DH and I going part time to deliberately reduce wages

[Bucketheadbucketbum]

Just working out the free childcare hours and actually DH and I will be muxh better off if we both dropped to 3- 4 day week to deliberately reduce our incomes. Would obviously be nice way to live too! Anyone else doing same? Seems mental but we've looked at it 100 times over and it's true!

...you and your DH...

Well the idea with free childcare for households where nobody is working is that it helps close the attainment gap. Income is a blunt tool, of course, but that's the aim of the policy. It's supposed to be education rather than childcare: I appreciate that the terminology the government use doesn't make this very clear.

@usernamealreadytaken but a SAHP doesn’t earn any money, that’s why they get a NI credit. Would you be happy for OP to give up her job entirely, or is that option just available for people on lower incomes?

I am now very glad pay my 40k per year tax into the treasury of another country than into that of HM Govt. Why would I pay so much money into a system that is not run properly, does not know how to spend money, save money or support people who need it.
With my DH that makes 80k that the UK does not get to spend from us both pissing it up the wall. Hurrah.

Respectfully, I don't think you have bothered to understand the cumulative impact of the thresholds at £100k.

There is no increase in take home pay between a salary of £99,000 and £134,000. If a four day week at my job gets me a certain take home salary, and a five day week gets me the same take home salary, then for a day a week I would be working for nothing.

In any event the “feeding hands” are those earning over £150k, they pay 12% of income tax.

47%. Less than the 100% levied on people with children at £100k, yes. But not 12%.

Yup, it's entirely likely that OP will cut off her nose to spite her face want to give up her £100k salary to get free childcare 🙄

It's not something I'll ever have to worry about, but a quick look at the Salary Calculator disagrees with you.

Funny how MN wants "the rich" to pay more, but doesn't actually want the rich to pay more.

@usernamealreadytaken you can pull faces at me all you want but I know plenty of (predominately) female higher rate tax payers who have given up their jobs to be a SAHM. You don’t have a problem with that but you do have a problem with OP working slightly less so she can spend more time with her children even though she will still be contributing shit loads to the system. If you can’t see how perverse that view is then you have a serious problem.

P.S. exactly how much are you contributing?

The salary calculator doesn't allow for the loss of both the 30 hour childcare and tax free childcare...

As a household, income jointly two net contributors, individually one net contributor one net recipient. Also decided not to claim what we were "entitled" to once we could manage without claiming that; it's called personal responsibility.

We "lost" part of CB but as we fell in to a decent household income bracket, we forwent the full amount so those not earning as much could have it because they needed it more. It seems we were mugs to assume that those who could afford to support themselves should do so, and leave taxpayer money for those who actually need it.

The Salary Calculator does not have the functionality to take into account the impact of losing both tax free childcare and the 30 hours once your income reaches £100k.

Have you read any of the numerous tax policy papers linked to on this thread? They explain the issue very clearly.

Once you have properly understood the issue I'm quite interested to hear if I think I am, in fact, morally obliged to work for free. And if there are any other groups in society that you also think should work for free.

You're not a mug for making a choice you felt happy with. You are a mug for thinking anyone else is even slightly interested in your 'shoulds', whether the bottleneck they're looking at relates to UC, tipping over 100k salary or any of the ones inbetween.

His many days a week are you willing to work for free for the greater good @usernamealreadytaken?

@usernamealreadytaken ah so you are earning less than £60k so paying less than £16k tax and NI. OP and her DH are paying many times that amount. At least £70k of they both earn over £100k.

Will the point about how people will inevitably respond to incentives and disincentives be easier for some you to swallow if we place it in the context of people sometimes not claiming what they're entitled to because of finances and value judgements? A person who can't be arsed filling out a tax return so they can get a couple of pounds a week in child benefit for their one kid if they're on 59k. Or a carer who's able to earn some income and would be worse off if they reduce it to the level where they'd be entitled to carers allowance, for example? Do these suit?

Terribly good of you to give up less than £15 a week. That probably equates to about 15 minutes of your weekly working time that you have donated to the nation's treasury. When are you planning to increase this to a full day a week of your working time, which is the expectation that you appear to have for others?

@usernamealreadytaken also how many DCs do you have? Do you use the free 15 (or 30) hours for them?

Exactly this:
There is no increase in take home pay between a salary of £99,000 and £134,000.

If a four day week at my job gets me a certain take home salary, and a five day week gets me the same take home salary, then who in their right mind would really truly work five days, with the associated stress, tiredness, loss of family time, cost of commute? No one!!!! Be honest with yourselves!

OP ignore everyone on this thread who is pretending that they would work for free which is what they are basically suggesting you do, for the sole good of others and to the detriment of your family.

This is a well publicised quirk at this income level!

Agree with everything @ladykale and@RedemptiveThursday are saying on this thread.
People sadly won't engage their brains on the maths and refuse to understand what happens at that 100k level even though people have included links to visual representations of the issue.

Very odd that people who clearly pay less tax expect people who are already and will continue to be net contributors to work for free and that they are not entitled to the very things they are paying for (and beyond). Just doesn't make sense. Sad state of the country when people are unable to understand relatively simple concepts.

Reduce your hours if you want. Enjoy the time with your kids. Just don't complain about being forced to do it because the of the awful tax system, and then also try and make out that the government is totally fucking themselves over as all these important people are reducing their hours which will clearly be disastrous for the UK economy.

There is plenty of economic research which shows that it is indeed disastrous for the UK economy and one of the main reasons why we have such low productivity growth. But clearly you know better. 🤣

@Bucketheadbucketbum

OP - I don’t have an issue with whatever you do but your claims about no difference between a 99k and 134k salary just aren’t true.

A £99k salary take home is £5,539
A £134k salary take home is £6,775

To say £1200 a month isn’t significant is not true.

If you earned £99k for 4 days and therefore earned a ft salary of £124k you are comparing £5,539 with £6,347 which is fine for covering childcare.

@Merryoldgoat another one who doesn’t understand that the 30 free hours childcare and tax free childcare stop at £100k.