Gutted about NI rise

[CarryOnNurse20]

I know we need it and we have so much money to pay off. But we have been scrimping and saving after a hard couple of years. Every penny is accounted for from pay day to pay day. I’m a nurse and my pay has been capped/below inflation my whole career. And now the NI rise means any savings etc we have made will now be gone. I’m gutted.

@thecatsthecats

Possibly an unpopular opinion, but I think it bizarre that older people expect to hang onto their homes as well as take up a new home in a social care setting.

I will only need one home when I'm older, and care also. Having an asset I can sell to fund that is perfectly logical. Sad, but then so is lots of stuff associated with aging. You're entitled to be sad, but expecting to pass on thousands and have your care funded is taking the piss.

Bring on euthanasia. I want the freedom to die, and to live well before that.

(caveat, yes yes, lots of different circumstances etc)

Not unpopular with me! Am with you on the euthanasia too...

YANBU. I don't see why this can't be covered by the billions we saved by not being in the EU.

I have been against all CV19 compulsory measures since March 2020 and against the incurred debt and against higher taxes.

Also most people are not in a care home very long so having to use £80k of your own money up before you get a single penny in practice means if you save up over 40 years you still won't get help with social care so we might as well leave it all alone and look at reducing taxes to fairer levels.

@thecatsthecats

Possibly an unpopular opinion, but I think it bizarre that older people expect to hang onto their homes as well as take up a new home in a social care setting.

I will only need one home when I'm older, and care also. Having an asset I can sell to fund that is perfectly logical. Sad, but then so is lots of stuff associated with aging. You're entitled to be sad, but expecting to pass on thousands and have your care funded is taking the piss.

Bring on euthanasia. I want the freedom to die, and to live well before that.

(caveat, yes yes, lots of different circumstances etc)

I agree. Just had a load of abuse on Facebook for saying exactly this.

@MrsCat1

Good point about social care budget not just being for the elderly. I'm more than happy to pay extra tax for a proper system. I would also like carers to be properly rewarded. My mum is currently self funded in a care home. She has the ability to pay and is rightly doing so. Bit by bit my inheritance is disappearing but that is completely fair.

Not everyone views it like that.

I got a net payrise of £50pm, and now the NI change will take it all.
It's a bit of a blow yes and an unfair way to do it, income tax would be more equitable.
But I do understand the need to take it from somewhere. Just wish it was done differently!

@EL8888

Are they definitely not getting rid of the triple lock for pensions? We are meant to be ALL in it together aren’t we?!

I read that it was going to be put on hold for one year. So 2.5% increase next and then back to the triple lock.

I'm not against a sensible tax to provide money for social care however the current social care service is terrible. This money will bump up private care company's profits while carers are paid a pittance and care for the elderly is severely lacking.

At some ping comes the realisation that the Rishi magic money tree was actually the public.

Not much we can do as there is no opposition and most Tory MPs just vote as they’re told.

NI rise totally unfair. It's a regressive tax (and so impacts women, the disabled and ethnic minorities more), and an ageist one too.
I think NI should be abolished and we should be more honest about income tax, which would obviously have to rise quite a bit to compensation.

Oh yeah dont worry ive just remembered the 350 million extra a week we have for the nhs after brexit

I'm fed up too op. NHS payrise of 3% and now almost half of it straight back to NI. I get it in a way but it sucks. I didn't suppose lockdowns either and worked through the latter ones. Shite isn't it.

@overthethamesfromyou

Is there a calculator anywhere that shows how much it will be

If it helps this shows roughly how much extra will be paid.

First £9,564 you don't pay NI on.
Then £9,564 - £50k you currently pay 12%
Then over £50K 2%

The increase is possibly 1.25% to 13.25% and 3.25%

Agree with everything you say @thecatsthecatsthecats. And I say that as a baby boomer that's benefited hugely from the explosion in house prices since I bought in the 80s. It would have been much fairer to just raise the rates of Income Tax.

I'm very happy to pay extra tax for better social care.

But I don't think people like OP should take a disproportionate burden of it, relative to higher rate taxpayers and asset/income rich retirees.

This should be on income tax and IHT, not NI. NI is already a regressive tax and increasing it for social care is entirely for political benefit, and entirely unfair.

@IAmWomxxnHearMeRoar

NI rise totally unfair. It's a regressive tax (and so impacts women, the disabled and ethnic minorities more), and an ageist one too. I think NI should be abolished and we should be more honest about income tax, which would obviously have to rise quite a bit to compensation.

I fully agree. NIC is a crazy outdated tax from a bygone era. Just increase income tax instead so that everyone pays a bit more, rather than the burden, yet again, falling on the workers.

The money has to come from somewhere.

And I'd rather it was going on social care and the NHS as opposed to nuclear weapons or sending aid abroad.

@Xenia

I have been against all CV19 compulsory measures since March 2020 and against the incurred debt and against higher taxes.

Also most people are not in a care home very long so having to use £80k of your own money up before you get a single penny in practice means if you save up over 40 years you still won't get help with social care so we might as well leave it all alone and look at reducing taxes to fairer levels.

I don't think your facts are correct. I believe that the average length of stay is about 2 years in a care home which will mean that most people will be eligible for some funding.

@MrsCat1

Good point about social care budget not just being for the elderly. I'm more than happy to pay extra tax for a proper system. I would also like carers to be properly rewarded. My mum is currently self funded in a care home. She has the ability to pay and is rightly doing so. Bit by bit my inheritance is disappearing but that is completely fair.

Is it really fair though ? What about a compatriot of hers who earned well but lived life to the full with many holidays and has no savings, no property to sell?

And I'd rather it was going on social care and the NHS as opposed to nuclear weapons or sending aid abroad.

That's fine. But is NI the right place? I haven't seen a single decent argument on why it should be NI not income tax.

@Megan2018

I got a net payrise of £50pm, and now the NI change will take it all. It's a bit of a blow yes and an unfair way to do it, income tax would be more equitable. But I do understand the need to take it from somewhere. Just wish it was done differently!

If you're paying an extra £50 per month in NI, doesn't that mean your salary is £50/60,000?

@AdmiralCain

What gets me is you pay 35 years of National insurance contributions - great, you have the maximum pension, so you leave school at 18 work. You're 53. Then for another 14 years you pay national insurance until you retire at 67 but those 14 years of contributions don't go to you - so that's a massive surplus the government are making.

I'm very privileged, i'll be working 35 years then retiring. I'm not going to give the government 14 years of contributions for nothing.

We have one of the absolutely poorest paying pensions in the world. I also understand part of your N.I payments go to the NHS but why don't the private car parking charges go to the NHS rather than private firms???

None of the contributions you have paid out are for your personal benefit, there isn’t a little piggy bank with your name on. The contributions you pay are currently funding the generation above you, your future funding will come from the generation after you.

It’s the same as healthy people never getting their money back on contributions to the NHS, childless people paying towards schools, it’s about a society pooling its assets to provide for those who need it.

I agree the NI insurance increase is a really unfair way to do it, I would prefer additional income tax, weighted so that those with bigger incomes pay more. And I say that as someone who doesn’t pay NI but who does pay income tax. I would also like a cast iron guarantee that the revenue does go into proper ring fenced social care funding, as I believe it does in Germany, and doesn’t get sneaked into the pockets of Friends of Government through their dod company deals. When the dust has settled over Covid there are going to be a lot of very wealthy people who have made a killing (apologies) over the pandemic.

I don't agree about the benefit of house price rises however as (i) we sold 3 properties at a loss in the 1990s including our home bit losses eg a flat bought at £75k for £50k kinds of losses and had been paying 14% interest rates (ii) as prices rose of my current house that just meant I had to take out a £1.3m mortgage to buy out my ex husband so no use having that price rise -just was a detriment to me (iii) prices rising has meant I have had to help the 5 children buy their first property - last one in Jan 2021 which is why I am 59 and have no savings and no pension other than state when I turn 67 and will work until i die. The fact there is equity in my mortgaged house in which I wll live until I die is not real cash as I want to do as my parents and my father's mother did - live in the one house until I die. If this house were in Newcastle from which I had to move to find work away from all babysitting and family support, nor would there be as much or any inheritance ta xon it but just because it is in the SE it means if I die with the £500k IHT allowance (I am single) then anything over that means the children are homeless because of IHT whereas same house in the NE and the children retain a home if I die.

The only "benefit" is if I were downsizing to a flat I suppose.

It wont be much. But it should have gone on income tax. Then retired people with large pensions would pay. Dont see why they shouldn't.

Dodgy. Not dod!