What would you do to raise money back after corona?

[arethereanyleftatall]

If you were in the government, what taxes/cuts would you put in place after we've all gone back to normal life?

I think I might raise VAT, or possibly have a means-tested state pension.

@EmeraldShamrock that is what I think the herd immunity plan is about, cull the elderly and disabled as they cost the economy the most money :(

I would tax the rich proportionally to how we tax everyone else
explain
as I think you'll find that the rich pay the vast majority of tax

I think I'd stop paying foreign aid.

Catsick
Foreign Aid benefits the UK and is only £9.4bn out of the £646 bn
www.ukpublicspending.co.uk/budget_pie_ukgs.php

Here is the income breakdown ....
www.ukpublicrevenue.co.uk/

Raise income tax by 1% or 2% for everyone. We need to start paying more tax to fund better services anyway, so may as well start now to help pay this back.

@Marsalimay

I would scrap most benefits and state pension and replace with a basic state income.

Me too. Incentivises work and makes sure everyone has some money. Does away with the humiliation and risk of much of the claiming process and the huge waste of money in the system.

We need to grow our economy by encouraging spending not taxing the arse off people who already have very little

Closing loopholes that amazon and costa etc use would be a good start make some headway into the people who actually owe tax instead of focusing our efforts on the smaller outstanding benefits fraud debts

Increase Air Passenger Tax, increase the highest rate of Income Tax by a little (enough to make a difference to the State, but not send people scuttling off to live abroad), close corporate tax loopholes.

I really dont think now is the time to spend billions on reinventing the welfare system especially when they have literally just done that and it still isnt run properly UC fraud is still a huge issue people are cut off from tax credits told it's because they have made a claim turns out they havent someone else has and has got their advance the person ends up owing tax credits universal credit and having no money while they try and sort it out

This has got worse under lockdown

How many elderly people have been wiped out by this virus......saving in state pensions?

UC rates quoted above are basic. You can also get rent paid (depending on allowances) and you will get more if you have kids.

@arethereanyleftatall A means tested state pension??! Have you lost your mind OP!! I’ve worked hard for 18 years saving into a public sector pension and I feel I should be rewarded for that by having a larger pension (in total) than someone who has spent their life on UC because they couldn’t be bothered to work. And before all the Tory bashers come on the thread to tell me off, I don’t care what you think. Some people are better off than others and people need to get over it and stop whining.

Legalise and tax cannabis. The war on drugs hasn't worked and never will, like prohibition didn't.

Raising all taxes by 1% across the board would be fairer and bring much more then going after just select groups.

State pensions are the last place we should be looking to save money, they are already disproportionately low compared to gdp, wages, cost of living and other similar countries

I wouldn't increase VAT at a time when people will be losing employment and we want to try and stimulate the economy by encouraging people to spend

Raise income tax by 1% or 2% for everyone. We need to start paying more tax to fund better services anyway, so may as well start now to help pay this back.

Yes to this but I’d also like to see it applied to Capital Gains and other taxes on income like dividends that arnt subject to income tax

MrSheenandMe - yes if you have children and rent the UC payments will be higher. My DP and me are in out mid fifties. He is about to be made redundant and my job is at risk. I have calculated our UC entitlement in case the worse happens. We will receive a grand total of £680 per month. Our mortgage is £550 per month.

Scrap HS2.
Income tax up
National Insurance up
Scrap child benefit altogether but make greater allowances through the benefit system. And tax benefits to those on low incomes.
Dog licence
Cycle licence and identifying number front and rear.
Tax on alcohol and fags up.

How about stop paying into the WHO as they just ignored their advice anyway? (I would rather they had listened, but why fund if they are just going to ignore)
Agree Air Passenger tax should be dramatically increased.
Sort out corporate tax dodging, the UK is one of the worlds biggest enablers of this
Raise tax for everyone apart from the very lowest paid to fund better services.

Increase inheritance tax.
Get rid of MP perks like second homes. Reduce MP foreign travel to essential only. Freeze MP salaries.
Increase capital gains and dividends tax.
Reduce trident spend.

What they will do instead is freeze nurses/police etc salaries, cut nhs, police and education services and budgets.

Would the UK have been entitled to EU help during COVID-19, if no Brexit?

Just curious really, I didn't vote in the ref.

MrSheenandMe
If you have a UBI that replaces benefits this cannot be the same for all can it? people have different circumstances, higher rent, payment, more children, disabilities so some will need more money we may want the procedures to be easier less complicated but do we really want to have a society that will give people extra money just because they ask for it with no checks, proof or commitments, so there has to be some sort of means testing to ensure people get all the money they need not just all the money they want.

As for pensions, at the moment the state pension is taxed if the pensioner has other income like a private pension or a job with all sources of income added together , people on benefits are not taxed the same, UC/tax credits are not added to any other source of income for tax so someone on UC is not taxed on ALL their income.

Now if you want my pension (next year) replaced by UBI then fine but if a working age persons UBI is not taxed why should mine be? after all its universal the same benefit so should have the same rules.

UBI as a top up is fine
but where housing costs are high (like in the UK) it can only be a top up
rather than a full UBI

Look at the spending pie chart I shared up thread.
Most of the stuff people are talking aboout
(cutting MP expenses etc) is fractions of 1% of expenditure.

THe changes I suggested way way up thread are what is needed
(ask John Whiting who was the head of the Tax Simplification office for the Labour government)

Just to explain about universal credit the limit is £1666 but you never get that because child benefit is taken off

you get a small personal allowance (£297) child allowance and rent allowance it is the rent allowance that pushes it up so for example a single person entitled to £300 pcm rent with no children would get £697 every month but if they were entitled to £800 pcm it would be £1097 per payment cycle this gives everyone a disproportionate view of life on benefits the point is no matter how much your rent is your still only entitled to the £297 per month personal allowance the rest goes to your landlord it's like housing benefits but paid to you it's not your money really it's the landlords