to think that 6000 per month is excessive for the government to take off my pay for tax?

[tootaxed]

Surely there should be a maximum limit that each person has to pay as tax? Six grand per month in tax is just excessive imo. And that is before NI contributions etc. If the government set a maximum tax limit they would take more care over how they spent their central funds. And I wouldn't have to work so many hours away from my DCs only to have 72 bloody grand a year taken off my income to fund their mis-spending.

You'll not find a 3 bed terrace house in Totteridge, Whetstone or Finchley for anything less than 300k.

Which is exactly why we had to move away from Woodside Park to just within the M25 9 miles away.

Our house, which we bought 7 years ago for £118,000 is now worth £250,000 approx.

My parents live in an (now) ex council house in Finchley (slap bang in the middle of Woodside Park & Totteridge but they arent allowed to call it either, such is the snobbery of local residents ). Their 3 bed terraced house is worth 300k.

Just thought I'd mention it . I'm not bitter at having to move out of Finchley. Oh no. Not me.

Xenia, don't think like that!

Are you feeling a bit stressed out just now, some of your posts have sounded a bit bitter recently and thats not like you, as I said before I enjoy reading your posts even if I don't agree with them all, but you don't sound like yourself recently (I used to be chelsygirl, I've "spoken" to you before, I'm not trying to be smart or funny here)

hope everythings ok

Whetstone 3 bedrooms

Finchley 3 bedrooms

Just catching up with this and PMSL @

'Nice turn to the thread for a change. Perhaps the housewives are busy taking their children to school.'

Gosh yes, because the 'housewives' can barely string together a coherent sentence

Why is there an assumption that people are envious of high earners? There are probably plenty of high earners out there (men and women) who would step off the treadmill if they could. The OP sounds like one of them.

Personally I have absolutely no envy towards you or the OP. I have enough to live on, am happy and have a fantastic work/life balance. Why would I want to exchange it for a 100 hour week, not seeing my children and a 6k a month tax bill. Don't need it, don't want it.

Progressive taxation (ie, increases in the tax rate with earnings) is a way of redistributing money from the rich to the poor (something that anyone with any real moral sense will agree is desirable, even if they disagree with the method).

Since the 80s, the tax rate has become progressively flatter - ie, the rates of tax levied on the rich have decreased, and the rates levied on the poor have increased. This has mostly been effected by reductions in the rates of income tax and increases in indirect taxes that tend to hit the poor hardest. Thus, the poorest ten per cent of the population have become poorer and richest ten per cent have become a great deal richer.

Yes quite, policy. That might be the first sensible and pertinent thing anyone has said on this thread.

Suddenly the rest of us look like squabbling children (except for Swedes the class joker).

Believe me, many potential posts were deleted before I squeezed that one out

I should be listening to Adam and Jo anyway...

That's true but it also meant the tax take from direct taxes went up so the state had more cash and it meant there was more incentive to earn more when we went down to a 40% top rate. It as jolly good news all round. The gap between rich and poor has widened and I have no moral problem with that at all as long as absolute poverty is no worse there is nothing wrong with relative poverty worsening.

(moreJell, it's not the best of times but I don't think my views on tax policy have changed over the last 25 years).

We don't spend much on things that attract VAT. Not very into consumer things, expensive clothes etc so certainly although we're reasonably well off we can choose through not being into conspicuous consumption to pay much less VAT than higher spenders pay. I never play the national lottery which is another stealth tax on the stupid or the poor who tend to play it - another one you can choose to pay or not as the case may be.

Absolute poverty is usually defined as a daily income of around $1-2. This is obviously (and thankfully) irrelevant to almost everyone in the UK.

Relative poverty excludes people from the norms of everyday life. Those of you who are motivated entirely by self-interest might like to ponder the consequent social alienation. Those who have no stake in the majority culture are unlikely to have too many qualms about undermining it.

The extermination of relative poverty need not be a step on the path to the eradication of all inequality. It can be an end in itself.

I meant absolute in terms of setting a standard for the UK which means people are fed and clothed and I would expect current benefit levels to be around the right level. The fact the national average wage say rose 10 fold would not then affect benefits because people on benefits would still be clothed and fed and housed adequately. In other words the comparison is irrelevant.

Levels of happiness become lower in countries where the gap between rich and poor grows, something Labour knows all about but will do nothing about (as we have a one party state in effect now anyway). But I don't subscribe to the view that we're after increasing people's happiness anyway so that's irrelevant. But you're right and most changes even giving women the vote have been a response to labour market demands because there is a commmercial reason why we need that. If the poor get so poor they revolt or won't work as needed in low paid jobs then yes the minimum wage or an increase in it can help if importing people from abroad keen to do the work doesn't solve the issue.

You give people a stake by making them feel part of things - compulsory work fare in return for benefits achieves that. Making people pay nominal sums towards state and health care too - because you appreciate what you pay for. All those things help.

I think this is a really interesting debate in terms the other current threads. It's been a long time since I heard tories set out their views so clearly without sugarcoating it, and it's a salutary lesson for anyone who thinks that behind David Cameron or Boris Johnson beats a heart that has anyone other than the rich and priviledged in mind.

'privileged' I mean...

Current benefits levels keep people in relative poverty, with all the societal fracture that that implies. Governments in the US and the UK have been following right-wing social/taxation programmes for roughly the last 30 years. Consequently, this period has seen levels of poverty, social exclusion, crime and imprisonment that are unmatched in modern times. (And let's not forget the children whose life-courses are determined by their parents' poverty.)

Sadly, there are plenty of people who are so enthralled by money and status that they their moral sense has entirely atrophied. It is important to re-state basic ethical arguments.

Good post, riven. Sorry to hear about your situation.

Glad to hear it's being sorted out. However, no need to thank me - I haven't paid any tax since having the DCs (my earnings are too low)!

I agree with you that the UK does, at least, display some vestiges of decency towards those in need. The safety net (much attacked and undermined by recent right-wing governments) is the legacy of socialism in this country. At least we have not yet plumbed the depths of rabid capitalism, as currently being explored in the US.

red, as I said above we have a one party state. Labour only got power because they took on then Conservative policies and Tory policies are almost identical to labour. I have no effective political choice so my views are an irrelevance and need not concern anyone. I can always go to Bulgaria and pay 10% flat tax if I get too fed up with 41% tax/NI.

Glad to see gratitude on the thread from all the non tax payers to those of us working 50 - 100 hours a week to keep them and our own families. Just as well some of us are. It's going to be interesting when most of us are OAPs without proper pension provision though because our children are going to have a huge burden to support us all unless we make some radical changes such as making family financially responsible for elderly relatives.

I was not advocating having no welfare state. Just improving it.

I don't think its reasonable to expect benefits to provide more than a very basic life style if you have no disablities. In countries like Germany where benefits are higher, unemployment is higher as people lose all moviation to work.

Compared to people who live in most of the world, families on benefits have it very easy.

There is no child labour in the UK, all children have the right to free education and there is free health care. A lot of people in the world have no electricity, clean water or proper sanitation. Their children die pointlessly from diseases which are easily preventable.

Although people earning below average income have increased in the UK, everyone's standard of living has improved compared to 50 years ago.

"Glad to see gratitude on the thread from all the non tax payers to those of us working 50 - 100 hours a week to keep them and our own families. Just as well some of us are"

I hope to goodness that was supposed to be tongue in cheek Xenia (though hardly funny).

I don't agree that it's a one party state. MargoandJerry has already described how different policy-making has been under labour as opposed to the tories.
I am also talking the comtempt that has been shown to the poor and uneducated, which is I'm afraid what I associate with tory rather than labour MPs, even allowing for all the corruption and mismanagement that goes on whatever the goverment.