To be irritated by this £100k a year whiner

[Viviennemary]

On Question Time tonight they were talking about subsidised childcare and the new benefits for younger children. Then a woman came on with a boo hoo sad face and said she wouldn't be getting it. So I think Fiona Bruce said because your income is £100k a year plus Then she said that it wasnt fair as there was only one wage. And their household only had one earner.

Well tough. Folk on just over £12k a year are paying tax and this cheeky woman thinks her child care should be subsidised. It made me mad.

We're one the richest countries in the world, yet our level of support for childcare is pretty poor. (As is our social support in general)

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2021/07/01/which-countries-have-the-most-generous-child-care-policies

Do you think it might be anything to do with our social and economic priorities?

Also, why shouldn't a parent get paid for childcare? it benefits the child, apparently (at the very least up until they are 3). It might mean a better work life balance for some too.

I'd much rather our government's revenue was spent on supporting children rather than supporting Nissan.

Plenty at Managerial level. If you are a Senior team leader, you have to be full time. Any Lead roles in all sorts of sectors.

Yet here you are whining with your bitter self. I would rather people like her get the help the need to remain working. They contribute more to the pot that helps everyone else. Why should they not get help when they need it?

You can't mention corporate welfare, it is derailing and nothing to do with this thread apparently!

Any job where you have been taken on as a full time employee. Why do you think so many women have to give up their careers once they have children? A big factor is finding a job in their field that is part time/flexible.

Because your "spends" of 'rich' people on 100,000 are hyperbolic and wouldn't look out of place in the comments section of the DM!

The Tories have encouraged a dangerously top heavy tax system where 10% of workers are footing most of the country's public spending bill.

Why should a single mother who’s done well in her career not get childcare help when bringing home £101k whereas a couple earning £198k would?

its simple math

Hasn't this always been the case? Those same people don't get any support from the state.

The top 10% of taxpayers paid 60% of all income tax in 2023–24, up from 35% in 1978–79. The share of income tax revenue contributed by the top 1% of taxpayers rose from 11% in 1978–79 to 29% in 2023–24, despite big cuts in top rates of tax in the first 10 years of that period.

This is just income tax and NI - everybody pays VAT and council tax.
I do question the idea that without you 10 percenters with your 6 figure salaries - we would all starve. You also enjoy all the things that the state covers as well as doing quite well for yourselves.
In my working life I have paid lots of income tax and NI and never once begrudged that I did not get my fair share returned.

In that case it shouldn't be a problem if everyone got the same support then - regardless of income

In that case it shouldn't be a problem if everyone got the same support then - regardless of income

why should anyone need support when working full time?

Because the cost of childcare for two preschoolers in London can cost more than £4k a month, which is most of a £100k salary after tax.

It’s absurd, but that’s the situation.

I could do the same thing though and say I am 30k worse off by working full stop. Because if I didn’t work I would get UC, housing benefit, child benefit, 80% free childcare, free prescriptions, free dental etc etc.

So it is ridiculous.

Have you read the whole thread, this is the question you post on page 22? Really, I assume another time wasting rhetorical one liner!

How do you intend to make up the contribution made by the 10%? I wait...

In many scandinavian countries, almost all women work full time after their kids are age 1. They have affordable and accessible childcare to facilitate this and the bulk of society is taxed to fund it.

On mumsnet, people are always highlighting the scandi countries as the model to follow. Well that also means doing away with all this part time work just because there are kids involved and higher taxes across the board for everyone. I am for it but I doubt most people on here are. The model they want is to tax the 'rich' so they can be part-time

Haven't read the whole thread but DH earns JUST under 100k and I earn part time 23k. South East, v expensive commuter area. We feel comfortable but not rich by any means. Loads of friends on 80k or 90k each so they have a higher household income.

We can't let his salary creep over and if it did we would just put it into pension or give more to charity. If we didn't have free hours I would quit my public sector job. So not sure how this would benefit society in any way. Either there is less tax revenue or one less badly paid public sector worker!

That's not strictly true. 10% of workers may be paying 60% of income tax revenue, but income tax is just part of the government's revenue stream. Even if we just look at tax, that doesn't give a real picture of what is going on. Most of that 60% comes from a relatively small group of very high earners, not from those on £100,000. 1 in 10 of the richest 1% in the UK pay just 11% tax.

In fact, we have a situation where somebody with a million pound taxable income is likely paying the same, or as in 2016 a lower rate of tax, than somebody earning £100,000.

That's not because of tax a avoidance or shady schemes it's because we have a system where if your income comes from capital gains or investments it's taxed at a lower rate than if you earn it. It's biased in favour of the wealthy.

Yes - and that’s the point! It doesn’t matter why they are earning so little to put back into the pot. Whether they’re fault or not, someone else is paying for them and their kids. Yet they moan on and on about the person paying! Talk about bite the hand that feeds you. Would that person prefer to be out on the street AKA Victorian times swimming in their own filth then? Because without people who are actually earning higher, they would be!

No, it really is

That's not because of tax a avoidance or shady schemes it's because we have a system where if your income comes from capital gains or investments it's taxed at a lower rate than if you earn it. It's biased in favour of the wealthy.

Very true. Which of course makes some of the more overblown claims about people on 100k PAYE even dafter.

Wow.

Even as a nurse with normal start in life I’m on £50k odd. Being ‘trapped’ in a minimum wage job isn’t always the case- you can make decisions which improve your own earning ability and push yourself to earn more.

I agree with albaalba351's posts above. Also when the welfare state was set up you paid in and therefore you took out and that is the case in much of the EU - if you have paid your national insurance if you lose your job you get your higher benefits. If you never paid in you don't get much. We lost that principle by and large and those who have never done a day's work in their lives can get UC.

My doctor uncle in the 1940s got a council house because the idea was everyone could take out and everyone paid in. We have moved to the worst of all worlds- highest tax burden for 70 years and 25% of people net contributors (as I have been since I started working full time in 1983 - i have not had a single break since not even for having babies) get much less out than they did - no 1940s council house, no free university fees, no covenanting money tax free to student children as my father did, no child benefit which I got for all 5 children despite being a high earner - it was non means tested and I had a single person allowance etc etc.

We have frozen higher tax bands, we have increased taxes, we have added massive student costs many on parents' shoulders, brought in the 9% graduate tax, removed single person allowance, removed child benefit - basically sent a message to people don't work hard, don't get on and particularly to women - work does not pay so keep your pay lower.

No wonder we have a massive productivity problem. If instead we said no one has to pay hm over than £x a year in tax and if you pay the maximum you get invited to a party at HMRC or No. 10 as a reward, or if we let women put 100% of childcare against their tax things might be better.

Even just take this example - I employed my trainees until last month as my trainee solicitors. As they are my only employees I benefiedt from a no employer NI concession. Just about the only small employer not allowed to get that exemption is a woman employing a nanny so she can work full time. Yet a nanny can be cheaper than 3 babies in a nursery (we had 3 under 4 at one time and both worked full time so a daily nanny was the cheapest option).