Tax childless adults

[Acidburn]

Hi all

Just saw the below article on LBC news:

www.lbc.co.uk/news/childless-tax-birthrate-uk-cost-of-living-paul-morland/

AIBU to think that this insane?

Yes. I suppose the people in favour are too young to remember Romania during the Ceausescu regime where having babies for the state was pretty much compulsory?

Arguably people having kids (especially women) tend to use social services more over their lifetime. When you consider that only individuals who earn over £130k are net tax contributers in the UK most families with kids who earn less (and the vast majority earn less) are tax drains.

It would be interesting to see of the people who earn over 130k are likely to be parents or not v

I love how "they are coming here and stealing our jobs" is changing to "please come in here and steal some jobs"

😆

I haven't argued the birth rate should be higher

so no disagreement anyway

My only point I disagreed with was that U.K. couldn’t attract the right skills, which it can. I didn’t vote for Brexit but so come from a country with a points based system. It just needs to be implemented. I did see visas to graduates scheme which sounds good as I was a graduate who could come here and appreciate many things - if more get the opportunity then great.

When you consider that only individuals who earn over £130k are net tax contributers in the UK

And EEA immigrants even with lower than that wages

So - do

That is the stupidest most short sighted and thoughtless idea I've heard of in a long time. I'm not surprised it came from a man.

Not even worth debating.

Arguably people having kids (especially women) tend to use social services more over their lifetime. When you consider that only individuals who earn over £130k are net tax contributers in the UK most families with kids who earn less (and the vast majority earn less) are tax drains.

I didn’t know this figure but if that is the level of earning that people want to attract from o/s (plus other skills that are not so well paid) as well as foster here of course, then that takes policies not everyone is happy about.

How very sinister. Particularly the recommendation that women are 'educated' into having children young and commended for multiple pregnancies. At a time when women's reproductive choices and bodily autonomy is front and centre too.

Nobody paying attention to this narrative in conjunction with the abortion rights narrative? I imagine soon enough failed birth control wont be a valid enough reason to have one.

The birth rate then would cripple maternity services. The work force would be a few hundred thousand short every year. And the coffers being used to fund extra family benefits. So they're not really thinking any of this shit through are they?

They'd be better marketing it as a tax break for families, or offering periodic cash incentives in the form of more heavily subsidised child care, wrap around care, tax breaks for companies who offer highly flexible working or funding additional leave entitlements.

Make having a family 'work' and more people will have them. At the moment most families are absolutely fried mentally and financially after their first child and are massively put off having a 2nd. Forget a third!

The UK can’t attract the right skills. It’s been a problem for a long time, made significantly worse by brexit. I work in a tech sector that is in desperate need of more skilled people, we don’t invest in teaching our own young people the necessary skills and we make it almost impossible to get a visa to come and work here.

It's so daft it's almost funny. How rude and offensive to the child free by choice AND to people who can't have children. I can't imagine what the person who thought of this idea was smoking when they blurted this out. DAFT! And offensive!

I agree we do not invest in the right training.
This is because we made colleges stick to a very tight budget and self fund a large proportion of courses. So we have lots of cheap popular courses like hairdressing and few of the more expensive technological courses.
We also have a business sector that is reluctant to invest. Lots of businesses used to offer proper apprentices and training for employed workers. These are now scarce.
Business is also reluctant in the main to invest in developing technologically. Our car industry will soon be decimated as it has invested so little into electric cars.

I agree it's a silly idea, but silly ideas can spark good ones. Taxing childless/childfree couples is a mad idea. But what underlies that suggestion? Worries about looking after the elderly? Paying for pensions? Filling jobs? Well what other options are there.

Yes, it's all a bit 'Kinder, Küche, Kirche', isn't it?

Hopefully graduate visas that are coming in will help. People are keen they just need the ability like I had. Many of us were attracted to London and mostly did finance (not me, I did something else) but there’s no reason other graduates can’t do the same.

In countries that have an aging population the consequences are quite dire. Who is going to be working and paying taxes to support all of these retired people, often with complex care needs

Not my problem. I am a person, not an incubator for future care workers. It's too late for me now, but even if I were 10 years younger I wouldn't be having any more kids!

Out of interest which universities taught the right skills over U.K.? Pre Brexit

I know movement in other sectors but not this one well

Yep, and very 'Handmaids.' They'll be banning abortion next. 😩😵🙁

The suggestion that women have multiple pregnancies and start as early as possible is horrific!

The obvious answer is immigration. There is not a shortage of young workers internationally. Immigration is an obvious demographic rebalancing of the population.

The suggestion that women have multiple pregnancies and start as early as possible is horrific!

I was keen for dc but any shift of this and it would put me off. Too late now but still. I’d protest against this kind of tax. So bad

Would smug parents like it if we charged them more or docked their pensions when their offspring turn out to be useless drains on society

Now that I would support. It might mean that some parents actually parent their kids, instead of letting them run wild (yes neighbour I am thinking about you, your charming offspring and the brick incident through the windscreen incident).

excuse the random "incident" in my post. But I'm a bit annoyed about the idea that my childfree DD should be made to pay extra tax to support such people.

The obvious answer is immigration. There is not a shortage of young workers internationally. Immigration is an obvious demographic rebalancing of the population.

Not necessarily. We need to move away from the zero hours contracts and the agency part time workers, who are low paid and underused and use the work force we have, instead of feeding the Ponzi scheme with fresh bodies, be it immigrants or children.

Oh, for crying out loud, it there not one solitary media created dichotomy that people aren't eager to create an oppositional other to sling shit at?