Welfare spending–Is Govt trying to goad me with letter on how my tax is spent?

[windygallows]

Received annual letter noting how much I’ve paid in tax and how that tax is divided (see pic). I understand the Tories started this practice a few years ago.

It’s useful to see how the money is spent and good to be informed but I can’t help thinking that the Tories done this just to showcase HOW much is spent on Welfare spending in order to reduce this.

Frankly I’m more concerned about (a) the amount we spend on debt - a huge amount and completely wasted money - and (b) how little is spent in the arts and culture (so depressing) and the environment.

Have others received a similar letter and what do they think?

I’ve found a few articles about this below but no opinion pieces, hence interested in people's thoughts- www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/tax/11204213/Voters-to-get-letters-showing-how-much-of-their-money-is-spent-on-benefits.html

This is interesting too - yougov.co.uk/news/2014/11/09/public-attitudes-tax-distribution/

The pensions figure that is separate is public sector pensions (for teachers, police, etc). Even though these were earned during their working life they are actually paid for out of current taxation.

State pensions (as well as pension credit, etc) are all part of welfare. Lodbat's figures are correct. State pensions are the biggest component of welfare spending. But the government does like to gloss over this and imply it's all working age benefits for scroungers

I like it, it shows how little we actually spend on international aid etc, regardless of what the daily mail would like us to believe!

Thank you to those who have explained what the welfare figure includes. They do certainly make it look as though state pension is separate, when in fact that figure is public sector pensions. It's very misleading.

Candlelights- it is actually the other way round. The state pensions sections shows just the state pension which everyone is entitled to dependant in nations insurance history. Pensions credits and public sector pensions are shown under the welfare section. The below is copy and pasted from the gov.orgs explanation of the tax spending statements:

For instance, state pensions are a significant area of ‘social protection’, so they have been shown as a separate category. As the data for state pensions is not published separately in PESA for 2016/17, the state pension number is taken from the Office for Budgetary Responsibility’s Economic and Fiscal Outlook, March 20177_. The remainder of ‘social protection’ has also been renamed ‘welfare’, in line with the consideration that terms should be accessible and easily understood by taxpayers. The Social protection category follows UN Statistics guidance (as outlined above) it therefore includes spending on items such as unemployment benefits, tax credits, public sector pensions and various benefits/support covering categories such ‘old age’, ‘sickness and disability’, ‘Housing’, ‘Family/Children’ and ‘personal social services’.

Would you be happy to pay more tax, purely for the arts? Yes, too true I would. It is higher on my priority list than others though because I do work in that sector.

crisscrosscranky Sun 15-Apr-18 09:26:08
you earn around £40k and have paid around 25% of your income into a pot that ensures you have access to free, good quality healthcare, schools for your children, if you lose your job tomorrow you have some benefits to fall back on, libraries and parks to access for free and the most vulnerable in our society are protected (the poor, the ill and the elderly).

Croscross, I agreed with everything you wrote until I was put off by the use of 'the most vulnerable in society', my most hated phrase. It's so meaningless. I'd like to see a 'pie chart' showing who 'the most vulnerable in society' are and one would discover, at different times in life, it is everyone. The phrase is completely emotive, impossible to calculate and not very helpful way to label people.

*One would discover, at different times in life, it is everyone.
*
But isn't that the point? It was me once (poor) but now I'm in a very fortunate position (tax credits helped me back to work- without them I couldn't have afforded to return after mat leave). I hope that if it's ever me again that the system will still be there to help me back on my feet. I think of my tax and NICs as an insurance policy rather than a penalty.

As an aside I can't vote for labour whilst they talk about cutting taxes- the first political party that talks about increasing taxes to improve the NHS, public services and schools in less affluent areas will get my vote and I say that as a higher rate taxpayer!

I think it's a good idea. It might even inspire people to look st it more carefully.

I came on here to have a go at people who were claiming the figures were being misrepresented to make welfare look big. But now that I've discovered public sector pensions are included in welfare, I think that's outrageous, far worse than if state pensions were included.

The occupational pensions of army generals and top Whitehall mandarins will be classified as welfare spending in the tax transparency statements that George Osborne has promised every taxpayer.

www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/nov/04/welfare-tax-statements-prime-minister-pension

Having said that, further googling has shown that public sector pensions are only 3% of the overall pie chart, so actually make hardly any difference to the picture of how much we spend on welfare.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-29898083

The government are lying, but it's a small lie.

It's transparent government. We need more of it, not less. The cost of sending those letters is a drop in a very big ocean.

It's entirely political but has at least the potential for more transparency.

It would give a completely different impression if the "welfare" figure was split into categories such as "disability benefits" "out of work benefits" "benefits paid to those in work" and the vanishingly small "benefit fraud". So there have been presentational decisions taken.

it is good they tell u s but I agree splitting down the different welfare elements into separate categories would be even more useful particularly as people are so interested eg how much is on disability benefits, how much on tax credits to working families (to see how much the state supports low wages paid by employers) and that kind of thing.

I am very veyr happy though to get this data - we never got it in the old days and that was a mistake. At least now we have some idea what is spent where.

I am not sure the poster really wants everyone to know what she earns though so I might take off the original picture if I were she as we can probably work it out from the net tax paid figure.

I’ve never understood why they hide pensions under welfare. I guess it plays into the DM narrative they we are wasting X on workshy scroungers.

The most vulnerable would be at risk children, people with mental health issues,
Homeless people and families etc. Groups that the majority will never fall into.

Smeaton, the problem is that's who YOU think the most vulnerable in society are. Other people would come up with a different list. I hate the phrase as think it's similar to 'the needy' which wasn't a helpful term either and filled with emotion and very subjective. I'd rather we classify people based on ways that we can measure. If we're ALL the most vulnerable at different times how can we ensure that we are actually meeting the needs of THE MOST VULNERABLE. It's a rubbish phrase and has been a catchall phrase that suggests we're meeting the needs of the most needy when we may not be - - hence the reason politicians use it so much these days!