Where do people think money comes from?

[MrsBlobbyOnLockdown]

Everyday we are hearing pay the NHS an extra 30% pay them £26 per day extra is the latest one.

I’m not disputing they deserve it of course they do & if we had an endless supply of money it’s the first place it should go.

But seriously, where do people think all this money is coming from?

What are your thoughts

@squiglet111 the Tories aimed to reduce the DEFICIT with austerity - the amount they borrow per year. They did. But the overall DEBT (total debt) increased every year and now stands at 85% of GDP.

There is a lot of proof that austerity doesn't work as low investment in public services just causes a feedback loop and makes everyone poorer. The Keynesian way out of a recession is high government spending.

@Frouby, well, it goes to the tax-dodgers. Everytime there is a recession, and stock prices crash, that money doesn't disappear; someone "cashes out" their stocks and hides that money in Panama. When people are going bankrupt and have to sell of their house and business for pennies, like they may have to after this recession, rich investors with loads of cash can swoop in and buy them up cheaply. The cash doesn't disappear, it just disappears in the form of assets.

Money is a confidence trick that only works if people believe it. Money is only worth money. The promise on a Bank of England note is to exchange it for another one. The days when a £ was a lb in weight of silver coin are long gone. (Not that silver coins are worth anything either.)

Anyway, looks like Keynes is back in fashion so maybe we should all read him.

Money is just a way of exchanging goods and services. If lots of money is printed, but there are hardly any goods and services, the money becomes almost worthless and the goods and services are ridiculously expensive.

lenpenzo.com/blog/id602-18-scary-things-you-didnt-know-about-inflation-and-hyperinflation.html

According to the Tories, money comes from the poorest. That's why they tightened welfare, disability and sickness and forced millions into poverty.
Their 'austerity' measures proved the poor, unemployed, children and sick had far too.much money so they took it. That few percent of taxation expenditure was well worth the deaths and suicides it saved.

Where it doesn't come from, obviously, is the wealthy, the billionaires the mega rich businesses that donate to the Tories or use loopholes to avoid tax. Nope that would be silly. Better to take £10 off someone with £1000 than a £1000 off someone with £1000000.

The Bank of England report linked to above is not specifically about London and is therefore misleading regarding this debate. London housing has been the subject of several expert reports and it is far more complex than cheaper money. It’s funding of deposits, pressure from investors, supply, willingness to pay for housing and give up other things in life, and the strong desire to be in London as well as an expending population there. It all feeds into house prices.

I think there is a lot wrong with the UK tax system which is directly linked to the low wage economy in favour of big cooperate companies. Just throwing money at a broken system won't work.

An overhaul of the tax system, increased wages - for health care workers (I include all care assistants!) and consequently an increase in tax/ better services won't happen any time soon.

Money does grow on trees. It's made of fucking paper.

Anyway, no we can't afford to pay everyone who works in the NHS - most of whom never go anywhere near patients at any time while those who do do so far less right now - a million pounds each, or to pay millions of people for not working, or to have thousands of people dying. We can't afford any of it.

Actually, the greatest total sum of income tax taken by the government is from those paying 40%. Far fewer earn enough to pay the 50%. Those paying just 20% do not contribute as much. Again we have a woeful understanding of where tax comes from.

Poorer people pay vat and other taxes such as those on petrol and fags, but they don’t pay income tax in great amounts or NI. People on benefits obviously pay some tax but essentially benefit from the taxes paid by others.

There are 650 MPs in Parliament. The NHS employs 1.4 million people. Even if we made MPs work for nothing, the net 'fairness' would be pennies.

Big business is always lambasted and rightly so but the black economy in this country is far bigger overall than people realise. Think of all the non traceable cash transactions that take or took place every day in this country. People always complain about really quite minuscule sections of society that are rich, there are millions of us just regular folk who by accident or design feed the black economy.

Here is an article from a charity about tax evasion and the black economy. HRMC estimate at 33 billion others say as high as over 100 billion. fullfact.org/economy/tax-gap/

These sort of opinions always make me want to cry. if we print infinite amounts of money, it becomes worthless. Earning £2 million £ per month is pointless if a loaf of bread costs £50000. which is exactly what happens if you have endless amounts of money.
Btw, the 10k per MP was spectacular ly out of sync with the current situation, no doubt about that

Money does grow on trees. It's made of ... paper.

Increasingly not the case. It's made of polymer. And paper notes are made from high-quality cotton rag, which grows on bushes.

As we are heading for huge numbers of unemployed people do we really want to frighten away big employers??? We need people to be employed and pay taxes. This, ultimately, is how we afford anything! Including paying down debt. If we overpay the public sector, we bring about a massive further debt that others largely have to fund as well as their pensions which already cost £13 billion each year.

People on 30% tax at the lower end of that is just above the lel pay the highest percentage of their income in tax as all of their income is PAYE, they pay regressive taxes ie council tax and fuel tax at the same amount as those earning twice as much etc. So yes in monetary terms it adds up to less but in terms of tax shaped hole in their personal purse it's more significant.

Sorry, fat fingers, should be 20% tax ofc.

Those paying just 20% do not contribute as much. Again we have a woeful understanding of where tax comes from

So lower earners don't pay VAT, council tax, ins, fuel etc taxes? the bulk of the population do not pay 40% tax.

QE proves we can indeed print vast amounts of money without crashing currencies, if the "markets" think its sustainable, it is! Go back to the days of high inflation and it wasn't caused by printing money but by stupid economic policies.

I'd like to think that they could raise it from closing tax loopholes so that the likes of Branson and Philip Green pay tax on the massive amount of money that they get from businesses that trade in the UK.

But we have a Tory government, so they won't do that.

It's actually ridiculous that Philip Green/Richard Branson have spent years siphoning money off into tax havens, and Philip Green registered his wife in Monaco as owner of Topshop so he didn't have to pay tax. But now they are getting the begging bowl out and asking the government for handouts! Just like cruise ships that registered in places like Panama so they didn't have to participate in minimum wages, employee protections or pay taxes.

Oh and people who minimise tax by paying themselves through dividends, and are now upset the government will only pay them back the tiny salary that they declared. You reap what you sow.

My post clearly said income tax and then went on to say that low earners do pay other taxes. However we still cannot trash the economy and think Philip Green and Branson and Dyson with his overseas factories will sort this out. They won’t. Even taking all their wealth is a drop in the ocean. It’s tabloid economics and a gross misunderstanding of what amounts of money we need. Both of them (not that I like them) provide thousands of jobs. Although Green might not for much longer. They are high profile representatives of companies who put wealth back into the country.

@MockersxxxxxxxSocialDistancing cool, so next time some tedious berk says to me, "money doesn't grow on trees you know" I can reply "AHA no, it doesn't, but it does grow ON PAPER" and then flap my cape around.

@BubblesBuddy as I said it's one of the causes not the only.

Fuck. It does grow ON BUSHES that is. FML.

Oh no! Not the dividends myth again, this feels like a never ending story.

I don’t know why I bother but I will keep trying...

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