How should covid be paid for?

[KenDodd]

I think there should be a small wealth tax (up to 1%) and before anyone starts saying I'm just jealous or whatever, I would be in for thousands of pounds that I don't have and would have to owe. I feel really strongly that we can't just load yet more debt onto the young, they have it much worse than my generation did already (I'm 51).

Yabu - No to wealth tax
Yanbu - Yes to wealth tax

If you vote No, please suggest an alternative that you think would be fairer.

The NHS isn’t particularly fit for purpose. All reactive. Nothing preventative. We should and can carry on treating ill people but perhaps we should work on less people being ill in the first place.

Are conservative central office doing surveys again?

Why is it always fat people that others think should lose their NHS entitlement? Most people (IME) are fat because of physical and/or mental health reasons. That and poverty. How is removing health care going to help?

@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander

Why is it always fat people that others think should lose their NHS entitlement? Most people (IME) are fat because of physical and/or mental health reasons. That and poverty. How is removing health care going to help?

It’s not. Xenia believes you can never be too rich or too thin.

Oh I know Xenia hates poor and fat people. But she's not the only person I've seen express that opinion.

Most people (IME) are fat because of physical and/or mental health reasons.
You forgot genetic.

No.

I'm not sure how it should be paid for, but "the wealthy" - ie middle class high earners - shoulder a very high tax burden.

Yes and that @ReeseWitherfork

I don't think we should bottom so many billions and expect future generations to repay this national debt. I actually think Sunak was too generous with furlough scheme. Most countries paid 70 percent but Sunak paid 80 percent.

Many people worked throughout pandemic in low paid jobs and yet they will most likely have to pay more taxes down the line to pay for others receiving up to 6 months pay at 80 per cent. Self employed do not pay much NI yet many got pay outs. They should pay full NI like rest of population. I know handouts given to protect from unemployment.

Hitting on the better off not good as will just drive them out and they often employ s lot of people. Sunak is looking at a fuel tax. This will hit all drivers. He has said he will not go back on manifesto promise of triple lock on pension. I suspect after next election this promise will be scrapped.

They could slim down peers in upper chamber. That would save money.

They could slash gift aid and target it on helping poor countries in genuine need instead of sending money to China.

NHS is free at point of delivery but hospitals could charge for food. That would save a fortune. People would have to pay for food if not in hospital.

Before Covid our economy was in ok shape with low unemployment do if we get vaccine and can more back to normal we will have to repay some debt every year. This may mean less public services.

This may mean less public services

That would mean none.

@VinylDetective

Many of the people who have to pay 1% of the house value as a tax would need to sell it to raise that kind of money

Really? It’s £10k for a million pound house so I somehow doubt it.

£10k what? Every year? How would a pensioner on a state pension afford this? How? Without selling their home? And why should they have to. This divisive, intergenerational, entitled bollocks really boils my piss.

Rather than council tax, an amount per household member

Erm... they tried that before. Have you never heard of the Poll Tax riots?

I can tell you for a fact we could not afford to pay 1% a year. We would have to sell the house to cover the cost.

And what do you class as wealth? What about pension pots? Cars? Businesses? How would you value all the small businesses around the country that would theoretically be worth something?

Would you want your nursery fees to go up because the owner had had a tax bill because they inland revenue had valued their business £x? Or pay you local garage more?

It'll just go round in a circle.

Flat rate tax no deductions
lower corporation tax with no loopholes
premium goods VAT increase( if you can afford 1K phone..)
replace VED with increased fuel taxes (high mileage pay more )
Biggest changes but longer term- change economy from service based to skills/tech based. Being a high value skills/products exporter.

Thank F*#! none of us have the unenviable task of trying to sort our way out of this! Let's leave it to the Chancellor because no matter what he does, some people will always be unhappy.

@KenDodd

I think there should be a small wealth tax (up to 1%) and before anyone starts saying I'm just jealous or whatever, I would be in for thousands of pounds that I don't have and would have to owe. I feel really strongly that we can't just load yet more debt onto the young, they have it much worse than my generation did already (I'm 51).

Yabu - No to wealth tax
Yanbu - Yes to wealth tax

If you vote No, please suggest an alternative that you think would be fairer.

Tax the obease. If they controlled themselves we would save billions every year (complications d type 2 diabetes NHS biggest cost). So big tax make some money from them, like we do smokers, and reduce the levels of obesity easing year on year expenses and reducing the costs of covid given its disproportionate affect on the obease.

3 bird 1 stone

@TartanSlippers

Rather than council tax, an amount per household member

Erm... they tried that before. Have you never heard of the Poll Tax riots?

Yeah but people aren't as stupid as there were back then and might be able to see the sense of it. The more people the more consumption of services the more you pay.

@Thirtyrock39

It was morally right to lockdown to protect the vulnerable but there is a lot of wealth in the older generations so it is only fair that they need to contribute now as so much was sacrificed by the young. There was a good column in the times a few weeks ago showing the percentage of millionaires in their 60s but it would take a brave Tory chancellor to start making the grey vote pay up. My parents are well off and don't need a bus pass, tv licence or free prescriptions. They have said this themselves. I still find it surprising that people get so irate about a £100 tv licence for pensioners but were fine about students having to get annual loans around £20000 to go to university.

If you didn't make an extra 60k from your career was there really any point in you going to uni?

National average wage 27k or something?

Decent graduate career wage what 50k? So 3 years for 3 years?

@Cocomarine

How about increasing VAT based not only on the type of item, but the value of it? (bit like stamp duty)

So cars:

• low VAT rate on any cars being pushed for environmental reasons (low engine, electric - whatever)
• standard VAT on cars to £30K
• high rate VAT on cars over £30K (on the full cost or just the over £30K part

No-one needs to spend £30K+ on a car - so you’re only taxing those who can afford it

Do the standard / high rate across a number of categories - cars is just one example.

Well except for all the people in the car making industry you just made unemployed.....

£10k what? Every year?
How would a pensioner on a state pension afford this? How? Without selling their home? And why should they have to.
This divisive, intergenerational, entitled bollocks really boils my piss

How many people on just state pensions do you seriously think are living in million pound houses? It’s nothing intergenerational - I’m a pensioner and can’t see a problem with it.

And as for people being less stupid than they were in the 80s - seriously? They’ve just voted Johnson in as PM, ffs, it doesn’t get stupider than that. And more people don’t consume more services, parents of school age kids consume far more services than a couple without kids.

caringcarer

NHS is free at point of delivery but hospitals could charge for food. That would save a fortune. People would have to pay for food if not in hospital.
What about if they have no money? And charge how much? I can feed myself very cheaply at home. I currently have less than £1 in the bank. However my fridge, freezer and cupboards are full. If i ended up in hospital tomorrow I couldn't afford to pay for meals, but can eat a varied and decent diet at home for the foreseeable.

Elsewyre

Tax the obease. If they controlled themselves we would save billions every year (complications d type 2 diabetes NHS biggest cost). So big tax make some money from them, like we do smokers, and reduce the levels of obesity easing year on year expenses and reducing the costs of covid given its disproportionate affect on the obease.
Or we could treat the causes of the obesity and reduce their risk that way. Ffs. The vast majority of obese people aren't obese because of a lack of control.

A little bit of background:
Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, and Sweden all had wealth taxes and abolished them, leaving Norway, Spain, and Switzerland as the only countries that still have one.
France (which is the most heavily taxed country in Europe) keeps toying with the idea. Up to 2017 (when they mainly abolished it), 10,000 French citizens had left France taking 35 billion euros with them over the previous 15 years.
The rich find wealth taxes easy to avoid. If farmland is exempt from a wealth tax, the rich purchase lots of exempt farmland, borrowing heavily to do so. The borrowing reduces the net worth of their other taxable assets.
Labour tried very hard to introduce a wealth tax in the 1970s. Denis Healey said "We had committed ourselves to a Wealth Tax; but in five years I found it impossible to draft one which would yield enough revenue to be worth the administrative cost and political hassle."

One option to raise tax that may be worth consideration is to tax properties abroad owned by Brits. If you have a second property in Cornwall, you pay UK tax on it. Why shouldn't you pay UK tax if the second property is in Spain? You could extend this to capital gains. Boris Johnson (who held American citizenship at the time) had to pay American capital gains tax on a North London house he sold about 11 years ago.

I like a couple of ideas further up this thread. To legalise weed and tax it, and to make VAT progressive so the more expensive items in any particular market attract higher VAT. An imitation of this already exists for cars where the more expensive attract higher taxes.

Unfortunately I fear that the governments of whatever persuasion over the next few decades will use the tried and tested but terrible old method of reducing debt ie. High Inflation.

*So cars:

• low VAT rate on any cars being pushed for environmental reasons (low engine, electric - whatever)
• standard VAT on cars to £30K
• high rate VAT on cars over £30K (on the full cost or just the over £30K part*

Australia has a luxury car tax, I think this is a good idea and could be extended to other items, such as designer handbags. If you can afford to spend 100k on a car and 5k on a handbag, then you aren't going to notice an extra 10% tax. The kind of people we're talking about have a ridiculous amount of money.

@jcyclops - doubt taxing properties abroad (do you mean income from properties abroad) would raise much. Not many people have them for a start. And worldwide income is already taxed anyway for UK residents so they are already taxed if they produce any income or capital gains.

@TheFormerPorpentinaScamander

caringcarer

NHS is free at point of delivery but hospitals could charge for food. That would save a fortune. People would have to pay for food if not in hospital.
What about if they have no money? And charge how much? I can feed myself very cheaply at home. I currently have less than £1 in the bank. However my fridge, freezer and cupboards are full. If i ended up in hospital tomorrow I couldn't afford to pay for meals, but can eat a varied and decent diet at home for the foreseeable.

Elsewyre

Tax the obease. If they controlled themselves we would save billions every year (complications d type 2 diabetes NHS biggest cost). So big tax make some money from them, like we do smokers, and reduce the levels of obesity easing year on year expenses and reducing the costs of covid given its disproportionate affect on the obease.
Or we could treat the causes of the obesity and reduce their risk that way. Ffs. The vast majority of obese people aren't obese because of a lack of control.

Well they are though, they aren't ill they just eat to excess and make bad choices.

I'd say tax forks but they'd just order a pizza...