To be completely confused by the mini budget?

[towelhammer]

Just baffled really, how is it going to boost the economy & improve public services?

I understand that perfectly well, actually, but your argument only works if the borrowing is used to drive growth.

I don't believe that tax cuts for the rich without significant investment in infrastructure is going to result in growth, and if the economy doesn't grow, then yes, we will be saddling future generations with the bills for this folly. How else do you think it will be paid for?

Liz Truss is not borrowing to invest in the future. She is borrowing to get quick political wins right now that won't have any long term positive impact.

No it isn't, because the price of property will immediately rise. Property sells for what people can afford to pay for it. If there's no stamp duty, asking prices go up to match what the previous cost including stamp duty would have been. It's been done before and always has the same result.

not quite so simple as if they have their own forward purchase & mortgage offer they are unlikely to want to risk that.

but yes long term it will boost prices

@MrsBennetsPoorNerves I'm saying it should've been in the budget but wasn't

The stamp duty cut is a bit bonkers, imo - because it leads to inflated prices.

The 45% cut is neither here nor there. A bad look for very little gain. Ditto the bankers bonus limit; I don't think the cap ever changed behaviour so removing it won't either, but the PR on it is shocking.

The 1% off income tax & NI cut is good for most, but not all. Care should have been given to those who don't benefit from this. Pensioners likely to be fine via the triple lock but other benefit receivers need further assistance - this could have been achieved via extra help on energy bills, for example. UC is already a disaster so messing with that further is wrong, imo.

Am amazed they havent touched the 40% tax threshold. Not least, because I think that would have been the thing to swing votes back to Tory. It appeals to their typical base and is likely to give those people significant benefit that they will then be reluctant to let go of.

Tax free shopping for tourists - OK.

Freezing alchohol duties seems like it's specifically aimed at bribing Scotland. I don't suppose they will fall for it

Low tax investment zones and the subsequent bonfire of worker's rights etc that go along with that = a bloody crime.

Thanks for clarifying... seems that we agree!!

I am not sure how this squares with the Bank of England raising interest rates to cool inflation and this strategy by Liz/Kwateng to spend our way to growth.

Not a very coherent strategy.

Low tax investment zones and the subsequent bonfire of worker's rights etc that go along with that = a bloody crime.

I haven't really processed what these zones are all about. Is there an explanation somewhere?

Low tax investment zones and the subsequent bonfire of worker's rights etc that go along with that = a bloody crime.

On this, at least, they are in agreement with Sunak on the virtue of increasing opportunities for fraud. They still need to make announcements on how they will continue Sunak's urgent efforts to promote smuggling.

@towelhammer I don't think it will have the same impact on prices as the previous stamp duty cuts. For starters interest rates are now much much higher than they were 2020-2021 and people can only afford to pay a certain amount each month. First time buyers will benefit most but they are also the most likely to be stung by massive mortgage repayment charges as a lot of people already in the market are on fixed deals and sheltered for a little while.

I am much more disappointed with Labour than the Tories after today's session in parliament. Some of Kwarteng's announcements may prove to be good for the country, many are probably useless and one or two are definitely just in the "reward our friends" area. He did, however, present the opposition with an open goal to really lay into the worst policies. Instead we got Rachel Reeves, who after her first sentence totally wasted the opportunity. You can see the guts of her overlong, waffling response here:
labour.org.uk/press/rachel-reeves-response-to-the-chancellors-fiscal-statement/

I thought misleading parliament and lies told in the house were the worst of sins, but she told a BLATANT LIE in the first few sentences thus wasting everything that followed.
"The Chancellor has confirmed that the costs of the energy price cap will be funded by borrowing, leaving the eye-watering windfall profits of the energy giants untaxed."

The facts are that whilst most companies pay 19% corporation tax, the energy companies pay 30% with a further 10% supplement. Since May 2022 they have also had an extra 25% Energy Profits Levy. You simply can't say that profits are untaxed, and by the way, the only difference with Labour's policy is that they wanted to backdate the tax to January 2022.

Lower worker protections, lower environmental standards, less planning control and more fraud/criminality, they are expensive to run too.
The Tories scrapped Freeports in 2012 for these very reasons

They don't actually grow the economy, what they do is suck in investment from surrounding areas = Robbing Peter to Pay Paul.

There is also the Brexit WA that has sanctions in place for either side to keep a relative fair competitive playing field.

I thought misleading parliament and lies told in the house were the worst of sins, but she told a BLATANT LIE in the first few sentences thus wasting everything that followed. "The Chancellor has confirmed that the costs of the energy price cap will be funded by borrowing, leaving the eye-watering windfall profits of the energy giants untaxed."

Semantics. It was perfectly obvious to me that she meant a windfall tax.

And yet plenty of countries have higher taxes than the UK but still have more millionaires per capita. Sweden for example.

@jcyclops Reeves is correct, Sunaks WFT was no such thing, all companies have to do is commit to existing investments to avoid it.

There is no additional extra tax on the windfall profit element caused by Russia/Ukraine war and cuts in supply.

Which is why KK didn't pull her up on her correct statement.

Also, after decommissioning costs are offset, many companies pay either nothing or very little.

@ChilliPB Only if the SNP decide to change Land Tax rates

It's not really fleecing the poor in the sense that you can only benefit from the tax cut if you're already paying tax. It doesn't take anything away from them, just lets higher earners keep more of their money.

@butterflycatcher it won't be the same but it's a prop to stop them falling too much in light of interest rates & in imo it will push them up at the bottom.

I found this graph which purports to show the weekly increase in income per household.

There isn’t a bonfire is there? What about all the increased red tape on imports / exports?

Rich people = Richer (especially if you're a banker like the chancellor was and might be again quite soon )

Poor people = nah...work harder and spend more to survive.

Public services = live down to your budget, you're getting fuck all else.

Economy...well the £ v $ is down...also the £ v euro... It will cost a lot more to borrow money to pay for all this than it would yesterday.

Oh dear.

Tory values in one simple graph.

He more or less said "fuck redistribution. Only growth and benefiting the rich is important".

I should have added. If you want to know which decile you approximately exist in, this graph shows that.

It's crazy how quickly levelling up as a philosophy was dumped. There are no one nation tories in foxholes.