The Economist ran an article on this subject a few months ago
Who will speak for Henry?
The “High Earner, Not Rich Yet” is the most overlooked voter in British politics
Mar 26th 2025
This is an illustration depicting a businessman struggling to juggle multiple responsibilities. The man, dressed in a suit with a headset on, is holding a coffee cup while pushing a baby stroller. The baby inside the stroller is crying, and the man appears
Photograph: Nate Kitch
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It is hard to feel sorry for someone who boasts about their £460 ($600) Sony headphones. It is difficult to worry about the finances of a person who rests their head on a £1,700 Tempur Elite mattress. It is almost unnatural to feel sympathy for a 30-something who posts a picture of their bank account containing £100,180.79, with the caption: “Charlie Munger famously said, ‘The first 100k is a bitch.’ Well, suck it Charlie. I did it!”
The High Earner, Not Rich Yet (Henry) forum on Reddit, a website, from which these examples come is a safe space for those on six-figure salaries to boast about their wealth and moan about their lot. It is the natural home of an overtaxed and underappreciated Briton, whom politicians should ignore at their peril. Pity poor Henry. He has it harder than you think.
For starters, Henry’s tax affairs are painful. Overall, the tax take is close to its highest level since the second world war. Middle-earners have it good. Still-generous tax-free allowances of £12,750, recent cuts to employee national insurance and a basic rate of income tax at its lowest level in the modern era mean that the average earner is lightly taxed.
By contrast, Henry is hosed. At £100,000, the removal of the tax-free allowance creates a 60% marginal tax rate for those lucky enough to have a fat salary. When national insurance and student-loan repayment—which act like a tax—are included, a young high-flyer can face a 71% rate. It is not quite 1960s levels, when The Beatles moaned about “one for you, 19 for me”, but it is not far off.
Henry misses out on perks others enjoy. The Conservatives introduced lavish free child-care allowances, which are worth tens of thousands. Yet Henrys are excluded. When all this is put together, a Henry in London with two children under five is better off earning £99,999 than £149,000. Tax experts must often explain that tax rates ensure there are no gigantic losses when income crosses a certain threshold. In England, however, earning one pound over £100,000 can cost thousands.
No party is in a rush to fix this. Henry looms small in the political imagination. Fundamentally, Labour is not designed to care for the rich. Henry has been evicted from what should be the natural home of grasping yuppies: the Conservative Party. A typical Henry is a youngish, white-collar worker in London, sending emails that somehow generate economic value—the type of voter the Conservative Party now, bizarrely, holds in contempt.
Even the Liberal Democrats, who today dominate England’s prosperous south, are squeamish about pandering to Henry. They are silent on the tax treatment of Britain’s best-paid workers. Reform UK, the challenger to Labour and the Tories, offers little to Henry. At the last election, Reform UK did worst among households who earned £70,000 or more and best among those earning less than £30,000. It is not yet a party for people who spend £250 a year on the American Express card that gives more air miles.
Ignoring Henry comes with political risks. There are more Henrys than many politicians suppose. In total, about 1.8m people earn more than £100,000 a year. When the next election heaves into view, about 2.2m will, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies. For context, at the last election, about 2m Conservative voters shifted to Reform UK, which was enough to trigger talk of political revolution.
Since no one will look out for Henry, Henry has begun to look out for himself. TikTok is awash with financial advisers hawking tax-efficiency strategies to people on £100,000 plus. The topic of how to qualify for free child care is so common on the Reddit Henry forum that some users want it banned. It is a mistake to assume that people are automatically rational actors who will milk a system for all it is worth. They can however be trained. Homo economicus may not exist; Homo redditus does.
These lessons are already spreading. About 10,000 more people earned between £99,000 and £99,999 than you would expect in 2022, according to Arun Advani, director of the Centre for the Analysis of Taxation, as people ducked under the Henry threshold. Teaching a generation of rich workers about the joys of tax efficiency is hazardous when the tax base is so narrow. After all, Henrys account for about 5% of taxpayers but nearly half of all income-tax receipts.
Britain may be desperate for growth, yet it has devised a tax system that encourages Henry to take things easy. Why not try a four-day week? The direct financial hit is small; the perks—such as free child care worth tens of thousands of pounds—are large. But the consequences are ugly. The British Medical Association, which represents Dr Henry, the most sympathetic example of the species, argues tax kinks mean its members work less than they would. A lawyer clocking off early is no bother; a surgeon doing a four-day week means granny waits longer for a new hip.
Nor is this likely to be a short-term problem. What happens if Henry tires of his four-day week? Early retirement looms. Britons can stuff £60,000 tax-free into their pension each year to lower their taxable income and avoid swingeing rates. If rich Britons are forced to oversave in their 30s, they can crack open a bulging pension pot in their 50s. Come 2050, many of today’s Henrys will have put their feet up.
It’s an inequitable life, Henry
If politicians will not fight for Henry out of political interest or for the sake of the economy, perhaps they will take a look out of self-interest. Parliamentarians have enjoyed healthy wage growth in the past decade. Each will earn nearly £94,000 from April. By the end of the parliament, an mp will likely earn a smidge over £100,000. The House of Commons will become a House of Henrys. Maybe they will fix it then. ■