their income if they earn say around 150k a year.

Why would we hate these people?

you mean where she said that rich people are not an asset, they own assets?

Well yes, I agree with that.

It's what you do with your assets that determines how much of an asset to society you yourself are, not simply the fact that you have them. I think that's quite a reasonable and rational point of view. I can't really argue with that, tbh.

No, I haven't heard generalisations about rich people. I am not saying they aren't made, I can't possibly know that. If you have heard them then you have heard them, I accept that without reservation. I can only say that hand on heart I have never seen or heard general lumping in negative discussion of or vilification of the rich.

I have heard generalisations about poor people. A lot. Not to mention all the exploitative tv programmes giving the worst possible picture of poor people, including all those 'look at this load of scum on benefits, swearing, eating crap and watching their big telly' programmes. And news reports about poor people. And statistics about poor people. and so on and so forth. But no, I haven't heard general vilification of all rich people just because of bank balance. I've heard discussion of specific people based on their behaviour, eg when someone is in the news for trying to dodge tax. I've heard celeb crap about who's wasting how much money on what pointless stuff, things like that. But the widespread and systematic demonisation of the rich? Nope. I have yet to experience that particular prejudice.

Why would we hate these people? fear of the unknown. jealoussy, many reasons

... actually the real solution is stopping thinking of intelligence as something either you have or dont.

"I have never seen or heard general lumping in negative discussion of or vilification of the rich. "
I rewrote that bit and it reads terribly. I meant

I have never seen or heard negative discussions that just lump all rich people together or the general vilification of people who just happen to have money.

I have no problem with rich people.
I have a problem with tax exiles.
If you want an Irish passport ( or wherever), pay your tax in Ireland ( or the countey you want your passport from).
Our laws are so lax.... at one point you could stay til midnight in the country and it wouldn't be counted as a day!!!
Or you could fly into Northern Ireland and drive down through the (open)border.

Youaremyfavouritewasteoftime I have no objection to you or anyone else selling your talents or good ideas for profit. I am glad that your talents and or education allow you to do that. Provided you pay your taxes treat your employees well I will even admire you for it. Equally I know that there are some people who have few talents and little education who do jobs which are essential for society and which in my opinion should be better paid. Generally speaking this is the group that is most easily exploited.

It also seems reasonable to me that everyone should pay tax; deciding what is a fair proportion is where I have a problem making my mind up.

I agree with whoever said that people in general aren't angry enough. The richest 1% of the population own as much wealth as the poorest 55% of the population. What isn't shocking about that in 2014?

normally around half their income if they earn say around 150k a year.

Take home on £150k is just over £90k, even before claiming back the tax on any pension contributions etc.

It concerns me that so many people struggle to tell the difference between "50% tax on income over £150k" and "50% tax on income of £150k".
(Also, it's now dropped to 45%. Because of how we hate the rich in this country and all.)