To think scrapping inheritance tax would not be popular with voters

[Lanadelday]

I'd say I can't believe the conservatives are considering it, but nothing surprises me any more that they do. But AIBU to think most people wouldn't back this anyway- I can't see it being a big vote winner and don't think they really get that voters are sick of all the inequality and so many people including kids and elderly, living in poverty, not wanting to make it worse.

Indeed. Capital is mobile, and higher taxes tend not to attract wealth when said wealth has better options available. The UK needs to attract wealth (and what it brings with it - it’s not just revenue from one individual), not chase it off. Chasing it off, and currently there is a net outflow of millionaires, results in less tax revenue and an increased burden being placed on those with less.

That isn’t to say that everyone that can afford to will leave, because of course they won’t, but those remaining aren’t generating enough wealth by themselves to carry the cost of everything. Those resources are finite.

‘Just raise taxes on the wealthy’ may sound good on the surface, but the wealthy have options.

Bizarre to you.
The concept that people can do what the chuff they like with their money if they've earned it and saved it without the government creaming off the top is not a bizarre concept to me.

https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/hmrc-tax-and-nics-receipts-for-the-uk/hmrc-tax-receipts-and-national-insurance-contributions-for-the-uk-new-annual-bulletin

Total IHT receipts at £7bn is approximately 1% of the receipts from ITX, NIC and CGT (£450bn), VAT (£160bn), and CTX (£85bn).

Scrapping IHT wouldn't make much of a dent, at least one that couldn't easily be recovered elsewhere. And conversely, even doubling it wouldn't do a great deal either for our countries budget.

Higher income tax or NI rates on very high earners or higher corporation tax rates are where you want to focus if you are actually interested in getting more cash in.

This is why IHT has by and large been left alone for years, and why it's still done on paper. It's not worth the hassle to the govt of messing about with it in a big way because it brings in so little.

It would be more viable financially for them to scrap it and change income tax or NI rules.

Here is how we compare globally.

@chopc yes me. Dh and I have been very lucky on the property market and our dc are going to inherit a lot of money. It’s not going to kill them to share some of that with others 🙄.

Which is utterly irrational as very few estates pay it.

@Verv ”earned” it. Now there’s a loaded word. Earned how? There’s a lot of ways of acquiring money - it’s not all earned.

Except when it's property gains over decades they haven't earned it. And yes, I include myself.

Iht has precisely squat to do with communism. Let's not just post scaremongering nonsense.

This was a reply to a previous comment, sadly I wasn't quick enough. I should have used the quote function.

Paying no tax is a very bizarre idea in any country that wants public services! Which it seems that the UK does.

Average nationwide or local? Because location is everything

Thanks, but the graph is not very useful, at least not the X axis which seems to show the rate of tax, but not the threshold above which it's paid. 40% in the UK is high by international standards, but setting an effective threshold of £1m for most estates means very few actually pay it.

Earned through work of accumulated through sensible purchasing, which includes investment and assets is what I had in mind when I wrote it.

Earned, accumulated, maintained, inherited, whatever.

What about a land value tax instead?

Do we not already pay VAT income tax council tax and NI?

Agree with this. I downsized 2 years ago and benefitted from the stamp dury holiday during the pandemic.
I had been concerned about buying another property and having to pay stamp duty. I needed as much equity as possible from the sale as I was giving up work due to ill health and needed funds to live on until I received my state pension 5 years later.

Older people may be more likely to downsize, freeing up family homes for families, if they did not have to pay stamp duty on their new home.

@Moneynewpence I thought Nationwide would be fairer.

And is this not an outrageous and criminal interference with your rights to do what the chuff you like with your money if you've earned it and saved it?

"Whatever"? Words have meanings and the last you gave are not synonyms.

I did not earn the tenfold increase on my mother's property from purchase to inheritance.

list not last

Older people may be more likely to downsize, freeing up family homes for families, if they did not have to pay stamp duty on their new home.

unlikely while the attitude of "they've lived in the home all their life so let them die there" prevails.

Hmm, no because you don't get to choose where your parents live.

@LauraNicolaides okay, that was my point really that 40% is globally quite high but the revenue is relatively low because only 5% of households in the uk pay it.

As I said in my first post, IHT needs reforming not scrapping.

BarbieBunches · Today 14:07
@chopc yes me. Dh and I have been very lucky on the property market and our dc are going to inherit a lot of money. It’s not going to kill them to share some of that with others 🙄

You can always give to the Treasury before you die.