AIBU that working people should be rewarded in the Budget?

[DistingusedSocialCommentator]

As above by way of increasing the tax threshold which has been on ice for a while.

The lower paid will benefit the most as those earning about 125k I think it is dont get any tax reliefe. 2 of the 3 children of ours pay 40% or more in tax plus NI. Therefore, the lower paid will benefit the most

We left worl in our early 50's and yet to reach state pension age.

I've read that many pensioners will soon be paying taxes as many are also being paid a few quid in private pensions they contributed to

so rather than a penny or two cut, raise the threshold of income tax

The gov must also do away with IHT but that is a different subject.

So if you agree with me, then it is I am being reasonable

Why are you presuming they rent?

There is no help for those with mortgages. Try paying all your bills on £350 a month.

Absolutely agree with this.

Benefits are of zero use to childless (mortgaged) homeowners who were doing ok but then lose their job.

It's criminal really, given that a single person with a mortgage is likely a net contributor until they fall on hard times, and then they're pretty much abandoned as soon as they're not able to be milked by the PAYE system.

We should have something more like Sweden, et al, where unemployment benefit can be up to £6,000 per month, depending on your pre-unemployment salary.

Even the USA has more generous (short term) unemployment benefits in some states.

In real life why would anyone voluntarily pay more tax to a government intent on decimating public services? I’ll willingly pay more tax to be spent sensibly. The current government just pisses it up the wall, I’m not paying more for nonsense like Rwanda.

The top rate of income tax was 83% during nine years of the Thatcher government. 🤷‍♀️

Maurice Fitzpatrick, Accountancy Age 04 Jul 2003
The tax burden is best expressed by the tax/GDP ratio, that is, the proportion of GDP taken in tax.
An analysis of Treasury figures shows the tax/GDP ratio averaged 35.5% during the 1974/79 Labour government (peaking at 36.8%) and averaged 37.1% under Lady Thatcher (peaking at 38.9%).
Between 1978/79 (the last year of the 1974/79 Labour government) and 1990/91 (the last year of Lady Thatcher's government), the tax/GDP ratio jumped from 33.3% to 36.3%, a rise broadly equivalent to 10p on the basic rate of income tax.
The tax burden thus rose decisively under Lady Thatcher (both on average and in absolute terms), compared with the previous Labour government.

On the news just now, they are all guessing it will be a "2% cut on NI"

Though we dont work, it seems fair ie reward those working. Fair enough.

I've not finished rtfs so apologise if someone else has said this, but I'm very wary of NI cuts.
After 30 years of working I have pretty much paid my "full stamp " of NI- it's easy to check this at HMRC. However I can't lift my state pension for another ten years. (I realise this is not a pension pot but does rely on current workers paying pensions for current pensioners. )
I can see NI being phased out - and then what happens to the state pension? Does it become means tested?
If I'd not paid NI ( impossible) and had used the money to buy a private pension or savings plan this would be seen as an absolute scandal, but people are quite happy to have the government change the goalposts with absolutely no consultation.
I really think this should be resisted.

A good deal for higher rate tax payers!

Yes and for this reason I was advocating a rise in the tax-free threshold.
This would have benefited more so for those on the lower to average wages.

I may suggest that the change will benefit the people the Conservatives want to attract re voters. Pensioners are already overwhelmingly Conservatives.

Working middle class, increasingly not. They will benefit from this and feel the benefits.

Just simplify the lot. Find another way to determine eligibility for the state pension and other contributory benefits (if we're keeping them at all).

Instead of child benefit/tax credits, how about doing what the French do and assess tax thresholds by the household rather than on an individual basis. So (based on existing thresholds)for a 1 adult, 1 child household the basic rate would kick in at £18,855 instead of £12,570; the higher rate at £75,405 instead of £50,270; and the additional rate at £187,710 instead of £125,140.

This would reflect the additional costs that parents have when bringing up dependants - dependants who society will in turn depend upon to avoid an aging population. Obviously the thresholds would have to be adjusted down a bit to avoid a net loss in revenue (say have the Personal Allowance down to £10k so for an adult with one child it would be £15k).

I was amazed to read that Birmingham's still was weekly (until now)

Instead of child benefit/tax credits, how about doing what the French do and assess tax thresholds by the household rather than on an individual basis. Back in the 50s this would have been easy to do, because a married couple were taxed as an entity. But there was a long and ultimately successful fight for individual assessment because it meant that vulnerable women did not have to disclose their income to their husband (tax assessment as a couple meant that women were not able to accumulate a "running away fund" for example). (You could apply for individual assessment but only at the expense of forgoing the relatively generous marriage allowance). Are we yet ready to insist that both partners in a couple should reveal their incomes to each other? In a healthy marriage, one would hope both parents would be open, but what about in cases of financial abuse?

I'd be apprehensive about adjusting the personal allowance downwards. Minimum wage may be OK for young people house sharing and being backed up by parents, but for an older person still on minimum wage, house sharing is more difficult, and they no longer have back-up support. I don't see they have much room to pay more tax.

Ultimately the only solution is to reduce the inequality, and that's not going to happen.

Instead of child benefit/tax credits, how about doing what the French do and assess tax thresholds by the household rather than on an individual basis.
Back in the 50s this would have been easy to do, because a married couple were taxed as an entity. But there was a long and ultimately successful fight for individual assessment because it meant that vulnerable women did not have to disclose their income to their husband (tax assessment as a couple meant that women were not able to accumulate a "running away fund" for example). (Youcouldapply for individual assessment but only at the expense of forgoing the relatively generous marriage allowance). Are we yet ready to insist that both partners in a couple should reveal their incomes to each other? In a healthy marriage, one would hope both parents would be open, but what about in cases of financial abuse?

Make it an opt-in system then. Your children or spouse become a tax relief you apply for in the same way that you can apply for a tax relief if you wear a uniform.

Pensioners are already overwhelmingly Conservatives. Not overwhelmingly. More over-65's intend to vote for another party than intend to vote Conservative. Even if you add in the reform voters, it's still only 56%

And falling. Just as Conservative support is falling across all age groups. The old adage that you lean further right as you get older is no longer true.

An opt-in wouldn't solve anything in abusive marriages.

You could do something by each stating your partner on your own private income tax return, but an astute abuser would soon spot that they were in a higher "household" tax band than expected, and therefore their partner must have an undisclosed-to-them source of income.

Well in that case the abused/ abusive partner wouldn't take the option of joining their incomes. Abused women would be no worse off than they are now, people not in abusive relationships and trying to support a family of four on a single income would have that acknowledged in their tax code.

As a pp said, recognition of women’s financial autonomy took a long, hard won battle. It’s unbelievable that people think it’s a desirable thing to go backwards.

But "household" income is already required to be disclosed when claiming certain benefits, so it's not really that much different if it was extended to tax. In fact, the £50k child benefit cliff edge tax already works on the higher earner in the household, so there's already a step towards the tax system needing to know the income of both partners.

I think sorting out the child benefit system would be a massive vote winner for whichever party does it. It's such a ridiculous way of doing things and it creates such massive unfairness.

Perhaps if you’d read the post properly you’d have seen that I did adjust for inflation, and in real terms the personal allowance is much higher than it was then :)

In terms of wage growth, the data’s out there if you google it. But broadly, inflation exceeded wage growth in the 3 years to 2013, wages growth exceeded inflation for the 8 years to 2021, and then fell behind in 2022, before overtaking it in 2023. So on average over the period I suspect the two have tracked reasonably closely.

https://www.statista.com/statistics/1272447/uk-wage-growth-vs-inflation/

They would be worse off in an emotional sense though (and maybe even physically if it’s a physically abusive relationship) as they’d have to try and justify to the abuser why they were not taking the option. Last time labour were in they tried paying tax credits through the tax system by giving extra allowance against tax rather than paying out as a benefit. The idea makes sense on paper as why tax someone and pay them benefits you may as well tax them less. I’m sure it worked fine in a loving family home but the fact it had to be changed after only a few years and the money paid as a benefit to the primary carer instead showed that many homes don’t work like that

Hats off to Mr Hunt. This is clearly a budget for those in work!
Good news re fuel duty but the idiots at the pumps raised fuel prices yesterday by 5p.