Emergency Budget

[Wouldloveanother]

What are we all thinking?

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-62920969

A discussion thread…

You argued with this:

The assessment I heard was that the stamp duty changes will only benefit people buying very expensive properties, mostly in the SouthEast, very rarely 1st time buyers

That poster was absolutely spot on. The only FTBs who will benefit are in London/SE.

Frankly if you don’t vote, you’re in no position to criticise the result.

I understand this point of view but let’s be honest, none of the options represent the population at large. None of them represent the people affected by the rising cost of living.

When I vote it’s usually for candidates that don’t stand a chance of getting in, so tbh it makes no difference.

the poster is completely wrong - the stamp duty changes do not benefit people who are buying very expensive properties. People buying very expensive properties will benefit to the tune of a maximum of 2500 pounds unless they are FTB in which case it could be more. This is the same for people who are buying cheaper properties.

All first time buyers will benefit unless they were not paying any stamp duty at all to begin with, some first time buyers will be the biggest beneficiaries overall as per the parameters I stated.

So to state that the changes will only benefit people buying very expensive properties is wrong, as is stating that 1st time buyers will very rarely benefit

👏👏👏👏

I spent much of my childhood with one of my grandmother's, a very strong independent minded woman. She was of the generation that fought for the vote, she believed it was important to vote and I suppose I absorbed that. I feel like I would be spitting in the face of the women like her who fought for the vote if I just stayed at home.

She always told the story of when she got married, back then it was normal to get married on the Saturday and the man would go back to work on the Monday but some women couldn't as their job didn't permit it. Her job did allow married women to work but my GFs job didn't. On the first Monday morning after the wedding GF apparently told her she could have anything she wanted, she just had to ask for it. After he went to work she went back to her employer and got her job back. When he got home she told him she could have anything she wanted as she had a job and could pay for it. I suppose it is no surprise that she ended up throwing him out, no divorce as very hard for working class people to get a divorce but that was the end of their marriage. So that is the woman who taught me the importance of exercising our right to vote and although she has been dead for 50 years I wouldn't cross her. Her mother did the same so I suppose it runs in the family, she was a working class woman who threw a heavy drinking husband out and brought up 4 children alone and bought her own house.

You're conveniently ignoring the fact that, of that 25%, some pensioners have never owned their own home and will never own their own home. There are poor people in every demographic.

There are also Tory voters and Brexit voters in every demographic. Statistically, a pensioner might be more likely to have voted for the tories / Brexit, but by no means all of them voted that way, and to blame all pensioners for the poor voting choices of some is just lazy and ageist.

Statistically, it's people with poor levels of educational attainment who voted for Brexit too, but you wouldn't try to punish that demographic by withdrawing their support, would you? That would only perpetuate the problem.

But you'll never find understanding if you aren't open to it.

My rationale for always voting is exactly the same as yours @ancientgran. Your grandma sounds amazing, I’ll think of her when I next vote.

Voting is a messy business. I think someone would be highly unusual to have a political party that exactly reflects their own views on every issue.

It's a matter of weighing up the best alternative to a party designed and run by yourself 😁

Thank you. She was wonderful, I still miss her.

She certainly sounds wonderful. I took all 5 of my children to the polling station with me so they could see the process and they all vote now they are adults even if none of the choices are always want they want at that particular time and even if all of us are cancelling each others votes out again and again.

“It is staggeringly unfair that this Conservative government is hiking taxes on our nurses and teachers, while giving big businesses and banks a massive tax giveaway,” said Ed Davey, the Lib Dem leader.

“Cutting taxes for the most wealthy while hammering ordinary families with years of stealth taxes shows just how out of touch this government has become.”

Paul Johnson, director of the Institute for Fiscal Studies, said: “Certainly, in the medium term, the four-year freeze in the personal allowance and other tax thresholds is really quite a big tax rise. And that does mean that, by the end of the period, anyone who’s not earning more than £150,000 will be somewhat worse off.”

I’m saying people who have seen their property double in price have a pension right there.

Only if they are willing to sell it and downsize, quite a lot of people become very emotionally attached to their bricks and mortar, regardless of how its suitability as a home might have changed over the years.

NI is a tax. It doesn’t go into any pot or cover the cost of pensions. Nowhere near it. If you’ve been paid a pension for about 7 years or so you’ve already got the average NI contributions back.

Wouldloveanother
🤔 I suspect it’s because rather a lot of them were in work on polling day

If you have worked a 10 hour shift, collected a toddler from nursery and a kid from primary school, and raced home to get them tea and bathed, how easy do you think it is to then stand on a freezing street corner for 15 minutes to queue up to vote? And who is watching the kids?

Have you ever heard of postal voting?

Some people will use any excuse. I've been a paramedic doing 12 + hour shifts for nearly 20 years, I've had a child in that time too. I have voted in EVERY election since I was eligible too, including the referendum on proportional representation. I have either voted very late on the way home from work, or more recently via a postal vote.

There is no justification for laziness, apathy and a lack of concern and responsibilty for democracy.

Which is completely understandable but currently a very large percentage of the publics wealth is tied up in that bricks and mortar. It’s not moving around the economy and in some examples an individuals wealth is almost meaningless because it isn’t liquidated in any way that’s useful to anyone.

I think we’re currently at a point (and probably have been for a while) that practicality trumps emotion although the public perception isn’t shifting with need.

If you’ve been paid a pension for about 7 years or so you’ve already got the average NI contributions back.

Where does that calculation come from? Mine weren’t average for more than half of the 46 years I paid them and I pay tax on my pension. I reckon it’d take a lot more than seven years.

We all know it isn't in a pot but it was taken, and is still taken, on the basis that if you pay it for x years (the years do vary over time) you get the pension. If you have years missing the amount you are paid is reduced so there is a clear link.

There is also the issue of people who were contracted out, as I was, I would be better off than someone who paid full contributions. Not really fair.

I dispute the 7 years, my first NI contributions were 54 years ago, were they small? Yes they were but if you owe me money, or the govt owes me money, from 54 years ago you also owe me interest on my money. There is also the average contribution, I worked hard and was well paid so I don't think my contribution was average.

I believe under the current law if you pay NI for 35 years (which can include 10 years at home minding your children) you can get a state pension in my case at age 67 although mine will be taxed at at least 40% so almost half is taken back by the state (as I work full time). I have paid NI for full time work every year since 1983.

However the state can do what it likes so although it could abolish state pensions or halve them that is not likely to go down too well with those who have been slogging it out in full time work for 40 years+

Yes it is 35 years now but it was 39 years then 30 years. So it does vary, also the age changes.

You can get NI credits till your youngest is 12. So in my case with 5 year age difference. I get 17 years of NI credits. I work anyway but for those who don't.